The following was written 6-29, my last night in Bangkok

9:03PM Bangkok at the night time is the best time. It’s too bad I’m pooped from the day of heat and walking.

One would do better to sleep during the day and adventure at night.

The following was written yesterday, 6-30, while I was exploring Ayuthaya.

3:46PM I managed to find a festival of some sort next to a bunch of ruins. There are many booths selling a variety of interesting things.

I had a meal of excellent chicken and rice. The lady gave me a few bags of sauce to put on it, and it was delicious. A-roi, as they say here.

They weren’t kidding about the stray dogs around the city. There are packs of them all over. One followed me around the park for a while, so I gave him the left-overs of my meal. He had large wounds over his butt and hind legs. I don’t know where he’s wandered off to now.

People are giving out free samples. Lots of food. One lady put what looked to be hand lotion in my hand and motioned to put it in my hair, so I did. I didn’t bring any shampoo on my trip, so whatever it was, it couldn’t have hurt. I sure smell better, if a little feminine.

All over I get compliments on my hair. I don’t think many Thais see guys with long hair. The lady at Baan Lotus tells me I’m beautiful.

It appears there’s going to be some sort of performance. There’s a stage where they’ve been playing what I think is a recorded speech and now there are people in costume looking like they’re about to perform.

Speaking of people prancing around, lots are sucking some sort of orange liquid out of plastic bags. Maybe I should get one.

A few minutes later I can’t figure out where they’re getting them from. I shall have to follow someone. Stalk them with my ninja ways.

On another note, Thais love their yellow golf-shirts. At first I thought it was some sort of uniform, but everybody and their mother (literally) has one.

5:00PM On my way back to the Guest House I found what I think is the only sane motorcycle taxi in Thailand. At least, he didn’t drive like he was in Grand Theft Auto (with God mode).

The lady who runs the house tells me she has day/night tours daily that leave at 4:40ish. Perhaps I’ll do that tomorrow. I’ve had enough ruins for one day.

It dawned on me earlier today that I don’t have to do the tourist thing. I had been thinking of heading to Chiang Mai tomorrow, but now I think I’ll spend 2 nights here. Tomorrow I’ll just hang around the peaceful guest house – maybe looks at ruins, maybe not.

Perhaps I’ll go back to the Muslim market I found today. They had really good food. One of the juiciest pineapples I’ve ever had.

The only complaint I can render of this place is that the walls are thin. There’s little privacy, in the room or the bathroom.

Speaking of the bathroom…

There’s a sign that says no toilet paper in the toilet, so, when in Asia…

I pressure washed my bum-crack. That was an interesting experience, but I’ll spare you the details. Suffice it to say that I prefer moss as an alternative to toilet paper.

5:53PM I jumped in the shower with all my clothes on. Hey, when you’ve got to do laundry…

The shower is not really a shower, just another hose in the corner of the bathroom. There’s no curtain or anything, so everything gets soaked.

Little else is as relaxing as taking a cold shower and laying naked on the bed under the fan. I think I’ll bust out my ipod and a book.

The following was written yesterday, 6-30, upon my arrival in Ayathaya

12:52PM We ended up making lots of stops on the side of the road, dropping people off and picking them up. Every time, the guy in the yellow shirt would yell something I couldn’t understand and I’d hope that it wasn’t my stop. Though I suppose that wasn’t really possible, since I didn’t have a stop in mind. In the end, I just rode it to the end of the line.

As soon as I stepped off the bus, a tuk-tuk driver offered to take me to the ruins, but I pointed to the guest house in my Lonely Planet and said he could take me there instead. As usual, the 40 Baht he charged me was way too much, but I wasn’t sure where the guest house was in relation to the bus stop, so I agreed. 20 Baht would have been better.

So now I’m sitting on my bed at the Baan Lotus Guest House. I had to leave my shoes outside. I hope it doesn’t rain.

When I was taking my shoes off, a nice old woman came out to greet me. She was excited to see me, and said she only had 1 room left. It’s got two beds in it, but she gave it to me for 300 Baht, which is pretty good. (Suk 11 charged me 250 for the dorm.) It’s not as nice as the Suk, but I like it. No AC, but there’s a fan and a good breeze coming through the windows.

I think I’ll go down to check in and then figure out what I’m doing here.

9:56AM I had toast and prickly fruit for breakfast this morning. The fruit is described by Lonely Planet as resembling “an ancient piece of medieval weaponry,” and that is an apt description.

I’m not sure where I’m heading tomorrow. Choices are Chiang Mai, Phitsanulok, or Sukhothai.

I think I’ll go out and see if I can find some internet now.

