• Transport. Most of the time, for our nearly-daily trips to Robinson's (which is like Metro or BHG or Isetan, with a Tops supermarket -like NTUC FairPrice- and a Tops food court downstairs), my dad drove this really cool car 'rented' from the Embassy.
• When my dad wasn't around, at work, my mum and I walked out (a typical walk to Robinson's, or the nearby BTS stations Asok and Nana),
• took a taxi (strange thing: only 1 taxi out of all the taxis we took actually had safety belts that worked), or
• a tuk-tuk (however you spell it- we took them twice, and by coincidence, it was the same guy that drove us! problem with tuk-tuks: they don't go by meter, unlike some taxis; all of them don't have safety belts; and some of them go really fast, which is bad for some people but I love it. wait. that's not a problem. kay, whatever).
• also, we took the BTS and MRT. I'm bolding these terms cos they're important! And different, which you've got to understand if you're from Singapore (well, duh) and only know the MRT here. In Bangkok, the MRTs are underground and the BTSs are the above-ground ones. The two lines meet at Asok station (I think). They have interchanges at places like Siam too. The system runs a lot like Singapore's, and you shouldn't get lost easily. At some stations there are little booths where you can get maps. This helps a lot.
• river taxi. actually, it's more of a river bus in a boat, along the river klong (that's how you pronounce it but I don't think that's how you spell it. x___x). it's really crowded and some people have to stand, but it doesn't speed or anything so you won't get splashed a lot. there's a station just down the road from my house- station meaning a little sheltered platform where you wait for your 'bus'. They go in two different directions, and the one I took heads for Pratunam, a shopping centre. There you see lots of other 'buses' all docked, and the bus you're taking will most likely slow down along that area, because if it goes fast, all the boats will rock and splash water on everyone. or at least, that's what my father told me.

• Residence. Well if you do some research you should find out basically what district I stay in, if I'm near Asok and Nana BTS stations. But anyway we live in a condominium, on a high storey and the setting is really great.
• We look out to an international school and some other houses, and not far off, just down the road, is the river taxi stand thing, which I've already mentioned. The main entrance is into a car park, and the thing about it is every resident has his/her own allotted lot, so there's no squabbling about where to park, you just go to your lot and, well, park. ours is like all the way down below, in the corner. unit numbers are printed on the lot.
• There's a little lift lobby. You access it by climbing up these steps (MIND YOUR HEAD- the ceiling can be a little low for super-tall people above 1.8m probably, but if you're below 1.8m tall you just bend your head or you don't have to worry at all) into the lift lobby.
• In the lift lobby, there's always a receptionist (the two I've seen, at different times, are both females) who is really nice. Most of the time she'll press the lift for us the moment she sees us entering. Sometimes, if the lift's already on the 1st floor, she'll press our level button for us too, but most of the time the lift's up fetching some other people. A few guys -I don't know if they're from maintenance, but I know one of them's from security- hang around sometimes. They all smile a lot, and are very friendly.
• I have my own room! And there's this huge balcony off the dining room, where I saw a dead worm thingy curled up on the mat. But other than that curled-up worm, the balcony's great.

• Schooling. I went to see 3 schools -not 4 as originally planned, because we decided against the last one, KIS. I'll list them by day of visit, and time.
• Monday, in the morning. We went to visit NIST, which is the New International School of Thailand, meeting this really smiley security guard who let us in and led us to the office. There we did a bit more walking further into the school to meet Miss Tracy, who told us all about the level system and everything (this is where my mum got confused and put my birth date as 9 OCTOBER 1991 and Miss Tracy was like, She's born in 1991? She looks a little young for that) and right at the end, Miss Tracy found out we were supposed to talk to another person, Miss Pia, before talking to her. But since Miss Pia was busy we went on a school tour first, before seeing Miss Pia to talk about the curriculum. Arranged another meeting for the next day, to talk about the curriculum further, as well as an assessment test-thingy for Wednesday to see which grade I'd be in.

I need to go now for breakfast -10.07 am!- but I'll come back later and resume.

More to go: Bangkok Patana School, International School of Bangkok, and learning some Thai...

♥ much love,

-grace<3