We have a date

Sale is going ahead, so far so good.. of course some things can still go wrong, or get delayed, but its all pretty much moving forward. Got the draft contract and dates for different legal points.

If all goes to plan......................we will see..... if all goes to plan we transfer on the 19th Dec, so we can set flights for as soon after that as we can.

We're on our way.

Ahthankyew

Fingers Crossed

We have another interested buyer... we have agreed a price, its not quite what we were asking but close enough to let us fund things, so now we wait for them to move forward and sort out a notaris and arrange their finance.

But as we saw with the last one, things can change, they may decide somewhere else is more for them, or that the area isn't as nice as they thought or... a hundred different things.

I'm not going to get super super excited like I did last time as it was crushing when the 1st bidders pulled out, but this seems more solid. If we can finalise the legals, we will be on our way "home" to Thailand very soon.

fingers very very almost painfully crossed.

Ahthankyew

Another missed flight?

Well... nearly, so so near..

We got a flight from Chiang Mai CNX to BKK at 21.00 arriving 22.00 given our flight out of BKK was at 23.50 that gave us a comfortable 1h.50m to get ourselves out of the domestic terminal to  the international...

We took that flight rather than an afternoon flight as it was the only one that actually allowed us to take some luggage with us. We planned to bring our suitcases back,  albeit mostly empty since we have a house now we left a lot of what we brought there for our return. We were unable to fold our big canvas bag into the hard large suitcase, so we just put our carry on in the hard case

great planning

yes... great planning,  was proud of that.

yes...great

And I wasn't too worried that when we got to  CNX with time to spare, to discover it was 15 mins delayed... no problem.

That is until the delayed 15 mins, didn' t update and it was still not boarding... in fact it was over 30 mins delayed

hmm still ok though

But we didn't take off for a while...didn't record the time

But we got to BKK and our 1.50 margin had slipped to  40 mins....oh shit

And we had baggage to collect....which ddn't show up until 10-15 mins later....

I sense  you're getting the idea now... my nice buffer got eaten away, and BKK is a HUGE airport

We had to get to the International terminal, drop off our luggage and we had now less than 30 mins

We moved as quickly as we could to get the the terminal, and  mean the full, scuse me please, coming through, we're late, sorry sorry, please let us through type of moving as fast as we could and we made it to departures, only to find Gate F....bag/check-in, closed.

FFFFFFUUUUCKKKKK not again.

We were checked in on line, but we needed to drop the bag, Jirawan asked several bored looking attendants  on other desks, if there was anyone from the air line to help but nope, they all said to send the luggage back via an office somewhere the other end of the lounge (when I say lounge I mean 1km square of desks) ...we did find it eventually but Jirawan was unable to get hold of her cousin to ask him to take care of this (he works in the airport).

tick tock....

So we were screwed, but Jirawan had a brilliant idea.. The big case only really contained our carry on bag which had a toilet bag and some change of clothes in it... take out the carry on case, and dump the suitcare...

So we did, we left the case in the airport and run like mad to get to the other side of Bangkok to get to the S120 gate that our flight left from.,...10 mins left.... queues, security, passport and other obsticles in our way... face scan entrance on doors didn't work...had to go to scan passport doors, etc.. oh of course security had another queue, and some of Jirawans creams and tubes caught security attendion for an extra delay... arrhhh

Scanning passport system however was really quick, so we got to run as fast as we could to....a shuttle train....oh gawd... 5 mins

The train can't be rushed, but it got there.... time was up... we were in negative time mode, we could only hope there was a delay...we had little to no chance of catching it, but we still ran as fast as we could carrying the small case, laptop bag and purses as fast as we could, at the top of the S gate escalator we saw 2 staff members holding Austrian Airlines Vienna last call cards...oh thank fuck.. yes yes, us... we're here we were delayed... after checking our boarding passes on our phones, they radioed the gate and took my arm to head there,  then she said those horrible words, can you run?

