Decided I didn’t wanna leave Thailand just yet.

So I’m lieing here in a box compartment in a bus on the way from the border between Thailand and Laos to Chiang Mai. I was quite surprised when the bus driver told me that all the seats on the bus were full and they only had the one compartment that was meant for storage but could actually be used for sleeping as well. Since this was the last bus leaving this evening, I had no choice. So far its actually quite comfortable.If I’m still feeling ok tomorrow morning when we arrive in Chiang Mai at around 8am, I’ll ask for the sleeping compartment from now on when travelling by bus in Thailand. So how did I end up here?

I was supposed to take the plane home to Copenhagen early this morning. Instead I decided that I wanted to stay here in Thailand for a while longer. I sent Stefania off on the plane from Bangkok airport around midnight between the 15th and 16th.

After that I had a lot of time to kill before my bus would leave from Bangkok towards the border town of Nong Khai – an 11 hour journey. I took a taxi to Mo Chit Station, arriving there around 1 am. The station is pretty big and the main bus station in Bangkok. As I stepped inside it was empty save a few people sleeping in the waiting area on the hard plastic chairs, I guess waiting for the first bus in the morning. No westerners whatsoever. The 7-11 was open and I went inside to buy some water before sitting down in one of the hard plastic chairs waiting for the first bus, which would leave at 5.40 am.

This waiting area is surrounded by ticket booths, that I guess work somewhat independantly from each other, as they are all usually yelling for customers during the day. At this hour there were only a few booths open but every minute, a girl with a high pitched voice would yell out some long sentence about selling tickets for x location. I have no idea what customers she thought she was gonna get, as hardly anyone was talking into the station.

At the same time there was a booth somewhere where a phone kept friggin ringing constantly. I was so tired at this point that I didn’t put any effort into trying to sit somewhere, where I couldn’t hear the girl and phone. Even when I dozed off, I felt that I could hear this woman. Finally I got myself together and bought some red bull from the 7-11, downed it in one go and then moved to a different area so at least if I was gonna be awake I wouldn’t go insane.

Obviously I couldn’t sleep after that and moved furthur down to the platform from where the bus was going to be. Everyone new area I came to, there were only Thai people and they always gave me that look as if I didn’t belong there. I didn’t really feel like I belonged there either.

When the bus finally left for Nong Khai, I was again the only farang(Thai word for foreigner) on it. I remember falling asleep at one point across three seats. In my sleep I hear someone shout “You! You! YOU!”. I realized it was the ticket dude trying to wake me up cuz some passengers needed the seats I was lying on. This is the way it is in Thailand. If people dont know english well and they want you to move from where you are, they will say stuff like “YOU!, HELLO!” or whistle at you furiously.

After 11 hours of bus ride we finally arrive at Nong Khai, where I had to take a tuk tuk to the border of Laos. After an hour of filling out some paperwork, leaving Thailand, getting my stamps I came back on a minibus to then take a tuk tuk back to the bus station.

From Nong Khai to the neighbouring city of Udon Thani, to just make the bus that I’m currently lieing down in while writing this.

We just made a stop out in the middle of nowhere. I think there’s some engine trouble and some american guy wants to come lie down next to me.

I’ll keep you posted on what’s going on.

Lost 11k 2nd day of the year!

What goes up must come down?

I guess for me this was true. I reviewed my play later and there really didn’t seem to be any huge mistakes. I definitely didn’t tilt, but just kept getting coolered or setups or other things where the timing was against me.

It’s really been a hectic start of the year for me, where huge swings seem to be the norm. Yesterday I played a guy deep at 2/4, where we had some pretty huge hands.

Heres a graph of this month so far with a couple of big hands from the match yesterday. Its all 2/4-3/6 euro and dollars.

