Keeping Up With The Culveys - 2019

So we left you at the New Year’s firework celebration…

Getting home from the middle of Bangkok on New Year’s Eve felt like it might be a disaster! So we stayed in a hotel in the centre. This meant after the fireworks finished, we could just stroll to the BTS, go two stops and we were at our home for the night! It worked perfectly, we even met Deadpool on the train!! 

New Years Day started with breakfast at Dean & Deluca, always nice, and we all indulged in something lovely! India looked particularly pleased with her enormous pile of pancakes covered in jam and cream!!

January is residential month for the big kids, and Indi headed off on the overnight train to Chiang Mai, while Kai headed to Kanchanaburi. A week of adventure for them both! Indi enjoyed some local farming, as well as canoeing, bike riding etc. before flying back to Bangkok at the end of the week. For Kai, they visited the elephant sanctuary, The bridge over the river Kwai, Hellfire Pass, plus plenty of trekking through the wilderness! They both had the time of their lives!

Just before Kai left, we had a new experience to enjoy, a Thai Wedding! My Assistant Khun Jammy was getting married so we got all dressed up and joined a very big crowd of people to watch the ceremony and celebrate their special day. As it was our first, we were a little confused about the way it all worked, but we followed the crowd and made it through. It was certainly a very glamorous occasion! As part of the reception, it is traditional for the Brides Boss to give a short speech, so not really knowing what I was doing, I headed up on stage and I gave a little speech about how happy we were to be invited and how much I appreciated the work that she did for me. It seemed to work, I got a round of applause and I was off the stage as quickly as possible! The evening was fun, with a few of the team from work, many parts of the wedding had similarities to an English wedding, but always with a bit of a twist!

Shortly after the kids got home, Lyra headed off for her residential trip in Bang Pla Kot… a silent retreat in an Ashram about an hour out of Bangkok. Quite an experience for sure, and plenty of opportunity to step way outside of her comfort zone. When she returned, she was mentally refreshed, although physically tired as it was as basic accommodation as you can imagine!

And then it was February, and Indi’s birthday! Just before though was Chinese New Year, very early this year, but I had the day off so Mrs C and I headed out for lunch at the Marriott. Still, back to Indi’s birthday… not sure how, but she was 15 already!! It was a school day, so it was still an early start (Indi’s favourite!), but after school we had plenty of time for presents, and cake!! At the weekend we headed out to see the Chinese New Year decorations and go to the movies. It was ‘How to train your dragon 3’, the last of the trilogy that Indi has loved so much over the years, so it was a bitter sweet moment. She was excited to see it, but sad as she knew it was coming to an end… The movie was great, but we did have some tears… We followed up with some dinner at Jones The Grocer, Indi was reluctant after the roller coaster of the movie, but she composed herself and we had a lovely dinner.

We have always loved to play games as a family, and Logan was getting more and more able to hold his own. We introduced him to Monopoly, and we created a monster!! He wants to play it everyday!! And seeing as it is a minimum 4 hours a go, we seem to spend a lot of time explaining why it’s not practical!!

Of course, it wasn’t long before it was visitor time!! First up, a bit of a surprise, Mr Glickman was in town, we hadn’t seen Paul for about 15 or more years! Paul and Terri were in Korea at the same time as us so it was great to catch up with him and get up to speed on a lot of news!!

Shortly after we met Paul, we were joined by Jane and Devon! Devon was starting a trip to see some of South East Asia, so Jane took the opportunity to come and see us too. It was so lovely to welcome them to Bangkok. We spent a week giving them both a taste of our latest city. We had a day at the floating market, a bit of a sweaty day, and some amusing experiences with the ‘facilities’!! But great day on the canals and Jane did a sterling job negotiating her purchases!! We managed to get them both to a few of  our favourite temples, and a few of our favourite restaurants!! Then Jane headed home, and Devon headed up north to see some more of Thailand.

For us, early March saw us head off to Kanchanaburi to stay at the elephant Sanctuary. Khun Wan, and Kai’s best mate Ollie came along too. This is a conservation place for elephants and visitors are there to help look after the elephants, not to ride them or simply look at them, so we started by feeding them sugar cane, we then headed off to meet some of the younger, cheekier members which was hilarious!! Next we helped prepare the food which involved mixing up a bunch of ingredients into these cannonball sized balls that we then handed directly to them and watched them swallow them pretty much whole!!

Later in the afternoon we had some time to hang out by the river and have a swim. The river was lovely, and they had this great raised deck that we could jump off, we had a blast pushing each other off the high deck, even Logan happily jumped from the top which was about 3m up!! It was a lovely way to end the day. We had a great dinner that evening and relaxed at our wooden villa’s. Our expectations of a night at the sanctuary were pretty low, but the villa’s were great, raised up to be able to see the river, fully air conditioned, and a comfortable night was had by all!

