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Category: Living abroad

Lovely creature: the downside of sending your child to a Buddhist school

Lovely creature: the downside of sending your child to a Buddhist school

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While living in Chiang Mai, Thailand, we’ve been sending our son to a Thai school. Like many schools in Thailand, this one works on Buddhist values with the children. Our son’s been learning mindfulness and love of creatures. This love of animals is something we try to do at home as well. A lifelong arachnophobe, I’ve had to get over my initial reaction to spiders (“KILL THEM, KILL THEM. AND IF YOU CAN’T KILL THEM BURN THE HOUSE TO THE…

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Snake in the garden!

Snake in the garden!

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I’ve been in Thailand for nearly 6 months now, and am starting to feel very comfortable here. However, the feeling of being very far from home never quite goes away. Sometimes it’s distant, other times it hits me without notice. Coming back from Vietnam and finding a 2m long snake in our garden was one of those times. Karl was out of the house and the kids were asleep, so I was alone. I saw a cat coming into our…

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Hidden Village Chiang Mai
Hidden Village Dinosaur Park, Chiang Mai

Hidden Village Dinosaur Park, Chiang Mai

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We found out from our Thai nanny about the new Hidden Village dinosaur park in Chiang Mai. With a 3 year old boy there was really no question of whether or not we’d go. There’s a pretty spacious car park in front, with cows grazing in the field opposite. After a few minutes of convincing Jack that the park would also be as fun as watching the cows, we entered. Admission fee for Hidden Village was 200 baht per adult…

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Hiking to the Khun Korn waterfall, Chiang Mai, with 2 small children
Khun Korn waterfall, Chiang Rai, with kids

Khun Korn waterfall, Chiang Rai, with kids

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Khun Korn waterfall is known as one of the most beautiful waterfalls in Chiang Rai. It’s a 1.5km moderately challenging hike through the forest to get to it. We weren’t sure about whether to attempt the hike with our 2 small kids (11 months and 2 years 9 months). With very little information online about doing this walk with children, we decided just to go for it. The hike took around 40 minutes up to the waterfall and around 30…

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Markets in Tachileik
Doing a ‘visa run’ from Thailand to Myanmar (Burma) with kids

Doing a ‘visa run’ from Thailand to Myanmar (Burma) with kids

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Last weekend we did our first ‘visa run’ to Myanmar. We’re on a 6 month, multi-entry visitor visa to Thailand. When entering Thailand on this visa you get a stamp with leave to remain in Thailand for 60 days. We had the option to pay 1900 baht (£44/$58USD) at immigration for a 30 day extension. However with 4 of us it would get pretty expensive. You have to pay every cost (visas, visa extensions etc) per passport, meaning that our 11…

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Thai triple bladed scissors
Thailand – the weird, the wonderful and the unexpected

Thailand – the weird, the wonderful and the unexpected

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We’ve been in Chiang Mai for nearly 3 weeks now. We’ve rented a house and a car, hired a nanny and figured out where to buy the basics. It feels like we’re in a strange phase between complete newbie and cool, collected resident. We thought we’d share our musings on weird and wonderful Chiang Mai before it all feels like the norm. 1. Strange utensils Thai’s seem to love their gadgets and utensils. There seem to be whole aisles devoted…

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Living abroad has it's benefits - one being the ability to get fresh coconuts which you can cut open and drink the water from
Our first week living in Thailand

Our first week living in Thailand

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We’ve now been in Thailand for around 10 days and what a whirlwind it’s been! It’s tough enough for the adults, but living abroad will always pose challenges for children too. Here’s how my boys have coped with the move and what we’ve done to help them. Flying with children We did a 12 hour flight to Bangkok, leaving at 12.30. We generally find flying with children to be completely fine (it’s mostly a case of entertaining them and helping…

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Living abroad with kids - having fun with the figurines at MAYA shopping mall
Living in Thailand with small children – initial thoughts

Living in Thailand with small children – initial thoughts

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Initially we booked an airbnb for 10 days near the MAYA shopping mall (pronounced may-ah) and Chiang Mai old town. We used this time to find a house.  If you’re planning to visit Chiang Mai, I’d definitely recommend this area – it’s loads of fun. The shopping centre itself is great. My favourite shop is ‘Moshi Moshi’. Full of quirky, fun, well designed housewares at Thai prices – you can’t really go wrong.  You can get your bubble tea or…

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Where to stay in Chiang Mai - searching for our dream house
Searching for our dream house in Chiang Mai

Searching for our dream house in Chiang Mai

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When figuring out where to stay in Chiang Mai we decided not to live near the centre after our experiences over the past week (see Being a pedestrian in Chiang Mai sucks). The centre of Chiang Mai is really fun and cool, but I’m not sure it’s right for parents with small kids – it certainly wasn’t for us. We wanted somewhere where we could walk around outside (preferably on good pavements), with decent air quality and generally a nice area…

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Making red bean baby ‘porridge’ in Thailand

Making red bean baby ‘porridge’ in Thailand

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Karl came back from the Western store yesterday with the closest thing he could find to baby porridge – multigrain porridge with red bean. Here goes! Step 1: Add strange ‘porridge’ balls Step 2: Sprinkle with seaweed Step 3: Add hot water Step 4: Wait a few minutes And the verdict? Jack (2 1/2) – Spat it out instantly Cade (9 months) – Ate most of the bowl! Success! Related articles Does organic have to cost the earth? How to…

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