No-Limit Hold’em, $4.00 BB (2 handed) – Hold’em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

BB ($1033.25)
Hero (SB) ($3486.35)

Preflop: Hero is SB with Q, K
Hero bets $10, BB raises $32, Hero raises $96, BB calls $72

Flop: ($216) Q, 2, 7 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $96, BB calls $96

Turn: ($408) 9 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $298, BB calls $298

River: ($1004) 8 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $555, BB calls $531.25 (All-In)

Total pot: $2066.50

Results:
Hero had Q, K (one pair, Queens).
BB had K, 9 (one pair, nines).
Outcome: Hero won $2089.50

——————

No-Limit Hold’em, $4.00 BB (2 handed) – Hold’em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

BB ($1625.85)
Hero (SB) ($4179.59)

Preflop: Hero is SB with A, A
Hero bets $10, BB raises $48, Hero raises $155, BB calls $115

Flop: ($334) 6, 8, 3 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero checks

Turn: ($334) Q (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $165, BB calls $165

River: ($664) 7 (2 players)
BB bets $332, Hero calls $332

Total pot: $1328

Results:
Hero had A, A (one pair, Aces).
BB had 6, 7 (two pair, sevens and sixes).
Outcome: BB won $1327.25
———–
No-Limit Hold’em, $4.00 BB (2 handed) – Hold’em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

BB ($1902.92)
Hero (SB) ($1334.38)

Preflop: Hero is SB with K, K
Hero bets $10, BB raises $32, Hero raises $104, BB raises $344, Hero raises $1218.38 (All-In), BB calls $954.38

Flop: ($2668.76) Q, 8, 9 (2 players, 1 all-in)

Turn: ($2668.76) 4 (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: ($2668.76) 9 (2 players, 1 all-in)

Total pot: $2668.76

Results:
Hero had K, K (two pair, Kings and nines).
BB had A, A (two pair, Aces and nines).
Outcome: BB won $2668.01
———
No-Limit Hold’em, $4.00 BB (2 handed) – Hold’em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

SB ($2981.35)
Hero (BB) ($2810.59)

Preflop: Hero is BB with A, Q
SB bets $10, Hero raises $40, SB raises $98, Hero raises $286, SB calls $220

Flop: ($660) J, A, 5 (2 players)
Hero checks, SB checks

Turn: ($660) 8 (2 players)
Hero bets $316, SB calls $316

River: ($1292) 6 (2 players)
Hero bets $788, SB calls $788

Total pot: $2868

Results:
SB had 8, 6 (two pair, eights and sixes).
Hero had A, Q (one pair, Aces).
Outcome: SB won $2867.25

Won 10k on New Years Day!

Had a sick session this morning where I managed to make 18 buyins in one sitting. 10 of them were from the same guy at 2/4€. Looks like 2011 is already off to a good start :)

What’s the saying? Oh yea.. Christmas came late this year. Here’s a graph of my progress so far on the new stake deal. Its all 2/4 and 3/6.

Happy New Year!!!

Just wanted to say HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone out here, especially the readers :)

May 2011 bring you closer to your dreams and happiness.

Was on Koh Phangan for new years last night, which was the illest! Never seen so many ppl on one beach. The countdown was the most awesome countdown I’ve ever tried. Imagine 40k people counting down at the same time.

Its 9 am in morning right now. Just sat down to play.

Goal of the day:

- Say Happy New year to all my opponents at the poker tables today
- ???
- Profit

Hand of the day

Hand of the day lol.

No-Limit Hold’em, $6.00 BB (2 handed) – Hold’em Manager Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

BB ($261)
Hero (SB) ($427)

Preflop: Hero is SB with 5, 5
Hero bets $15, BB raises $54, Hero raises $409 (All-In), BB calls $201 (All-In)

Flop: ($522) 2, 2, 7 (2 players, 2 all-in)

Turn: ($522) 6 (2 players, 2 all-in)

River: ($522) 4 (2 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: $522

Results:
Hero had 5, 5 (two pair, fives and twos).
BB had 5, 2 (three of a kind, twos).
Outcome: BB won $521

How to prank your friends on the new Facebook

So I pulled a prank with a lot of my friends the other day. It takes use of the tagged pictures feature on the new facebook. You know the five pictures under their name on their profile page? That shows the last five pictures they were tagged in.