The following day, we were up pretty early and enjoyed breakfast watching the elephants have their morning stroll. Then it was time to spend some time with all the elephants (including the cheeky youngsters) out in the open. This was hilarious, especially the little ones as they just wanted to play. Our finale was to head up river, and then don life jackets round our waists and float down stream back to the sanctuary. As with most rivers in Thailand, they are big and quite fast flowing so it was an exciting half hour!! Once back at the sanctuary, the elephants joined us in the river to give them a good wash. Armed with big brushes we gave them a scrub, and did our best to avoid the enormous poo’s that floated by!It was a truly wonderful experience that I don’t think any of us will forget!. The whole experience at Elephant World had touched us all, the elephants were simply incredible to be up close and personal with, and the staff that run the place were inspirational, their love for the elephants shone through and their commitment to their well being was wonderful to see. We would be back!

It was my birthday the day we got home, so we had a quiet celebration of my oldness at home!!

Logan continued to love his time at school, he has a great group of friends and is doing so well, he loves Taekwondo, they have been growing plants in the garden, and working hard on their end of term performance as sea creatures! Logan was a lobster and looked fantastic in the outfit!

Kai was also doing well, and he entered into the World Scholars program, at the local rounds in Bangkok he did amazing, coming home with seven medals!! He was all set and excited go to the overseas round which looked like it would be in Beijing, but sadly due to a number of complications the trip didn’t materialise, never mind, his chance will come a gain.

March of course also brings Mothers Day! A chance for the kids to show how much they appreciate all their Mum does for them. This means I have to chase and push them to do anything!! Thankfully though between them they managed to pull off breakfast in bed and some home made cards, plus some treats! I would like to say that they then made sure Mum didn’t have to lift a finger all day, but sadly that would be overstating it rather!!

As the end of term arrived, they all got the change to go to school dressed for Songkran (Thai New Year and water festival). This means colourful shorts and water pistols all round for a big school wide water fight! As you would imagine, the boys loved it, Indi was nowhere to be seen!

April is always a big month with two birthdays, and this year a mega visit from Abi, Kiera, and Cam as well!!! We got them straight into the action with our weekly Yoga class! As you can imagine, it was not very zen, but lots of fun! Then it was a day in the garden enjoying the weather and the pool!! 

The next day was Kai’s big day, he was a teenager!!! Yep he reached the grand old age of 13 and celebrated in style!! The day started off pretty relaxed at home with some lovely gifts and breakfast! Then it was time to hit the Flow House for a surfing party!! Of course Indi, Logan, Abi, Kiera and Cam were there, along with school buds, Ollie, and Cass. There were some epic battles on the surf, and some major wipeouts!! Everyone had blast for about 2 hours then it was time to eat and cut the cake!! Then, as soon as they finished eating, they hit the surf once again!! That evening, everyone was tired but happy, and we laughed the night away with more cake and a few rounds of Guesstures!!

After a day to recover, the mob (minus me, as I had to go to work!) headed off up to Kanchanaburi for a few days. They took in the river Kwai, walked Hellfire Pass, then joined the elephants for a couple of days at Elephant World! I won’t describe the whole thing again, but rest assured it was a big hit, and they all fully immersed themselves into all the action! This time they even had to head into the fields and harvest some sugar cane for the feed. Once again it was a wonderful experience with these amazing animals.

The following weekend, we took off to the floating market, Abi was just as good a shopper as Jane before her, so the vendors were very happy with our visit! We took a couple of private boats and got the complete tour, and even visited a local temple. 

And then it was Songkran…. Floral shirts and water guns at the ready, we headed out into Bangkok to join the madness! Initially we headed to Lumphini Park but that was all a bit quiet, so we jumped back into the car and went to Central World (one of Bangkok’s biggest Malls). This is where the madness started! Firstly it was like a concert, there were thousands of people there all blasting each other with water, there was a pumping rave going on with DJ’s, but all in all it was the biggest water fight you had ever seen!! The kids were loving it!! Well all accept Indi who was having none of it, she headed into the safety of the mall to chill out while we got into the thick of it all! It was a wet and wild experience that none of us will forget in a hurry!!

