Again?!? Really?!?

I've managed to pick up yet another intestinal bug. YUMMY! Gah! It's not as bad as the first two, but I'm definitely not happy about the constant tummy ache. I'm not entirely sure how I got it this time either. What do you think:




1. For the past few weeks I'd been seeing all these tables set up outside... literally everywhere. They'd be covered in plastic and have all these brown circles on them - about maybe 5 inches in diameter, a thin layer of who knows what. They were just out there in the sun, out with the flies and the motorbike exhaust etc. Well, my laundry lady has been giving me mangoes from her tree. Apparently they're in season, and it's like zucchinis here. Everyone's giving them away. One day, as she was handing me mangoes she also handed me one a rolled up brown thing - one of the circles I'd seen. Homemade mango fruit leather! It was really yummy. But now that I'm sick... I wonder.

Free mangoes... most assuredly *not* the culprit

2. As part of Bunny & Bobby's farewell bash the teachers and even some of the school staff all went out to dinner together. It was more or less family style, and the Thai gals did a lot of the ordering. Someone handed me a plate of Som Tam (spicy papaya salad) with seafood in it. I took a bit with a prawn in it and had it in my mouth before I realized the prawn was raw. I, foolishly, ate it anyway thinking what the heck - I eat sushi! But my last intestinal battle was brought on by eating Som Tam with raw crab. So... I wonder.

3. I usually eat at the Dive... the dingy nasty fly-infested restaurant near the school. It's a nasty nasty place I promise you. But the food is awesome, seriously tasty! And cheap! It's 35 baht ($1)for a plate of fried rice, or my favorite, the garlic fried pork. These dishes would go for easily $7 - $10 in the states, and probably not taste as good. So it's where we all eat. And usually I'm fine, but lately I've been trying to eat more vegetables. And my eating vegetables has coincided with this recent digestive unpleasantness. Ordinarily I wouldn't blame nice wholesome veggies... but I've recently learned that they wash the veggies in what passes for the 'toilet' (bathroom) here. I've yet to venture into the toilet...it looks something not unlike a porta-potty off on the corner of a building. One hopes that they are merely using the sink to get water and washing the veggies in a nice clean area using soap and all. But now my stomach cramps started right after a nice big plate of stir fried veggies & noodles, so I wonder....

Bunny at the Dive

4. Then of course, there is the Swine Flu, which you know, hasn't actually been transmitted from swine to humans and turns out to be only about as dangerous as the average flu. Which... you know... still kills a lot of people every year. But hardly the apocalyptic pandemic the media would love to be reporting on at the moment. Nevertheless, I have been eating a lot of pork fried with garlic lately, so I wonder....

5. Finally, not that this is a blatant cry of self pity or anything... but perhaps my recent bout of malaise is due to a serious lack of correspondence. One can never be too sure about these things.

What do you think? Cast your vote in the nifty little poll thingy on the side ------>

In any case I started a course of anti-biotics this morning and will hopefully have this bug kicked by the end of the week. Aren't you glad you tuned in today?

TAG: Code Fish Sauce