March 16, 2006
Package from Thialand
Last week my final package from Thailand arrived here in Zürich. The most exciting item was my new pair of slippers from the Luang Pabang (Laos) night market. Second on the excitement list was my $3 refugee blanket that kept me warm during my first week in Laos. The rest of the parcel contained books I’ve read along the way, my malfunctioning iPod (confirmed dead), the unused underwater camera case for my stolen Sony DSC-T1 (grrrr), and the carry bag for my new Canon 350D with manuals. The week before, a tube with handmade paper from Laos and a painting arrived. Sadly, the tube was dented resulting in damage to the painting. The handmade paper is fine and I plan to use it for little projects and wrapping gifts.
Posted by stu at 08:21 PM | Comments (1)
February 07, 2006
Bangkok to Krabi
After arriving at Bangkok’s aging airport, where the immigration queues seem to only get more and more disorganized with time, I cleared the authorities with no problems in about 45 minutes. Then it was a 380 Baht metered taxi ride to the Ambassador Hotel where I’ve been staying on my previous visits to Bangkok. This time I went for the cheapo room in the main wing, #408 at ~US$50 per night for three nights. This time around my impressions of the establishment went from ‘ok’ to ‘shit’. They kept forgetting to stock my room with towels, the television had intermittent reception, and the lobby lounge people now were adding 17% in taxes and service charges, unlike my previous visits. (I was spending a lot of time there blogging, processing photos and uploading photos to the website gallery which I was several weeks behind on.) They also refused to take my American Express card, which was on deposit. I called up Swisscard and they told me the expiry date they entered was incorrect and my paranoid mind thinks they did that to make an extra few bucks. (AmEx changes 3% to the vendor, while Visa and MasterCard charge 2%.) An illuminati conspiracy, clearly. My only revenge was scamming a free breakfast buffet (380 Baht.)
Other than that, I hit the Bumrangdi Hospital for some cosmetic stuff (penis reduction, etc.) and spent many hours down at the hotel pool. The swimming and sunbathing area was much more relaxed. They guys running the area knew that I liked two towels, to sit in the water reading at the shallow end, and that my Singha beers should be served in buckets full of ice. No silly taxes, either.
I did pop out onto Sumkhumvit Road to take some pictures (not too exciting) and buy four dodgy Video CDs that I might like but probably will not. Video CDs from this region are generally of poor quality, frequently subtitled in Chinese, Thai or whatever, and sometimes don’t even play all the way through. The titles include Underworld: Evolution, War of the World (the Scientologist version), Fantastic Four, and Doom all at 100 Baht each. Screw the MPAA.
One big mistake was not arranging transportation down to Krabi in southern Thailand well in advance, which kept me in Bangkok a full four days. In the end I had to settle for an 800 Baht overnight private minibus service, which to date had been avoided. There are many horror stories about getting ripped off, uncomfortable seating, overbooking, wrong destinations, and remote drop off points with extortionist taxi drivers waiting in lay. I caught my first of three busses at the hotel—a 10 passenger poorly air-conditioned minivan that drove us around central Bangkok for over two hours picking people up. (Actually, I was the third to last person so others must have suffered more.) At about 6:30pm they drop us off at a centralized, private bus station where they split us up into destinations. About an hour later many of us board a monster double-decker 60pax bus that is actually fairly comfortable. I sat up front top side on the left isle seat beside an Irish woman whose name eludes me. Our bus was delayed while there drunken Irish-folk (two guys and gal) argued incoherently with the drivers for a good thirty minutes. In the end they boarded the bus. The Irish woman, who was on a year long RTW trip spoke about various topic until about 11pm when we finally fell asleep.
Side note: The Irish women used to live outside of Cologne, Germany which I’ve been to many times including Jon and Jen’s wedding in the spring of 2002. My good friend Dave and I went up to that festive occasion via first class train carriages. It’s a long haul and Dave got totally inebriated—to the point that he was only semi-lucid and knocked over a beer onto the two passengers in the cabin with us. They had been politely ignoring us up until then, but after my profound apology (Dave was completely unaware of the drama) one of the fellow passengers asked “So, I guess I have the right to ask: Are your Irish?” I recited this story to my new Irish travel mate and she actually thought it was funny. :D
Anyway, at about 1230am we pulled into a soup kitchen, probably owned by the driver’s family, for food. One of the drunken Irishmen hopped out, puked his guts and then passed out on the ground until we were ready to leave. At about six in the morning we pulled into Surat Tani where we again awaited new busses to take us to new destinations—Krabi for me, Koh Samui for my new Irish friend, Ranong for this other Australian guy, etc. After an hour of sleepily pacing about the station, an older former 40pax government bus pulled and several of us jumped onto it. Soon I was fast asleep and was surprised to find myself in Krabi at 9:30am. (The lady who sold me the ticket said I would arrive about 3pm.) So I quickly grabbed a 150 Baht motorbike driver and was off for Ao Nang (aka Ao Phra Nang) Beach that, according to my Rough Guide to Thailand, is the diving hub of Krabi.
After about thirty minutes of wandering around fully packed I settled into room Bream Guesthouse the 300 Baht per night. I’ve got a fairly clean room about 50 meters from the beach with shared facilities. (Cold shower, but it’s 30C, so whatever.)
I have arrived. Sun, beaches and diving are on the agenda. Also somewhat excitingly the Norwegian Terje who I met in Sam Neua, Laos is in the region and we will probably meet up. Life is good.