After all of that madness, we had a day together with a little more serenity… still loud, as there are five kids involved, but compared to the water fight, it was serene! We arranged to stay at the Marriott Vacation Club in Bangkok called Empire Place which is in Sathorn. Just a few buildings along from Empire Place is the tallest and funkiest building in Bangkok called the Maha Nakhon (or the Minecraft Building in the Culvey household). At the top of the Maha Nakhon is a glass viewing deck, so we went to check it out! Wow, what a view from the top, and stepping onto the glass platform was a scary and surreal experience. The kids of course loved it, and did all sorts of poses including Superman!! It was amazing. Once back on the ground it was time for refreshments, and then we took Abi & Co. to one of Bangkok’s famous night Markets, in Patpong. It was a hot and steamy evening, and we all had a good adventure looking through all the stalls of fake items etc. We all bought some great paintings of Marvel heroes and their famous quotes. As we progressed along through the market we stumbled across some of Bangkok’s less salubrious establishments!! The boys had noticed a few of the bars had lady’s dancing on the bar with not a lot on and were all a bit embarrassed and giggly!! Hilarious!! Anyway, by the time we got through and out the other end of the market, everyone was too hot and wanted to get back to the hotel, so we flagged down a couple of Tuk Tuk’s and raced back to the hotel!! Everyone thought it was brilliant fun (except Indi!!) but we all made it back in one piece! Once back everyone cleaned up in the shower, put on bathrobes and settled down to a movie and of course snacks!!

Time with Abi & Co was running out fast, it had been an amazing trip, and a lot of laughs! To celebrate we headed to the Octave roof bar for an evening of dinner, drinks, and views!! A great opportunity to pose for photos and reflect on a fun packed holiday. We ended how we started, with a day of fun in the pool together and dinner at the clubhouse, but then it was time to say goodbye as Abi, Kiera, and Cam took our fun bus back to the airport and headed home. 

April was not done though… oh no, we still had Mrs C’s birthday to celebrate!! I took the day off and Lyra and I went for a massage and then lunch at the Goji Kitchen. Then the kids met us there and we headed home together for pressies and cakes!! Yes, she had three birthday cakes (they were little ones!). Then the following day, as an extra special treat, we all took Lyra to the movies to watch the latest Avengers movie!! (Second year running!!). 

Then, to finally finish April, Ed Sheeran came to town for a special concert for Lyra (and about 20,000 others)!! It was at the open air national stadium and our seats were very high up in the stadium. This was great as we had an excellent view, the sound was great, and we got a breeze, which was heavenly seeing as it was a hot steamy night as usual! Vikki and Ollie came along too and we had a great time singing our hearts out with the Ginger one!! Logan was loving the experience, but it was all a bit late and towards the end he fell asleep. No problem, other than we were about 60 rows up in the air and I now had to carry this heavy sleeping lump down all of these extremely steep steps without falling!! Well I made it, but it certainly worked up a serious sweat!! And as with all major concerts, the next stage of fun is getting to your ride home! Thankfully Khun Ae managed to skilfully get as close as possible so I was able to put Logan down and collapse in the comfort of our air con’d bus!

As April turned to May, Logan had a sports day where he enthusiastically threw himself into all the games and races. He always has such fun, didn’t get a medal for finishing in the top3 for anything but he should get a medal for being a great team player and putting in the effort!!

We also saw Devon again, this time with his brother Hamish. They had met up in Vietnam and travelled together for a while and then returned to Thailand for their final leg. They spent a few days with us before heading home to the UK and made Logan’s week!!

Our Brighton College hosted the Headmaster of Brighton College in the UK. As part of a reception for him, a number of students were selected to perform for him at a local hotel. Indi was selected and played the piano for him. Lyra had the pleasure of being there too.

One thing about being in Asia is that Liverpool are always playing at night which means we don’t get to watch many games. However, when it is the Champions League final, it doesn’t matter what time of day or night it is, we’re watching it! So in early June, Kai, Logan, and I dragged ourselves out of bed at 02:00 in the morning to watch Liverpool beat Spurs 2-0 to lift the trophy! It was brilliant to watch it with the boys, when Liverpool scored the second we shouted so loud that we woke Lyra! So she got to see them lift the trophy too!! 

Logan became the proud owner of the Brighton Ted when he was given star of the week! We also celebrated Fathers day with  lovely home made cards and my favourite non chocalatey treats (Namely green tea dipped sun dried bananas)!

As we closed in on the end of another year of school it was time for Indi’s formal. As the senior school is still small, there are not that many kids so parents were allowed to be there too (if the kids don’t mind!). However, earlier that day, just before she went to get her hair done for the evening, Lyra went to the Doctors because she was having some stomach pains. Not expecting anything serious she was a bit blindsided when the Doctor informed her that she had an inflamed appendix and she needed to have surgery immediately! Thankfully it all went well and she was soon in recovery. For all of us though, it was a worrying time. To see Lyra suffering like that was not something we wanted to see.

