Sixth form in the UK

Like most things in the UK the schooling system is supposed to be very organised, if not regimented. Which is a bit intimating if you do not fit strictly within the parameters they work to.

Jono was seventeen without GCSE. Eventually we got him into a course for repeat students at Chichester College which is graded as Outstanding. But a year later I do have many questions. Not just about Chichester College, or the grading system, its the system.

Fortunately we ended getting locked down due to the coronavirus pandemic and he managed to scrape through with straight fours and a single five.

Wood eating ants

Wooden houses are all well and good . But they come with an ant problem. A problem that is a losing battle. Blink and the little blighters are back at it chomping their way through anything and everything

The rains

The creek rose significantly higher after raining most nights for a week or so. But we have had a few dry days and the mushroom stalls have started popping up at the intersection at traffic lights.

But it has been a funny wet season. Sporadic showers after an early start. Thereafter mostly rumbling thunder, a bit of lightening and then little to show for it.

The termite mushrooms aren’t that exciting either.

Smaller, scappy and the ones I have seen have already opened. Hopefully more to come.

Despite this cars are now beginning to line up. Hopefully with more to come.

 

Conservation

A World Heritage site, the Thung Yai Naesuan and Huai Kha Khamin Wildlife Sanctuary covers an area of over 600,000 hectares.

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Access is limited to a few hides and walking trails around the administrative centre. Although there are accommodation facilities these are only available for research and study purposes rather than casual visitors.

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More than half of the total population of the Indochinese tiger survives in Thailands Western Forest Complex, with Huai Kha Khaeng as its core habitat. This a story of Huai Kha Khaeng, a story about Seub Nakhasathienva the superintendent whose work and death at the sanctuary was largely responsible for it being declared a World Heritage site.

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A struggle and commitment best expressed by the solitude and simplicity of a bench near his cottage that overlooks a bend of the river at the Sanctuaries Headquarters. A testament to the memory of a man who dedicated his life to preserving something he believed in passionately.

Dam building

Phian has 12 rai just off the main road. It is a good long term investment. But she hasn’t had much luck getting it to pay for upkeep. She dug a dam and tried sugar cane. Only to get hit by the drought. Last year she planted rice but had difficulty getting into the lands, as bad drainage made it difficult harvesting. She then decided to dig a borehole and plant sugarcane again.

They found water. But the flow was not nearly strong enough to irrigate the lands.

In desperation she made the decision to excavate and dig a bigger, deeper, better dam.

The crew consisted of a macro mechanical digger, two dumper trucks, and a tractor equipped with a grader blade and ploughs.

The two trucks carried the soil from the dam to the landfill site, dumping it for the tractor to shift and level.

 

There was much excitement when they hit water. A small spring virtually in the middle of the dam. And another in the one corner which trickled out of the dams wall.

 

Concrete pipes were lowered over the spring in the floor to create a well. Not sure how this will work out. But will wait and see.

 

After the rains, once the soil has settled, the landfill will be used for building well out of reach of any flood water.

 

The trucks shuttled back and forth for two days. After which the macro was loaded onto a low loader and off to the next job. And that was when the skies opened and the rain came bucketing down.

 

Leaving us to wake to a few large muddy puddles in the driveway.

 

Which required a bit more digging and filling. But by hand this time.