We got that attitude! – 26th September 2019

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Yesterday I showed some resilience. Small things upset me in the morning and everything felt overwhelming again. After school, I went to the dentist. I think sitting under the drill settled me down again. At home, Amy was quite negative about being here in Thailand but I was the one telling her things aren’t that bad. I realised I had some strength and resilience I need to draw on more.

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful that other people have shown an interest in working with me. It shows me that I am valued for my contributions.

Gratitude Journal

Today I’m looking forward to a job interview with another school. I’m looking forward to Hayden coming to visit in a couple of weeks’ time. My friend, Ellen, will also visit from China with lots of yummy Sichuan sauce. I’m looking forward to getting away from some people in this school where I work. I’m looking forward to time hanging around at home with Amy and our friends. I’m looking forward to the cooler weather of winter. Damn! I’m looking forward to a lot of things.

23rd Feb 2021 – Looking back on this looking forward is interesting. Some of the things I was looking forward to, didn’t necessarily turn out for the best but it was definitely the right way to approach all those things. I know some folks who anticipate the worst of the future and then feel pleasantly surprised when things turn out better than expected. I think I used to be like that but not these days. I’m much more of the thinking that even difficult tasks, events and situations are just occurrences and they will be over after a certain period of time regardless of what my thoughts are about them.

We got that attitude! – 25th September 2019

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I dreamt I couldn’t find my socks so that I could go to school/work. Mum was there, although, I didn’t see her. She made me feel calm and I understood to work methodically to find them. I think my mum taught me patience – I surely tested hers.

Hayden will come to visit soon. I hope he can take away some life lessons from me. I should plan some things to talk with him.

Gratitude Journal

I learnt today that the sun still rises. No matter what. The old adage ‘it will pass’ is consistent, even if it doesn’t feel like it at times. I am grateful to the kids in my class. Day to day they don’t give a shit, yesterday’s problems are forgotten.

18th Feb 2021 – Sometimes I need an ego reset. Resume child-like wonder! This time was tough for me and I’m reminded now of one girl in another class getting really upset and angry at another student who made fun of her skin colour. I comforted her and told her she was a beautiful person and not to ever forget that. She looked up to me a lot after that. But now, I look up to her, as she and the bully run around playing together still.

Candle lights begin to glow – 24th September 2019

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I dreamt about fire…and friends. We did our best to keep each other safe.

I still wake up during the night thinking about working with kids and how to get my mojo back and get rid of this dark cloud. It’s slowly lifting but I still need to do something to move it along. I want to learn to deal with this kind of feeling better.

Gratitude Journal

I smiled today when a P1 student came and gave me a hug.

15th Feb 2021 – Kids can be so perceptive sometimes. I obviously needed a hug.

Three things I am grateful for:

My friends who can show me support and the positive way. They make things feel better.
My wife who is a strong independent woman with a beautiful heart.
My cats who make me smile every day!

Peru resh! – 23rd September 2019

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Chiang Rai, Thailand. Don’t forget where you are and everything it took to get you here. It’s been an amazing journey. But now you are here – what next?

“In enlightenment, there is no pleasure, no pain – just nameless ecstasies.” – Sadhguru

Hmm – enlightenment seems like something to aim for.

Learn to meditate.
Learn Thai.

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful to meet Laetitia because she has a lot of energy and strives to do what she wants to do. I hope it can inspire Amy too.

14th Feb 2021 – Laetitia was a bright and bubbly French lady who was teaching at the same school as myself (and fell foul of the same stupidities that I did). She was in Thailand with her husband and two of her four kids. She had a can-do attitude and worked really hard and always came up with new ideas. Amy and I met with the family once to discuss a possible business proposal but despite their enthusiasm, we couldn’t see a way things would really work out. Soon after, I left the school and we didn’t see them so much. They seemed to have a lot of financial issues and eventually, if some stories are to be believed, they fled the country to Burma to avoid repaying their debts and this is what had led them to Thailand from France in the first place. Who knows where the truth may lie but I was even more grateful that we didn’t get involved in any business dealings and defer to Amy’s judgement on these things, that working with other people and their money will only lead to trouble.

23rd Mar 2021 – Along with starting the music podcast I also started reading more about Stoicism and discovering various email lists and blogs that dealt with mindfulness and self-help but with deeper thought than just the usual quotable influencers. I started this gratitude journal on this day and with very few exceptions haven’t missed a day where I have found something to be grateful for. Looking back to this time I can see a big change has happened in the things that I do day to day. Trying new things and testing myself in new ways. Whilst I guess this is inevitable across any 18-month period of time, this time it feels more like a serious decision to make some changes.

The Chiang Rai Alternative Hour #01 – 2nd September 2019

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Music from Lifter Puller, Thinking Plague, Ozric Tentacles, Built To Spill, Unknown, Shellac, Parliament, Naked City, The Fall, fordamage, Boredoms, Pink Floyd and Dexys Midnight Runners.

14th Feb 2021 – Around this time things were getting very difficult for me with the school I was working at, which led to me leaving at the end of the semester – I forget exactly when, perhaps late September or early October. I’ll write more about that at some point.

Anyway, with the stressful situation, I decided to adjust my focus to making a music podcast. I would often sit and marvel as my music library would be set to shuffle and so much great music just kept popping up, so I started keeping track and then making recordings of those songs. I eventually settled into a rhythm of doing one episode per week, often working 3 or 4 weeks in advance.

It was a really enjoyable habit, to focus 3 or 4 hours per weekend to put an episode together. It kept me sane until, of course, it drove me insane. As usual, I developed more ideas as I went along and refined and improved things (I think).

As with this blog, I only made the shows for my own pleasure and didn’t really care whether anyone listened or not and was happy when one or two listeners became comrades. Only after seeing that a million others were doing the same thing and not many people were listening to them either, I decided to bow out and not add any further to the noise of the internet for a while.

When I was in my mid-teens I would blast crazy music out of my bedroom window in the weird hope that people might be intrigued enough to come in and discover more about this mad world of music that I existed in. But living in rural Dorset with only the odd farmer and stray cow or dog passing by, no one ever came to enquire – or even to complain.

Now I can sit in rural Thailand and do the same.

Gamnad737/Grave Blankets – 25th August 2019

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Cat #:199TZM

Grave Blankets: 

Grave Blankets is Steve, Kyle and Dave. 
More at:  graveblankets.bandcamp.com

Gamnad737: 

Harsh Noise from Bangkok, Thailand, Main project of “Arkat Vinyapiroath” The sounds of liberation which may lead to free the others from their inner confinement, Bangkok Noise outfit who represents the stories through recordings from time to time in both acoustic and electric sound synthesis.

Grave Blankets: 

Recorded with signals sent from land to space to land again and again and again. Thanks to resistors and capacitors. 

Gamnad737: 

Gamnad737’s track recorded, mixed, mastered by Arkat Vinyapiroath at Moontone Records in 2019 

Contact:  arkat@hotmail.com
moontonerecords.weebly.com/gamnad737.html
www.facebook.com/gamnad737
gamnad737.bandcamp.com

Artwork and layout by Dave Petersen 
Yarhn, Vaccine and Sacrifice mastered by Jeff White