All this meant that Lyra wasn’t available to escort Indi to her formal, so she had to put up with her old Dad on his own!! I think I did ok, I took some photos, and stayed out of the way so not to embarrass her… 

Lyra came home and we started to get back to normal, although Lyra had to be careful. We were invited into Logan’s class to watch a presentation they had prepared where they all had some lines to say in front of the audience. They were all a bit nervous, once Logan got to his turn he confidently stood up at the front and said his lines with no notes and did a brilliant job! So proud!! Next day the school had a concert, Indi and Kai were appearing as part of the chamber choir, as always they were wonderful.

Lyra’s recovery was progressing ok, so we agreed it was ok for me to travel. So I headed to Korea, for my first trip since we left in 2003, needless to say, I was excited! Landing in Incheon, I made my way to Seoul to meet up with my colleagues. We had a great meal out and then hit the sack to be ready for a busy day to come. The next day. I visited our warehouses , then headed to the office. On our way to the office, Lyra called. She was back at the hospital and suffering from acute stomach pains, she didn’t know why at that point but she was in extraordinary pain. I needed to get home quickly. Thankfully my assistant managed to change my flight so I headed straight to the airport, but it was the longest flight home not knowing what was happening with Lyra was simply horrific. As soon as I landed I called Lyra and I was so relieved to hear her groggy voice. She had been in surgery again and had had a piece of her small intestine removed as she was suffering from a strangulated hernia! It was poisoning her from the inside, and if she hadn’t had it cut out it could have been fatal. Too scary for words…

Thankfully within a few days Lyra was allowed home, she needed to be careful as there was some serious healing to be done internally, but at least at home life could feel like it was heading back towards normal.

The final week at school of the year is always a busy one. With end of year presentations and lots of fun a games for everyone. For Logan he had to say goodbye to Lylia as she was moving away from Thailand in the summer with her family. It was a real shame as Logan and her always had a lot of fun together! Such is the life of an expat.

Summer holidays of course means travel! And of course we had plenty of plans. Before all of that though the kids had a couple of weeks to relax. Kai had two of his best friends over for the weekend, Ollie and Cass. They even joined in our Sunday morning Yoga, yet again, the zen feeling was far away! Logan joined his friends to celebrate Petch’s birthday. They hit the laser quest for numerous rounds of shoot ‘em up fun, then enjoyed a well earned dinner. Logan also headed off to Ayton’s for a sleepover for a few days. He loves spending time with Ayton and his family, in fact we have to negotiate with him to get him back!!

Before we knew it though, as July rushed by, it was time for Lyra and the kids to leave me in Bangkok for a couple of weeks while they started their summer adventure.

As always, first stop is Binfield to meet up with the Bracknell massive! Joyce and Jim hosted and they got to see the new Bracknell town centre, which by all accounts was pretty nice, certainly compared to what it used to be! After a few days, it was time to head up to Northampton, everyone was very excited as they were finally getting to meet the very lovely Faith! They had waited 9 months for this opportunity but everyone got to have a hug and enjoy some time with her. Grandad joined for dinner, and of course there was only one star of the show!

No time to stand still! Next it was back to Binfield to get ready to fly to Bulgaria! Joyce and Jim were also coming to St Vlas, along with Hannah and her new chap Ben. time for the real summer fun to begin!

The days were filled with time at the pools and beach, intertwined with hanging out at the local beach bar and restaurant for a few glasses of vino. Everyone was having a great time, Ben discovered he had a stalker, our Logan was loving his time with Ben, and was determined to be with him every minute of the day! Poor Hannah wasn’t getting a look in!! To break up the beach days, everyone headed over to Nesebar to have a stroll around the ancient cobbled streets, and of course, ice cream was on the menu.

Indi, Kai, and Logan, love a good roll in the surf when on the beach, and they were very happy when they saw that the surf was up at St Vlas! Hour after hour was spent crashing and being thrown around by the waves, they absolutely adore it. Unfortunately Lyra isn’t so keen on watching her little Logan being thrown about and dumped on the beach by the swell, but there is no doubt Logan was having a ball!!

On a quieter day, the big kids (and younger adults) decided to take a spin around the bay on an inflatable donut! It sat about 6 people and the jet ski pulling it does all it can to throw you off into the sea! Poor Logan wasn’t old enough to do it, but the big un’s loved it. Many promises were made to Logan that once he was big enough, he chance would come too.

The week in Bulgaria passed too quickly of course, but there was more fun to be had this summer. Back in England there was time to catch up with Nat and meet up with Thea and Jasmine our friends from Kuwait. Jas and Indi were best friends in Kuwait and India spent a few days chillin with Jas (without her Brothers!).