12:14PM It took me a couple hours of getting lost, but I finally found Soi 1, the backpacker ghetto, and plenty of cheap internet. The computer I’m on is a P2 with 64MB of RAM. Impressed?

Speakeasy claims I’m getting 254k down and 188k up, though it feels like less.

It’s July already. I wasn’t sure of the date till yesterday. The time zone shifts messed me up.

The following was written 6-30, as I was leaving Bangkok for Ayuthaya

10:45 Made it! The Skytrain got me close to the bus terminal, but I was still walking around for half an hour, trying to find the damn place. A friendly motorcycle taxi stopped me and offered to get me there for 20 Baht (I had planned to walk in the first place because I thought the weight of my backpack would tip the motorcycle over.) In retrospect, it was like 2 blocks away and 20 Baht was way too much. But that’s like $0.50, so I won’t complain.

The driver pointed me in the direction of the terminal for Ayuthaya when we got here. A bunch more friendly Thais helped me get to the ticket window and, a 50 Baht ticket later, I wait here at Terminal 113 for my air-conditioned bus.

I got here at 10:45 and the bus leaves at 11:00. It’s like I knew what I was doing.

10:57AM Just jumped on the bus. My ticket says I’m in seat A4, but I don’t see any assigned seats, so I just grabbed a seat behind the guy in fatigues.

You see a lot of military looking guys just wandering around Bangkok. It’s strange.

Yesterday when I was walking by some Naval building, one guy pointed to the entrance and then pointed his fingers at me like a gun. I guess he didn’t want me to go in there. Not that I planned to.

We’ve started moving.

And the bus just died.

It seems Thai bus drivers are just as crazy as the rest of Thai drivers. This guy is honking like crazy.

I should have brought a video camera and filmed Speed 3.

I’m the only Farang on the bus. Of course, there’s only about 12 people on here.

My seat appears to be infested with ants.

Bumpy ride. I wonder if I’ll be able to read this to type it up later.

11:10AM The guy just came by and took my ticket, so at least I know I’m on the correct bus. That’s a relief.

11:33AM We just stopped and picked up a couple more people in the middle of the highway. Strange.

I forgot to mention that this morning in the shower I noticed a couple bug bites. Malaria is only supposed to be a problem in the Northern border areas, though. And I only have a limited supply of drugs, which I’ll need since I’m heading there soon.

I just saw a sign for “The Church of Our Lady Mother of God”. God has a mother now? That oughta shake things up a bit for the Christians. I’m glad to see that someone has come to their senses and decided that if you’re going to have a god, and you’re going to assign it a gender, it only makes sense that it’s female. Plus, “The Church of Our Gentleman Father of God” just doesn’t have the same ring.

The following was written 6-30, my last morning in Bangkok

7:00AM I’ve never seen such rain! Or heard it, for that matter. It’s amazing the city keeps from flooding.

Bangkok is full of surprises.

The following was written 6-29, in Bangkok

8:30AM BK Time The plane ride to Bangkok was uneventful. I slept all of the way. We arrived a little early. 11:30PM, I think. After going through Passport Control, I went to collect my backpack – which, thankfully, made it through unscathed. On my way out of the airport terminal, lots of private taxi companies tried to give me a ride to the red light district. I ignored them, and went out to wait for the Airport Bus, which is supposed to run every 30 minutes till 00:30 (I have to get used to 24-hr time. Everyone uses it here), but the bus never came. So I walked over to get a meter taxi.

Of course, I luck out and get the taxi driver who keeps moaning like he’s going to pass out right there and keeps an empty cigarette box next to him that he spits in every few minutes. His English was more or less limited to “Name hotel?” and even after I gave him the direction card to the hostel, the best he could do was get me to the right street. Not the best experience, and I’ve been avoiding taxis since.

After wandering around the Soi (side street) for a while, a taxi driver and two different tuk-tuk drivers helped me find where I was supposed to go. Their friendliness made up for the taxi ride. So after walking around for about 20 minutes at 1AM, I arrive at the hostel, dripping sweat.

After checking in, I drop dead on the first empty bed in the dorm that I see.

I woke up the next day around 8AM – in time for the hostels free breakfast of bread and fruit. Quite tasty, especially after airplane food. After that, I ventured out and explored most all of the areas that the Skytrain went to (it’s cheap and air-conditioned). Plenty of people tried to sell me cheap tours and prostitutes, which got annoying after a while. Around 2PM I cam back to the air-conditioned dorm room, figuring I’d read a little and maybe take a nap. As soon as I got on the bed I was out.

I woke up around 8PM, but it was dark out and, for some reason, I wasn’t hungry, so I just thought “screw it” and went back to sleep. Not exactly smart, as sleeping half the day isn’t going to help me get over jet lag. Though I think my exhaustion is more from heat than the time zone. I woke up this morning at 7AM, took a cold shower and washed my shirt, underwear, and socks. Then I went down to breakfast, and now I sit on my bed, writing this.

