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The New Year was seen in at a beach barbecue organised by a fish restaurant some way South of Pattaya City. From here we were able to see all the various firework displays around the area as Thailand celebrated the coming of 2003, or 2546 in the local calendar.
 A few days later my personal possessions arrived from the U.K, and a major part of the month was spent unpacking and finding places to store the various items. This involved the purchase of several major items of furniture, e.g. bookcases, room dividers, display cabinets etc. To make space for these, some of the original furnishings that came with the condo had to be disposed of. The net result was to transform the layout of the condo from one huge open room to a split arrangement with the living room area on one side and the bedroom and computer/office area on the other.
The other major event in the Otter’s life this month was when he became a motor cyclist.
Having already purchased a car, and whilst still finding it an essential mode of transport for getting around when it was raining or to do shopping or to arrive looking respectable at various social functions, I found that for routine daytime trips, e.g. to the gym at the far side of town, a motor cycle was a more efficient and less frustrating way of getting through the Pattaya traffic which has now grown to resemble that of Bangkok at times.
Not however having ridden a Motor bike seriously before, and given the somewhat erratic driving here (to put it very mildly), this enterprise was undertaken with some trepidation and not without a few dire warnings from friends and colleagues.
However a small 100 cc Honda Motor Cycle was purchased and after spending the best part of a week, practising driving it round the condo grounds, I eventually ventured out onto the highway.
And nearly a year later I am happy to report that I am still unscathed (more or less) apart from falling off at zero speed once in the early days, and also a couple of leg burns from brushing past the very hot exhaust pipe when parking (something I have learnt the hard way to be very careful about).
 Still in need of some essential furniture items, e.g. a comfortable recliner chair, a trip was taken (by bus) to Bangkok in search of these. With the vastly improved road network between the two cities plus the Bangkok sky train system, the journey time each way was just over 2 hours, thus making the return trip easily done in a day - and the net result was a chair ordered to be delivered in a week or so.
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