August was upon us and finally I got over to join in the fun! We headed over to Reading to meet back up with Indi and catch up with Thea and Jas, they seemed so settled back in their old home, all they were missing was Dave. He was working away in Kazakstan so only go back once a month or so. Great to see them though.

We couldn’t stay long though, as I was still outstanding a hug from Princess Faith, I think I was officially the last one of the family to meet her royal highness, but hey, saving the best until last I guess!! It was lovely to see Faith, such a lovely little cutie. While we were there it was the kick off to the new Premier league, and it just so happened that Liverpools first game was against Auntie and Uncles favourites Norwich! Well that is too good an opportunity to miss. We just had to get together and enjoy watching Liverpool thrash Norwich, which indeed they did! Could this be Liverpool’s year!

While we were in Northampton, Judit and Brendan had kindly offered to put us up for a few days, it was great to be able catch up with them and the lovely Patrick. Logan and Patrick always get along so well.

We had a celebration to enjoy while we were over, Auntie and Uncle were both 80 years young! The whole family and many friends got together on a lovely sunny afternoon to wish them well, have a good chat, a few drinks, and of course plenty of food! It is so rare these days for everyone to be able to get together that we all cherished the opportunity and made sure Auntie and Uncle had an 80th to remember!!

However, we were heading to Malta for two weeks in the sun and to spend some time with our friends the MacCulloch’s!! We had booked into a hotel for a week, but Indi went and stayed with Fiona, Beth, and Amy so she could have some space from the crazy boy time we were all ‘enjoying’!! The week on Malta was wonderful, we were looked after wonderfully by Nannette, Sam, and Fiona, showing us around, taking us into the catacombs, bowling, and lots of great evenings together over dinner! We must single out our trip to Mdina, the ancient city high up in central Malta. It is lovely to wander those winding cobbled streets, and then we ended up meeting up at a favourite place of Nannette’s that looks out across the island. Everyone ordered, and settled in to chatting about all sorts of memories… after a while we noticed that no food had arrived, we also noticed that most of the tables around us had no food either!! It seemed they were having some issues in the kitchen, but strangely none of the staff wanted to admit it! Thankfully, the drinks were still coming and we had plenty to talk about so we could wait it out! Eventually the food did arrive and it was devoured in seconds!!

As we got to the end of our week on Malta, we finally got to see Nannette and Sam’s house. They had been refurbishing it for a few years and we were excited to see it. The house sits on the port overlooking the capital of Malta, Valetta. It was a four story town house with a roof terrace. They have done an amazing job on it, and the view from the roof was breathtaking!

Our week on Malta was complete, so now it was time to get on a ferry and head to Gozo, just North of Malta. It was a short ferry ride, and when we all landed on Gozo we headed straight out across the island. It was strikingly different from Malta, much more rustic, and seemed to have been caught in a time warp, it was lovely. We found our way to the house we had rented. It was in the middle of the island in a small hamlet and up the narrowest little street (so tight, Sam had to leave his car out on the high st). The house was perfect though, a renovated old place with a pool and lots of social space for us to hang out in and play our latest favourite game, Sussed!

Our live-in tour guides took us to some wonderful spots, first up was the Citadella at Victoria. It sat in the middle of the island and dominates the skyline. We wandered through the winding streets within the Citadella’s walls and eventually stood on the top overlooking the whole island, it was a great view. It was a beautiful day, we were all a bit sweaty by the time we reached the top, but it was worth it for sure. On the way down, we found a set of stocks and managed to get Kai, Logan, and Amy into them!! Sadly we had no rotten fruit or veg to throw at them!

Next it was Xlendi, a beautiful bay surrounded by cliffs / hills and beautiful crystal clear water. It was idyllic. We were all relaxed and happy in the moment… then my phone rang, it was work. In Singapore we had a new distribution centre being developed to support the healthcare industry. The local team had decided to go live earlier than planned, and also tried to do things far too quickly. Within hours, things were going wrong. Nothing was going out and orders were piling up. I organised a team to come down and support, but it was become increasingly clear that this was very serious. The next morning, after a conversation with my Boss it was clear, I needed to get back there.

We were planning to fly back to the UK in a couple of days, but were meeting my Mum and Dad in London for a couple of days, However I was having to go straight on to Singapore and support the now crisis level recovery.

For our last night on Gozo we headed up to Marsalforn, a lovely town on the coast. We met up with some friends of Nannette & Sam. We sat outside on the seafront and ate pizza and other wonderful dishes and watched the sun go down for the last time on Gozo.