What you do is find a picture that you want to prank your friends with. I chose to go along with a speech bubble theme, where I found a picture with a speech bubble with some text inside. Then you go to this site: http://www.facebooktiles.com/ , which is originally made so you can take a cool picture and put it up on your profile.

After saving the five different pictures from the facebook tiles webpage onto your computer, you upload them in an album to facebook. You then tag each of the five photos with your friends. Remember to tag the pictures in the right order, going right to left. So the left picture is the last one you tag.

I’ve attached the pics I used for the prank in the gallery below if you wanta use them on your friends :P

Here is my final result *evil laughter*:

New stake deal started.

So I finally decided on a stake a few days ago. About 8 contacted me interested in staking me. Some more serious than others. A lot of them were flexible in regards to %, but I ended up going with a friend of mine. We’re gonna be doing 200k hands and the split is one that I’m very satisfied with. My staker wanted me to start at 2/4-3/6 first and then move up to 5/10 a little later, which is fine by me, since like 75% of the hands will be played at those limits anyways.

I’ve had a good start on the first 6k hands.

In other news not much else has been going on at the house. Magnus’ friend Mads dropped by for a couple of weeks. We all went to the Full Moon Party together on the 21st. There were many more people there this time than last time. Im anticipating that New Years Eve on Koh Phangan is going to be phenomenal. Other than that we haven’t really done that much more. We had an american christmas dinner last night at a local place thats owned by a Texan. We had turkey with stuffing, honeyglazed ham with cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes amongst other things for only 20$!! We had originally planned to go out after the dinner, but we were so full, we decided to come home and relax instead.

Tune in tomorrow when I tell about a prank I pulled on my friends on Facebook.

Shopping for a stake deal

Since grinding small stakes is getting kinda boring, I’ve decided it’s time to do some business and get involved in a stake deal again.

I’ve done a few deals before. The first big one I made was in spring 2008 with Morten “pokergirl” Erlandsen, a well known danish pro. The deal was 70/30 in my favor and we started out at 3/6 NL HU. The plan was to reach 118k in profits so I would end up with an 80k roll at the end of the deal. The first month I kinda struggled, breaking even mostly. With some aggressive Bankroll Management I hit my goal in about two and a half months and paid Morten his 35k in profit. I had back to back 200k months, where I played as high as 50/100 NL. I remember my biggest ever pot lost clearly. You’ll find it here: http://www.liquidpoker.net/h/497821

2008 ended with a approx. 240k profit for me.

The second deal I did was last year in September and lasted 217 days. It was a 50/50 deal with my friend Niller, where we both put 20k into a roll to play midstakes NL HU. We would both play and split our profits 50/50. We felt it was a good way to minimise the variance, support each other and learn from each other. We used very conservative bankroll management, where we would move up to a new stake at 70buyins and move down at 55 buyins. It was a very successful project. We managed to make 198k in combined profits, of which I made 135k. I did however also play 70k hands more than him combined over the 7 months. I made 60cents per hand in that deal.

I’m looking to get a stake started for at least 2/4-5/10. Higher than that is also fine, since I always bumhunt at the highest limits that I play. This way I keep my game sharp but also don’t end up with huge swings because of playing regs at the highest limits.

I’ve put up my whole database from Holdemmanager in a few screenshots below. If you check the sessions picture, you can see the earliest ones are from August 2009, so their not exactly lifetime but should give you a good picture of my play, since its 400k hands. Some hands are also missing. Cake poker hands have a habit of not being accurate at all. Obviously if I made 135k from Sept to March without rakeback then my stats would also reflect that, but regardless I feel the stats still give a picture of a winning poker player. If someone is interested in more precise numbers, we can talk in private.

I feel this is a solid deal for anyone who is interested, which is why I’m looking to do a 70/30 on a stake. I’ve played poker full time since July 2006 at mid to high stakes.

