Looks like I am returning to my blog after quite some time. I was on a 4-day trip to Ubon Ratchathani Province in eastern Thailand last week. The province borders Laos to the east and Cambodia to the South with the mighty Mekong River to the north of it. I was hoping to catch a glimpse of the famous river, unfortunately the itinerary of my trip around the province led nowhere near it. I was part of a team that went there to select sites for placements of sensor equipments for drought monitoring. The aim was to select two sites where these sensors could be placed. Although I had no involvement whatsoever in the actual selection, I tagged along to check the GPRS coverage in the selected sites. Both areas selected had some GPRS coverage but it doesn't seem good enough to build a system around it. It seemed better to go for a satellite connection to gather the sensor data from the field.
I liked the place. It was cooler than Bangkok, in terms of temperature and the humidity was lower, so I was not sweating like a horse, something that is unavoidable in Bangkok all year round. Right outside our hotel, there was a market with numerous food stalls with a multitude of variety and taste. I enjoyed new gastronomic delights in every meal, and to my very pleasant surprise the food stalls there opened till midnight where as their counterparts in and around Bangkok start closing at 8pm. But if you ask me the names of those dishes, I remember none. One of these I should go around writing down the names of all the dishes in a notebook along with the translation.
We moved out of Ubon on the fourth day. On the way back, we stopped at a place called Phanom Rung in Buriram Province. Phanom Rung is famous for its Khmer style Shiva temple nestled on a hilltop. The temple dates back to the heydays of the Cambodian Empire when they ruled the area. The temple looks like a mini-Angkor Wat in a mandala layout. There were depictions of Ramayana on the walls all around. I've always wanted to go the Angkor Wat, but I've never had the opportunity. Atleast I got to see a demo version.
I'll go to the Mekong the next time I go to Ubon for sensor setup.