The following day we crossed back over to Malta and made our way to Nannette and Sam’s place. We were going to spend our last night with them before flying out early the following day. We had a lovely last night sat up on the roof terrace recalling all the wonderful things we had done.

We flew out early morning, however the flight was a bit late so at Heathrow I had run across terminals to get to my flight to Singapore. I got there in time and lined up to check in. No sooner had Lyra and the kids caught me up to say goodbye when it was announced my flight was cancelled! This was a nightmare, as things were getting worse and worse in Singapore, I needed to be there. So I said goodbye to Ly and the kids as they headed into London to meet my Mum and Dad, I queued up with everyone else to try to get on the next flight out. Thankfully, I got on the evening flight, via Bangkok. This meant I had a few hours to kill so I jumped on the train into London and met up with Lyra, the kids, and of course, my Mum and Dad! It was great that I got to have dinner with everyone, we went to a fabulous old English pub, right next to the train station. We had a great meal together, and managed a bit of a catch up, but soon enough I had to get back on the train and head off.

It felt like a long trip, and I was concerned about what I was going to uncover once I arrived.

Meanwhile Ly and the kids enjoyed the day with Nanny and Grampy, they visited Tower Bridge and climbed up and over the top! Mum and Dad headed off later that afternoon, and Grandad arrived! The next day, they all took a ride on the London Eye, it was Logan’s first time, and he loved it!! Then it was time to head to the airport, Chris, Gemma, and Faith came down to the airport to say goodbye too, so it was a lovely send off for them as they headed home to Bangkok.

On arriving in Singapore, I went straight to the DC and dived into to understanding the issues. Over the next few days, we worked pretty much day and night getting our arms around the issues. It was bad, hospitals were not getting the treatments and medicines they needed for patients in their care. We were starting to put lives at risk, the pressure was growing.

The whole period is a blur if I am honest, over the next 3 or so weeks it was 18 hours a day, 7 days a week, head down as the operation slowly started getting some sort of process to allow orders to flow. I will never forget the meetings we had to attend with the hospital boards where we had to explain what was happening, and how long it would take to correct. As you could imagine, they feared for their patients, they were some of the most difficult meetings I have ever attended. This experience would stay with me for a long time. One ray of sunshine did occur while I was there, the weekend Lyra decided to fly down to see me. It was so lovely to have her there with me. Even though I still had to go to work, being able to spend a few hours with her each evening was a really uplifting experience, and helped me keep going through this nightmare. It was all too short though, after a wonderful weekend together, Ly had ot get back, and I was back to long, long days with my crisis.

Eventually we had enough control to allow me to get away for a bit so I was on the next plane home for a few days of joy with Lyra, Indi, Kai, and Logan. It was such a boost for me to be able to be back with them and be normal for a couple of days, but sadly, all too soon I had to head back to Singapore. This became my life through until November. Lyra came over for a weekend, and I managed to spend a few hours with her, but otherwise it was all work.

Back in Bangkok, the kids went back to school, and carried on their normal life as best they could with no Dad! It was great to hear about Logan spending time with Ayton, he went with them to an amazing live event put on with the BBC called Walking with Dinosaurs. It was at an exhibition centre and had life size monster dinosaurs walking around the place!! They loved it!

Thankfully in early October I got home in time for Logan’s 7th birthday, it was a welcome relief for me, and Logan had us all together to celebrate. Before that though, Logan brought Lyra to school for her to attend a few of his classes, they both had a fun and inspiring day!

We kicked off at the live show of The Lion King. What a show, a really great event, so innovative. It was easy to see why it had been running for so long in the UK! On the day of his birthday, it was a school day, so an early start, but that didn’t stop our boy wanting presents (which included a new bike!), and cake!! Later the same day, Lyra and I arrived at school with bags of birthday cakes for Logan and his class to devour while singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to our boy!!

At the weekend, it was time for a mega party! Two of Logan’s best friends, Ayton and Petch also have birthdays around the same time so they had a combined Do! It was hosted at a huge kids adventure playground in Mega Bangna. The indoor adventure called Harbourland was a kids fantasy, the size of a warehouse and full of very excited kiddos! After a couple of hours of madness, it was food time, they all piled in and demolished the buffet and lots of cakes! It was then time for the staff to play some games with these crazy lot! To say they miss judged the audience was an understatement! The games were targeted at 5 year olds at best, it wasn’t long before it was pretty much just the parents were left in the room, the kids had all disappeared back into the playground!

Eventually we did manage to round them up again, and next it was downstairs for a game of Laser Quest, and then eventually they all collapsed from the endless fun and it was time to go home and spend a few hours opening an endless pile of gifts from all his friends… he must have come away with about 6 Nerf guns!