No... no, I am totally spent now.. but l will go as fast as I can.. Jirawan took the lead and ran with her while I tried to catch a 2nd , no 4th wind.... and jogged on as best I good, we stll had 400-500m to get to the gate... I did manage to increase speed from 2km/h go 2.5 and we almost all 3 of us go there together to face the 4 staff on the gate waving us to hurry......ermm we're doing our best

Passports please, and residence card.... oh shit my card is in wallet in the bottom of my laptop bag.... Jirawan had hers, I said please, my passport is UK so its ok, (it usually is) do you really need mine... yes yes we.....oh no just go...

phew...  go go go quick, through the gate, down the stars, up the ramp, and finally into the air craft where the stewards were clearly waiting to close the door...

WE MADE IT... 

We actually made it... I can't believe it, we got on, sweating like piglets, red face, heavy breathing, immnent heart failure and sat down...oh my ....we made it.

The flight was not the most comfortable though, but we made it to Vienna, where there was far less hassle getting onto the connecting flight to Amsterdam, but it was also delayed about an hour... due to weather
Get to Amsterdam, and...the trains were all delayed...

But we go the train.... we got to Breda, we got home.

What... a nightmare... the time in CM was amazing, the journeys there and back however... unreal.

Now we wait to see what possible refunds/compensation we can get back for the 1st flight.

One thing though that is so abundantly clear, is how little help there is for passengers who turn up late due to curcumstances they have no control over... twice that trip we arrived at an airport check-in late, through no fault of our own and there's no help available at all... its terrifying.  While I was totally overwhelmed with fuccckkkkkk it thoughts Jirawan's brilliant idea gave us a fighting chance to catch the plane... even if it cost us a nice suitcase and a potential heart attack.

I hope that will be the last time we ever had to go through  this, and the lesson is allow for at least 4 hours delays and get to the air port as early as possible....mad.

Ahthankyew

He shoots, he...

misses....

Dammit our buyer pulled out, for 3 days we had all the boxes ticked and started planning the dates and travel plans...

Lucky I choose not to count my chickens before they hatched, cos the buyer had cold feet and then withdrew....damn. 3 days... I thought they'd done their costings...but no apparently they felt the renovations would be too much..

Not totally unknown to happen here but deeply annoying non the less..

So we wait for the next one and we make extra sure that we have signatures in place before we spend a fortune on plane and shipping costs.

But aside from that annoyance, our last 3 weeks here in Chiang Mai has been fun and informative and of course rewarding. We have a home, a car, TV's, internet, phone numbers and a TM.30 which is needed to help register myself when I open up a bank account... something that is a tad tricky to do while in Thailand, but pretty easy when we apply for it in NL... but dates... dates are important and we're back to unknown.

Also I doubt strongly we will get anything back for our missed flights.... but I guess its just something we have to swallow. We had enough savings to cover it, but losing nearly 4K in rebooks is hard to take.

But, positive thoughts, we'll get another buyer soon, even if the current political climate in NL is making people nearvous, we still have a highly desirable propery to sell at a good price.. so it should be too long.

Ahthankyew

In a transition

We have the house, and though we're still checked in with the Hotel, we have been staying mostly at the house to set things up, buy equipment/furniture etc, and get internet and other things sorted.

Its also been a busy house with Jirawans daughter Gift and the grand kids staying a few nights. Geo, our 1 year old grandson, is cute, but very much at the exploring and destroying stage... the house isn't really baby proofed, so we need to get a few things like a baby stair gate to makes sure he's safe walking around the place. Venus, the 11yo pre teen.. is.. a typical pre teen, seem happier in her room and on her phone :D

oh well... 

Gift will be dropping in and out of the place while we are in NL, so the house isn't left empty, attracting Geckos (found one in the loo as I stood up to flush... poor thing had no chance)

Its immediatly a different kind of experience, not quite feeling like home yet, but much more a place to be.. we are putting our things in, buying stuff, and emptying our suitcase and car boot onto the shelves.

Its a far biggert house than we have in NL, but there is much less storage so we need to be a bit more minimalist in our content.