I’d prefer to get staked by a HU pro who plays HSNL for obvious reasons. If you’re interested or know someone who would be interested in making some money on a solid investment, I can be reached at Alexamarre (at) gmail dot com.

Good luck at the tables.

Make a donation to Wikipedia. Free knowledge for everyone is important.

Just recieved this email from Wikipedia today and decided to make a recurring payment of 7$ a month. I’ve donated to charity in the past. This is something that is at least just as important as charity. Giving people free access to knowledge is a step closer to more freedom and opportunity for all.

Dear Alex,

Thank you for your donation to this year’s fundraiser. We’re a little more than half-way toward our 2010 goal, so I hope you won’t mind if I ask you to help again.

Most people don’t know this, but I’m a volunteer.

I don’t get paid a cent for my work at Wikipedia, and neither do our thousands of other volunteer authors and editors. When I founded Wikipedia, I could have made it into a for-profit company with advertising, but I decided to do something different.

Commerce is fine. Advertising is not evil. But it doesn’t belong here. Not in Wikipedia.

To keep Wikipedia ad-free, we ask for donations every year on the site. We’re sending you this email because we are scaling up our infrastructure this year, and we’re simply not able to raise the whole budget from the banners alone.

We have an easy way to make an automatic monthly donation to Wikipedia, and we’re looking for people who would like to become sustainers. (Of course you can make a one-time donation as well.)

Please make a monthly recurring gift of $3, $7, $13 — or whatever you can:

http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/WMFRE019/en

Wikipedia is something special. It is like a library or a public park. It is like a temple for the mind. It is a place we can all go to think, to learn, to share our knowledge with others. It is a unique human project, the first of its kind in history. It is a humanitarian project to bring a free encyclopedia to every single person on the planet.

Every single person.

If all of Wikipedia’s 400 million users would donate $1 each, we would have 20 times the amount of money we need. We’re a small organization, and I’ve worked hard over the years to keep us lean and tight. We fulfill our mission, and leave waste to others.

To do this without resorting to advertising, we need you. It is you who keep this dream alive. It is you who have created Wikipedia. It is you who believe that a place of calm reflection and learning is worth having.

This year, please consider making a sustaining monthly donation of whatever amount you like to protect and sustain Wikipedia.

Thanks,

Jimmy Wales
Wikipedia Founder

P.S. — If you can’t commit to a recurring monthly donation, I hope you’ll consider making another one time gift to help us reach our goal before the end of the year. Please make your donation today.

Hot Thai girls!

So we went in to Chaweng Beach a couple of days ago, and decided to check out the Cabaret Shows. It’s all ladyboys who put on the show. The one we went to was on Chaweng Beach Road called Christy’s Cabaret Show. It’s pretty interesting to watch. Some of them you wouldn’t be able to tell areladyboys at first glance and are pretty feminine and sexy.

The cocktails and drinks are a little bit more expensive and the waitress will try and get some tips out of you. It’s still a lot of fun and I would recommend saving some money for after the show for tipping the performers, since they are the whole show.

Heres a few clips of the show we went to. The second clip is harder to see on video so I’ll try and explain what happens. Basically the performer gets on stage as a girl and while singing changes from a woman’s dress to a suit and takes off the makeup. It was an interesting and touching act so I wanted to share it on here.

There’s many reason for guys to become ladyboys or Kathoey, which is the real term. Being Kathoey is more accepted in Thailand than in any other country.

I talked to a few of them and there are varying stories. Some of them felt very feminine from a young age and it was accepted they play with dolls and act like girls, which resulted in them turning kathoey at a later age. Some had horror stories like being sold to rich old white men while they were young boys and being abused by them. Sex tourism is obviously pretty rampant in Thailand is pretty rampant.

Anyway, I don’t wanna get into Kathoey culture too much. Here’s the videos of the show. Enjoy and if you ever go to Thailand, be sure to check out a cabaret show.