Shortly after Logan’s birthday we had visitors for just a day… Shelagh and Nigel dropped in on their way back to NZ! It was great to see them, it had been a good few years since our paths had crossed so there was lots to catch up on. After arriving at ours and freshening up after their flight, we headed out for lunch at Siam a nice Thai restaurant close the the school, then we headed over to Brighton College to pick up the kids. Shelagh and Nigel were introduced to Logan for the first time, and eventually they got over the shock at the size of Indi and Kai!! One thing’s for sure though, they were our shortest guests at about 12 hours!!

The joy of reaching October is the rain stops, the humidity drops, and it feels like summer has began, even though it’s actually winter! Thankfully in between my trips to Singapore I got to enjoy some pool craziness with those boys!!

With me back in Singapore, rather than me come head to Bangkok, everyone came to me for the weekend. I met them at the airport, and in true Singapore style, it ‘s a pretty impressive place. They had recently opened the Jewel, a semi tropical indoor arena with a huge waterfall flowing through the middle! So after landing, we spent the next few hours at the airport! Eventually we did move on into Singapore to the hotel.

On Saturday, Lyra and I took the kids to a Singapore favourite of ours, The Zoological Gardens. We hadn’t been there for about 18 years but it was no.1 on our list!! Happily, it was as wonderful as we remembered and we had an amazing day wandering around the gardens. One of the great things about this place is that they use psychological barriers rather than fences, so you feel much closer to the animals. The kids loved it! Towards the end of the day we hurrying to catch the zoo train when someone… Kai I think, suggested a short cut down this hill. Everyone followed, but I was carrying lots of stuff and as I stepped over the fence at the bottom my flip flop got caught and I hit the road… hard!! Whatever I was carrying flew across the road, and i was bleeding from my elbows, toes, and knees! It bloody hurt!!

Still I got over it, after a lot of sympathy / joking from the family, we decided to stick around and go to the night safari. Again, it was as much fun as we enjoyed on our honeymoon. We decided to head out on foot rather than wait for the train, with Indi navigating, the walk was a bit long… but eventually we made it back to the train and collapsed into the seats to recover!

The problem with the zoo is that there is so much to see, we had to go back again on the Sunday!!

We did head back into the city later in the day and went to watch the dancing water and light show at the Marina Bay complex. The show was great, and was a fitting end to our great weekend away (in what was becoming my second home!), we wandered around the Quay, had dinner, then crashed out in the hotel. As Monday dawned, I went back to work, Lyra and the kids chilled by the pool, then flew back home that evening.

Suddenly it was Halloween again! As you would expect Logan fully embraced things with costumes as zombies, and Men in Black! Logan and I walked what seemed like the whole of our Moo Baan scaring people and stealing their sweets, while Ly, India, and Khun Wan were scaring little children and making them dunk their heads into buckets of water just for an apple!!

Our friends Paul and Su had been hosting a pretty legendary halloween party for a few years, so we were looking forward to experiencing it this year! Paul spends about a week preparing and decorating the house, and it was impressive, the whole house is turned into a scary grotto, and it is dress up or get out!! We all went as the Men in Black, fully suited up, raybans, and guns!! It was a big night, with all sorts of ghouls and goblins in attendance, as you would expect, things got crazier as the night went on, we left (well almost left) three times before I was actually allowed to drive away!! I think we actually left close to 4am!! Oh what a night! I have to say these nights have changed a lot for me since I stopped dinking!!

By mid November, Singapore was stable enough for me to not need to be on the ground all the time, so Lyra and I could take a break. We had cancelled a planned trip in September to Juicy Oasis because of my time in Singapore, but we made it over in November. I had never needed a retreat more than this! Unlike last year, I was actually not injured so could join in. This time it was Lyra’s turn to miss out. Following her surgery she was obviously being really careful She had also found that she had another hernia and was preparing to have it corrected, and have a mesh placed across her stomach muscles to prevent further hernia’s. So Ly kicked back, and watched me work up a sweat!! It was the first time we had been to Juicy in the Winter, it was pretty chilly, and it rained a fair bit, but who cared, it wasn’t Singapore!! The other bonus of going in the winter was that every evening we had soup instead of juice, I can honestly say that was a moment of excitement every day!!

While we were away, Indi and Kai enjoyed the space and the freedom to sit on tech all evening long! As for Logan, he moved in with Ayton. The plan was for him to stay for the weekend, but he managed to keep it going for 5 days!! We are so grateful to Cici and Arm for looking after our monster for us!!

Of course, while we were away, we dropped in to see Faith (and Chris and Gemma!) as you would expect, she was even more charming than she had been in the summer!!