I’m not looking forward to going out again today, but know I should (and stay out – all day). Bangkok is chaotic, hot, and smells worse than Tacoma. Which isn’t to say it’s all bad, but I’m looking forward to moving on. I suppose today I should go out and do all the tourist stuff. The Skytrain is really limited and only takes you around “new” Bangkok. All the tourist stuff is near the river in “old” Bangkok, so I don’t know how I’ll get there. An air-con taxi sounds nice, but is probably the most expensive option. Perhaps I should figure out how the bus system works.

It’s going to be hot. It’s probably about 75-80F here in the air-conditioned room – about the top of my comfort level. And it’s only 9AM. It rained a little yesterday, but that didn’t help it cool down any. Well, I guess I’ll go brave the streets. Wish me luck. I need to get to an ATM, too.

10:00AM BK Time You haven’t lived till you’ve risked life and limb, weaving in and out of the streets of Bangkok on the back of a motorcycle. (They should make a Fast and the Furious movie here.) I was worried the driver wouldn’t take me to the right place, but he did. 150 Baht later, I’m at the Grand Palace. IT’d be nice to get a tour guide to tell me what I’m looking at, but I’m to cheap for that.

There’s hundreds of people here. White is still a minority.

Aah, a breeze…

I wonder if I got lice from that motorcycle helmet.

1:35PM Bangkok Time I’m at Wat Pho now. Home of the giant Reclining Buddha and the Thai Massage School. I think next I’ll go to the National Museum, which is probably air-conditioned. By the way, I’ve devised a new system to find one’s way around Bangkok. I found Wat Pho by walking in the general direction and waiting for someone to approach me and tell me the Wat was closed today. If I stopped hearing that, I picked another direction to walk in. And it worked! After all, here I am.

I find Thais are much more friendly here in the tourist part of town. I’m not topped every block by a tuk-tuk driver offering me a tour, because I’m already here.

Though I love the Suk 11, I wish it was in a better location.

Oh, I have plans for tonight: an air-con movie theatre! There’s a couple in Siam Square and from there I can Skytrain back to the Suk.

A cat just jumped on the bench with me. There are a lot of stray cats and dogs around Bangkok.

There’s lots of school groups the Wats, too. The little girls all get really excited if you wave and say hello. It’s funny. I kinda feel sorry for them in their uniforms. Must be hot.

The following was written 6-27, while I was waiting at the gate at Sea-Tac

11:31AM PDT Security was a breeze. I didn’t beep going through the detector. No one checked my obviously military backpack or my obviously military daypack. Funny, that.

They’re blasting CNN here at the gate. The news is kinda depressing.

By the way, when I was checking in they thought I was Pedro Honduras flying to Toronto. Oops. They found my my Double Agent identity.

The following was written 6-26, during my lay-over in Tokyo

4:00PM Tokyo Time So that was a 9 hour flight. Which is close to 19…

Shows how much planning and prep work I’ve done for this trip. I’m pretty much winging the whole thing.

Tokyo gets my vote for best western toilets. Those things are nice. The squatting toilets scare me, though. Squatting in the woods is one thing, but on porcelain? That scares me.

My body knows it’s midnight, but can’t figure out why it’s light out. (We followed the sun here. It wasn’t dark once.) I want to sleep, but I’m afraid I’ll miss my flight. Narita is nice, but there isn’t much to do here. So I’m just gonna sit here for 2 hours. Then sit on a plane for another 6.

I’m in Siam Square now. A place called MBK Center. It’s an 8 story shopping mall, pretty much. The internet cafe here is nice. They advertise 8Mbps and AMD 64-bit processors. Not very secure though, if you know what I mean.

I never did go to the National Museum today. Instead, I got lost and walked around the city for 3 hours. I think I’m getting over the heat now – though I say that sitting here in an air-conditioned mall. No, I don’t think I am getting over it. I’m drinking a lot more water, though. That helps.

7-11 here is like Starbucks in the States. There’s one on every corner, and if there isn’t room in a building, they setup in a booth on the sidewalk. A large bottle of water is 9 Baht. I’ve probably gone through 5 today. I’m really going to have to pee tonight.

Did you know that your body uses a lot of heat keeping your pee warm? So if you’re setting down for a cold night in the woods, take a good piss before bed so that your body can use that heat for better purposes. Random fact from survival training.

There’s a Baskin Robbins here. I had a scoop of chocolate. Man, that was good. They brought me a glass of ice water, too. Ice is generally a no-no here, but it looked to cold too pass up. So if I die in the next day or two, sue Baskin Robbins.