Posted by stu at 06:00 PM | Comments (0)
November 13, 2005
Chiang Mai to Hong Kong trip
The trip down to Bangkok was pretty fun. After consuming my bottle of wine, the cheese and some of the bread (which turned out to be days old rubbery stuff) I met a couple from Germany. Hannes and Ola are from Ulm, a city in the south of Germany that is the birth place of Albert Einstein. We played ‘guess what this Swiss German word/phrase is’. After a few beers in the ‘party wagon’ we decided to leave when we realized how drunk the Piper 100 sipping staff were—they were getting confused as to how many drinks we had.
On this journey the train was on time and I made a hasty exit at the Bangkok airport around 0530. Since my flight was not until 1320, there was plenty of time to kill...too much, in fact. After reading several dozen pages of Spycatcher, wandering the length of both check-in halls, paying too much for internet access and multiple lattes, I was finally able to check in for my Emirates Airlines flight EK384 en route from Dubai to Hong Kong.
The flight was running about two hours behind schedule. While waiting at the gate a Latino man came up to me and asked “Are you from New York?” Ah...no. We chatted about how late the flight was, his dozen years of living in NYC, charity work in Thailand (me) and his native Honduras (him) and the various levels of service we experienced with different airlines. This last topic is one I’ve had before with many people and can state, for the record and unequivocally, Singapore Airlines rocks and all American-flagged carriers do not meet the expectations of the experianced traveler.
Posted by stu at 11:50 PM | Comments (0)
October 19, 2005
Heading for Koh Payam
Tuesday afternoon most of us at Child’s Dream departed for various destinations—Koh Payam for myself, Hanoi for Pam, back home to Hong Kong for Gene (Pam’s friend), and I forget where for the rest. Pam, Gene and I were all heading to Bangkok on our first legs of our journeys, so we took an overnight sleeper train together down south. At Marc and Daniel’s suggestion, we picked up three bottles of wine, various cheeses, and a box of assorted crackers. It was also Gene’s 33rd birthday so Pam organized a cheesecake complete with candles, Christmas balloons, and a ‘Happy Birthday Gene’ sign.
Once the train got underway Pam and I pretended to hit the restaurant carriage while Gene grooved on his iPod. This is where the fun begins. Pam couldn’t blow up the balloons so I had to do that while she tied them to a piece of yellow thread. The wind in train carriage was strong so we could not light the candles. But it was all worth it as Gene was genuinely surprised as we greeted him with the cake, balloons and a weakly sung ‘Happy Birthday’.
Then we started on the cheese cake and broke out the wine. We had to compensate for a slight oversight: no plates or utensils. It is quite a messy affair to eat cheesecake on a bouncing train with only a Swiss army knife and shreds of cardboard substituting for plates and spoons. But it was certainly tasty! As were the three bottles of wine, one white and two read, which went very quickly.
(Picture removed because Pamela threatened my life.) By the time we did finish the wine off, we were the only people on the train having fun. The Aussie couple forward of us ignored us so much that they resisted taking a picture at our request. After Gene and I got into a little political debate about the Bush administration, the two French creeps just stared at us in amazement until I toasted them with my wine glass and smiled. Pam started off with a small wine spill on her shirt, followed through with a few slashes on me and the floor, dropped her hair bungee out the train window during a stop, and finished up with two major spills onto her own legs. Then she broke out the brie and got really messy with it—eating the cheese like a two year old without a bib.
More booz was definitely necessary, so I headed down three cars to the ‘party carriage’ where the katoey barmaid begged us to come hang out down there. “We need to stay near our luggage” was my defense making a quick exit after buying a bottle of “Piper 100” (the label actually reads “100 Pipers”) and three cokes. After one round it became clear our dear sloppy drunk Pamela was finished for the evening after she hurled out the train window.
Gene was the gentleman in this case, and held her at the window, patted her back, put her in bed and gave her sympathy. I played the insensitive bastard role by just taking a few photos.
With the Piper 100 only a quarter gone, Gene and I retired to the smoking lounge (aka: the space between two carriages) to discuss politics, Hong Kong, and other interesting tidbits. In his drunken stupor he offered to let me stay at his flat the next time I’m in Hong Kong (November). I certainly hope he remembers! Once the whiskey was finished we headed for bed. Pam woke us up at about 0600 with ‘Are we there yet? It is almost six!” The train was due into BKK at 0605. My connecting train was at 0745 and Pam’s flight at around 0845. It was going to be tight for them, but I was surely fucked.
Pam and Gene got off at the airport and I certainly hope they made there flights. An hour later I pulled into the Bangkok train station at 0915 with a hangover, heavy beard growth, and no tolerance of sunlight. After exchanging my ticket for one tomorrow I headed for the Ambassador hotel to catch some much need sleep. Blah.
(Somehow I think Pamela is going to demand that I edit this blog entry a little heavily, so enjoy it while you can!)
Posted by stu at 05:53 AM | Comments (0)
September 20, 2005
Entry into Thailand
Immigration was absolutely hell in Bangkok. It was about 0015 when I first got into the immigration hall, and it was fairly chaotic--poorly defined lines, tired and aggressive passengers, and not enough staff to keep it all together. I was lucky and moved quickly to a newly opened queue which probably halved my waiting time. Afterwards, I was met by the Asia Airport Hotel guy who whisked me away to the safety of a cold, quiet room on the 17th floor of the hotel.
The plan over the next few days is to get train tickets to Chiang Mai, get some contact lens refills, pick up some flip-flops cheap, go to the hospital and have this minor red spot next to my nose removed (purely a vanity thing), purchase a 'losable' wallet, and visit a dentist for my six month cleaning. All of this should be dirt cheap.
Bangkok is just waaaaaay too big for my tastes. And too crazy. And too polluted. And just so completely overrun with hordes of package tourists, sex tourists, and aggressive merchants. Blah...counting the seconds until my train for Chiang Mai.
Posted by stu at 06:13 AM | Comments (1)