Again we were heading towards the end of the year, and the school term. Kai had a trip out to a snake farm, and got to hang a huge snake (about 3m’s long!) around his neck!

December arrived, so of course, so did Belfy! Our resident elf on the shelf was back to amuse Logan, and keep an eye on his behaviour so Santa knew whether presents would be in order this year!! But this year he wasn’t the only elf in our house. The school show this year was Elf so lucky old Kai became an elf (and a few other characters) in the Brighton end of year show. Indi managed to swerve the Elf characters and took the role of the store manager. She was made for the part as she could be cynical and bossy!! She really is an amazing actor!! :-) The show itself was great, a lot of fun, and some wonderful opportunities to take pictures of Kai that he will hate for years to come!! After this, we were certainly feeling Christmassy!!

Before we could truly get into Christmas though, Lyra needed to head back into hospital for her hernia operation and her Ipom mesh fitted to prevent her having repeated hernia’s! As usual we underestimated the impact this would have. The operation went well, and Ly was soon back at home with us. However, it was pretty sore and her movement was limited. Keeping Lyra from doing too much is no easy task!

The school term wasn’t over yet though. Kai joined a group of his schoolmates and entertained an old peoples home one Saturday with a number of Christmas carols, it was the Prep and Senior school sports day, which Kai won a brace of medals, and Indi yet again pushed herself hard and gave her best for Chichester!! And there was the school Christmas fair! Logan starred in the Pre Prep Choir and Indi took her place in the truly talented Chamber Choir. They both gave us some wonderful Christmas songs and more!

Before we knew it, the term was over! The final day at school was more fun, games, and parties, the lessons, but it was a great end to the term and everyone was excited to head off and celebrate Christmas!!

As we closed in on Santa’s big day, the kids needed to buy presents, so it was off to Mega Bangna always a fun day out! Once the present shopping was done, Logan was already missing his friends so he was chuffed to be invited to Intach’s for a pool party!! It was a crazy afternoon, pool antics and a lot of cakes and sweets!!

The final days running up to Christmas were filled with seasonal fun.. we had the Denyer Greens over for drinks and the girls had a ball with Logan! Then it was our pre Xmas Yoga with Khun Apple, followed with recovery Christmas breakfast all together!

The 23rd was of course our anniversary, and for once we kept it quiet, Lyra had to go to the hospital, so we went out to see the Christmas dec’s at Emquartier, and experienced one of the most bizarre Christmas shows that we’ve seen. It involved inflatable animal and santa costumes dancing to hard core rave music!!

And then, finally it was Christmas!

Christmas Eve was just us at home getting the final bits ready, and giving in to the kids pleading for a Xmas Eve present! Then the magic began, preparing to say goodbye to Belfy , putting out Santa’s snacks, the reindeer food, and the magic dust to ensure they know where to land! Then it was time to get to bed to give Santa time to visit!!

Christmas day started early with Logan jumping on our bed in full flow hysteria!! Santa had been and he was loving getting into his stocking! He did his best not to get Kai and Indi up, but it didn’t last, Logan wanted us all up to get Christmas day started! We had a relaxed breakfast, and then we sat down to share our gifts. The wrap was everywhere!

For Christmas dinner, we had been invited to the Cantwell’s, Su and Paul, so we got out of our PJ’s, brushed our hair, put on something smart and hit the road! We had a fun afternoon and evening. A great feast of a Christmas dinner, plenty of chat, and for some, a few glasses of bubbles!

As we were out on Christmas day, we decided to cook Christmas dinner on Boxing day, so another turkey feast was prepared, and we all sat down again, this time with our lovely Khun Wan to enjoy. Crackers were pulled, terrible jokes shared, and some of us this time even managed some pud! The rest of the day was dedicated to enjoying some of the Christmas presents received, one we all had some fun with was Logan’s VR headset for the playstation! All very freaky!

Between Christmas and new year we kept things relatively quiet, and got ourselves ready to host a few friends for New Years Eve…

We returned the favour to the Cantwell’s, along with Paul’s Sister, Kerrie, Marek, Max, and Isobel, Vikki and Ollie, and Cici, Arm, Ayton, and Ali, so a good bunch! It was evening of laughs, fine wine, and a midnight dip in the pool… fully clothed!!

And there you have it, 2019 was done, it had been a rollercoaster ride, with some health scares for Lyra, and a work crisis I wanted to forget, but never would… we were all happy to look forward to 2020 with a smile…

Lots of love and hope,

Dan, Lyra, Indi, Kai, and Logan… aka The Travelling Culveys!!

xxxxx