Internet is proving a bit tricky though, my "unlimited" phone internet, was great for 2 weeks, but now has clearly been throttled down to a snails pace, makes doing some basic documentation and contact with work harder than I wanted it to be.. But we get all new internet today and a new permanent Thai mobile phone number so thats a problem quickly resolved.

Working on my laptop has proved a bit cumbersome, especially as the nice little Lenovo monitor I bought last year to help me do some work seems to enjoy blanking out at ran...like that, random times... 

Not sure quite what that is, but not to worry as all these things will be replaced.

Today we wait in for the internet guys to do their stuff, then we can get our mighty new 65" Thailand made 4K TV working at its fullest.. it was sad watching a netflix movie last night in chunky resolution and buffering.

But TV wise, Im going to be totally fine with the options we have here.. Netflix, HBO and Amazon are all working. No SkyHD or Disney+ at the moment but am sure something will come though. And lots of old TV stream systems on most TV's. 

We were debating going for Phillips 65 inch, but got talked into this Thai brand by the salesman,for 5K bhat cheaper. yes I think it is a better TV... but we also bought a 32" bedroom TV, a Phillips which honestly has much better software interface... we have to buy 2 more TVs for the study and 2nd guest room, and I think I will buy Phillips ones... oh yes.. did I mention TV's are cheap as chips here... but I think generally they are cheap everywhere now,...but here... cheap as chips. 

I don't really watch a lot of TV these days though so am not overly worried. A few key programs I like and the news, and the odd Friday night film, but these are available.I will miss The Chase though, thats the pivot around our day in NL... sob..

I'm going to try and do a bit of work today, once the internet is in, to get a sense of how my working life will be here... I mean its all going to be hobby based now, no working when retired,  but I think its important to keep your mind busy with things you like, and doing coding is still my favoute hobby. I will also try to do a bit of model building once things are settled.

Ahh all these plans, but annoying that I have to put them on hold again at the weekend, as we head back for a few months until the house is sold.. Speaking of which, our 1st viewer cancelled... and the seconnd one is on the 27th.. but nothing more... hope thats not a bad sign.. The interest levels on Funda peaked last week and we're not adding any more favourited views... gulp. Nahh am sure its all fine.. maybe we did set the price a bit too high, given we missed the peak season.... we will see. Its not the end of world if we canb't jump till Feb, but April or later could be a pain.

edit... a few hours after posting this I checked my mail... we have a bid on the house... slightly over what we asked... we will see if there are any more when we get home then decide......overjoyed

edit edit, my bad, Venus is 14, so like an 11 year old but 20 times worse (actually she's not too bad, yet, but you can almost hear the internal sigh when she's told to put her phone away while at the table)

Ahthankyew

We got a mop

And towels and bedding and plates and things....

Althoough the place is furnished and has most of the basics we need, its still nice to go to a home store and sift through the bargain bins for all the basic home stuff we all take for granted.

We paid our booking fees and secured the house today, we have to put down a deposit in a few days but we move in on the 18th :D yes it will be empty for a few months, as we go back on the 26th, with only our mop and towels showing any signs of habitation but when we come back in a few months it will be home.

Quite a feeling, we are very excited.

A whole new life about to start.

Ahthankyew

AND, we have a house

The owner of the house we wanted, has accepted our offer, so subject to some pesky payment details, we have a home in Thailand, for the next year, maybe more...we'll see, but once here and settled we will have the funds to actively look for somewhere to buy, that we hope will be even better.

yipee... 

So cool, this gives us a foothold and a chance to establish our place in Thailand while still finishing things up in NL. We can now ship our 3cubic metres of personal possesions and also get our bank accounts and other details done a bit easier... not totally easy, but easier.. there's currently a bit of a clamp down in Thailand for non thai account holders, but the address helps.

The house is nice, and big, and clean and tidy, with a nice little terrace to sit and eat meals and  a good sized study/office for me to escape from the inevitable invasions of Thai ladies who eat and talk...its Jirawans idea of heaven.. and I want her to enjoy it, but I will need a little man cave refuge and it has that.

Excited

Ahthankyew