Hello all. Firstly I must apologise if my the foul mood I find myself in today comes across in this postcard! Have just cycled 10k (and therefore will have to cycle another 10k to get back) to Thong Sala where I was told that a parcel was waiting for me at the post office. Oh goody I thought and began to get excited, thinking another shipment of Marmite must have come in! WRONG! After searching for 20 minutes through parcels for random other people, the post man told me that there had been a mistake and that they had actually sent 2 tickets for the parcel that I picked up last week and that there wasn't in fact a new parcel at all. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!! Anyway - rant over now! Secondly I must thank all of you for your kind messages/emails about the speedboat tragedy. We are all safe and well but have seen the most shocking pictures on the news. It seems the Thais don't have any kind of censorship on TV so we have seen the most awful things. I won't go into them now - but you can imagine. Life here has been quiet since the Full Moon party. Haad Rin was almost deserted on Weds when we went down - apart from thousands of aussies celebrating Australia Day! We had such fun - in fact I am still finding flourescent paint on me! Chalok Lam, by contrast, seems to be getting busier. I think a lot of people came to Koh Phangan for the Full Moon party, stayed in Haad Rin and now fancy a bit of a chill out after too much partying. A few weeks ago we could walk down the street and not see another Westener - now the Germans are everywhere! School is still going ok - the little ones keep me going. There is one class that I teach that I really don't like. There's 30 of them and they are all 11/12. I think it must be all the hormones or something but they make me feel really uncomfortable. Thank goodness I only have them twice a week. We've been teaching the little ones "How are you?" this week and it's soooo satisfying when you ask and they say (in their very cute little Thai voices!) "happy"!! Fridays are always a bit of a doss day at school (much like being at work really?!?!) so we always play lots of games. Had a rather surreal moment this morning whilst standing in the middle of a circle of kids singing "Old McDonald has an elephant"!! Weird or what!?!? Oh yeah - and a dog nearly died in our classroom today! It's been lurking around for a couple of weeks practically asking to be shot! It's sooooo manky - it stinks to high heaven and when it comes near the kids they all hold their noses and start chasing it out of the classroom with a broomstick! It just lay down in a corner today and we thought it was the end but no, it stank the room out for the entire lesson and then got up and went on it's way! The school lunches seem to be on the up - thank goodness! We had egg fried rice today, instead of the usual fatty lumps of "meat" floating in grease! Am starting to get a bit fed up of food - never thought I would say that but it's true! It's weird going out every day for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It's cheaper to buy something in a restaurant than to buy food and take it home. Stuff never lasts long anyway - it either gets infested with ants (no matter how well you seal it up) or it just melts and goes squishy! Mum sent me a parcel with some home comforts, Marmite, bakewell tarts, Benylin etc so that has been keeping me going - along with tuna and ritz crackers! Sometimes all I want is a salad though! We are off to Haad Rin tonight (a bit of a Friday night tradition!) so I guess I should love you and leave you now as I have to cycle the 10k home. The thighs of steel are coming along nicely - still a little way to go though! Hope you all have a great weekend - keep the messages coming! Lots of love Vicky xxxx