I’m debating whether I want to see a movie or not. There’s three theatres in the Siam Square area. All of them are playing Superman Returns, except for the one in this building, which is also showing Tokyo Drift. Neither of the films really appeal to me. There’s ads for Dead Man’s Chest all over the city.

Today is my last day in Bangkok. At least that was the idea. Now I’m starting to like the city. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll head north tomorrow, maybe I won’t. This is the last night I have reserved at the Suk 11, though.

I was planning on heading over to the station today to seeing about getting a train or bus ticket to somewhere for tomorrow, but that never happened. So I guess I’ll just wing that – hopefully I can buy the ticket a few hours before departure. I’m thinking about heading to Ayuthaya, and from there to Chiang Mai. Perhaps I’ll stop at Lopburi, but that seems to be the same thing as Ayuthaya, plus gangs of monkeys.

The Buddhist monks walking around the city aren’t exactly what I was expecting. Something about monks with cell phones and digital cameras just doesn’t seem right. I saw a tour bus full of monks at one Wat.

The Speakeasy speed test says I’m getting 1.4k down and 134k up. That’s from the Seattle node.

I clicked on the little thing that was giving me a count down of how much time I have left and now it went away. Doh.

The food stalls in Bangkok are awesome. I’ve been snacking all day. But I think I might grab dinner here. Did I mention there’s a KFC and McDonald’s? Depressing.

It’s sad that us Farang have to be so weary of Thai approaching us in the street. The vast majority are incredibly friendly. This morning while I was walking down the street from the hostel, two guys at a tuk-tuk stopped me. One tried to tell me that the Grand Palace was closed today, but the other guy shut him up. He said that traffic was too bad for a tuk-tuk, thus giving up money for himself. He then said I should take a motorcycle and, when I agreed, ran down the block to get me one. I was worried that the driver would try to take me to some silk/gem shop or some other scam, but he went straight to the Grand Palace and asked for the previously agreed upon price. Throughout the day, other Thais stopped me on the street. Some wanted me to buy something or tried to tell me something was closed, but the majority just wanted to talk. They always get excited when they hear I’m an American. Not sure why.

As nice as this mall is, the Thai music is getting to me. Not as bad as Japanese pop, but bad. I think – yup, they’re playing Spice Girls now.

I went to a weapon museum in the Grand Palace today. There was a whole lot of blades there. Guns, too. Speaking of which, I stumbled upon this two block stretch that was nothing but gun shops. I bet I could walk out of there with enough arms to start a small army, with not even an ID check. Bangkok is funny like that. They should have filmed Blade Runner here.

Well, I think I’m going to see about dinner. Long live the king, and all that.

The following was written 6-27, on the flight from Seattle to Tokyo

4:31PM PDTI think it’s just setting in how long this flight is. 19 hours, they say. We’ve only been airborne for 2.5. Think of what one could do in 19 hours. A hell of a lot more than sit in a plane and watch Firewall multiple times (which was a horrible movie, by the way). But I suppose it’s better than taking a boat…

I’m one of the few white people on here. Seriously, there’s like 10 of us. It’s kinda funny to watch the flight attendants – they have to decide whether they should speak Japanese or English whenever they want to talk to someone. So far its been all English with me. Which is good, as my Nihongo is a bit rusty.

I wonder how the Tokyo airport will be. Cooped up for 3 hours…

I hope people there will take USD so I can get decent food.

They served us lunch here, which was chicken worse than the teriyaki on Amtrak. But it was a large lunch, at least.

By the way, what’s up with Japanese guys and alcohol? All three Japanese business men in my row have ordered beer and wine. Is that a cultural thing, or did I just luck out? I’m indulging myself in water while I still know it’s clean.

I hope my backpack makes it. That’s really gonna suck if I loose that. There isn’t much money or any papers in it, just stuff.

I wonder if I’ll sleep? I usually don’t sleep in cars. It’s not even 5PM here and they turned the lights down and closed the shutters already.

7:19PM Is it bad when they ask if there’s a doctor or nurse aboard?

10:45PM I’m confused. Judging by the map, we couldn’t be more than an hour or two from Tokyo. Yet we’ve only been airborne for 8 hours and 45 minutes. I swear somebody told me this was supposed to be a 19 hour flight.

The only possible explanation is that we somehow jumped through a worm hole and apes now rule the Earth.

You’d think it would be difficult to screw up beef and noodles. At least I would. You got your beef, got your noodles, and bam! Beef n’ noodles. Oh well. It looked better than the pasta.

What’s this Japanese Tea I keep being offered? I highly doubt that if if I asked for Japanese Tea in Japan that anyone would know what I was talking about. And if it isn’t some American-ized title for a certain tea, it needs a better name.