Saturday, April 14, 2007

 

6th March. Chalekeree Village. Part 1.

On Tuesday 6th March I went for a walk on my own in Jamie and Mam's village. I shall put the pictures on the blog in 3 parts.

Jamie, Mam, Jessica and John live in Chalekeree Village.

The word 'village' does not match a British idea of a village for we would see it as a housing development.
Chalekeree is different from some because the spare ground for development lies beyond existing houses which are on one side of a road which kinks about a bit for about half a mile in from the main road.
Most of these villages have a pretentious entrance with some sort of security. At the Chalekeree gateway a young man sits and idles the day away and takes little notice of who goes in and out.




This is the view of the gateway from within the village looking towards the main road and across to the lake - actually a by product of the old tin mining days.
The name of the village reflects the lake and the hills.


This part of the village has older houses - but not very old. Most buildings on Phuket date from the latter part of the 20th century, although there are some older settlements. Development took place here as a result of the flow of money into the island as tourism increased.


This picture shows one of the least attractive features of Phuket - electricity wires everywhere!
The big houses beyond are part of the adjacent 'village' - much smarter and better managed than Chalekeree with security like at Fort Knox!

The traffic in the village - not too much of that for it is residents only most of the time, goes round this little landscaped island. I like the trees - the one at this end looks like a fountain.

The original village developers still employ people to maintain the grassy areas and roadsides.


This building is the village centre with an office. The swimming pool is there, still used but not maintained to a very high standard at the moment. There had been for a short while a restaurant, but that closed.
A Thai couple seem to have just negotiated to invest some money into developing this amenity again.
Perhaps then more people would be attracted to this village. There are few new houses as yet.

This is the shrine to Buddha outside the village centre, looking across to Jamie's house. His house is quite small - there is a much bigger 2 storey one behind it.


This picture , taken last year, gives a better idea of their house.

This picture shows the 4 J's little house with a huge one next door, which is empty at the moment - up for sale. It would be nice if a family could move in - the old residents were odd; we used to say they were up to no good with comings and goings in the wee small hours and they had no desire to be friendly.
You can see a plot of land next to Jamie's house. Jamie and Mam fear the day when somebody might buy it and wish that they could buy it themselves and keep their open outlook.



This picture shows the view from the road outside their house. You can see that it is peaceful and rural.

6th March. Chalekeree Village. Part 1.
posted by Grandma P on Saturday, April 14, 2007