Top Chefs - Pattaya

The ABV team organized a Thai cooking class for us as a team building exercise on Saturday, 27 October.  We joined local Chef Sherri on a trip to the Pattaya market where we bought ingredients including marble eggplant (pak chee), kaffir lime  (bai magrood), palm coconut sugar (nam tan peep) and noodles.  We also saw some interesting items like pigs’ heads and live turtles.   

Chef Sherri shows how to pick the veggies.

 Preparing the food was a great time and thankfully Chef Sherri instructed and prevented any disasters.   The menu included Penang Curry with Chicken, Pad Thai, Spicy Noodle Salad (Yam Woon Sen) and Papaya and Sticky Rice (Khao Neaw Malakx).  We definitely had some ringers in the group.  Mauricio was a pro using the pulverizer to make a fantastic curry paste.  Anna, a self-proclaimed novice, made amazing dishes.  We were all very full after the event.  What else is new?

We met in the office set up for us at the hotel on Sunday evening to organize for the work week.  We’re all set for the great project kickoff with the local team on Monday!

 

 

Denise checking out the tofu at the market.

Sherri and attentive students.

 

Yam Woom Sen ready to eat!

 

 

Pigs head are often used as offerings.

ESC Chonburi Lands in Thailand!

The Team - Krishnan, Denise, Michael, Mauricio, Anna and Jean

Our team arrived in Bangkok at different times on Thursday, 25 October, 2012.  Distances traveled varied with some over 20 hours and we all needed some recovery time.  Our accommodations in Bangkok were the very comfortable Pullman Hotel.  Friday (Day 1) started with the team meeting in person for the first time at breakfast.  We have nice global representation with Krishnan (India), Anna (Greece), Mauricio (Brazil), Denise (Chicago) and me.  Australian Business Volunteers representatives (www.abv.org.au), who coordinate our project logistics, include Jean from Australia and David and Tang from Thailand.  After some sleep, we headed to the IBM Bangkok office where we spent the day with the local team to learn more about our project scope.  Not much time to do any sightseeing but we're enjoying the fabulous Thai cuisine.

Thai folk dance demonstration

On Saturday we traveled two hours to the project location in Pattaya, Chonburi.  The city is a very big and popular tourist destination in this region with a beautiful crescent beach and massive hotels.  More meetings on Saturday and of course some more eating.   Pad Thai with shrimp or tofu, vegetable curry and spring rolls were some of the choices.  

We also met our local team of translators who will assist us for the next three weeks. I made a Thai phrase cheat sheet but I'm struggling putting the sounds together.  I think I've got "thank you" down, pronounced cop-koon-kup.  Say that fast three times. 

 

David (far left) and Translator Team outside Bangkok cafe