Crazy Bangkok Part 2

We sat down at the table and one of the Thai managers came to us and said: “Would you like a breakfast buffet” Indeed we did! 250 baht for both of us – buffet with coke. Making a quick conversion we realized that we only paid 67 rand for both of us. Just got to love that exchange rate!

As we finished our breakfast we went out to have a smoke, we thought by ourselves what are we going to do till 2 pm in the afternoon??? So I said to Brian let’s take a walk and go explore Bangkok. That said we left everything at the hotel (with the help of the VERY friendly doorman) and started walking. As we walked we realized that, that was not the best decision we made in a heat of 45 degrees Celsius   and we were wearing jeans… so we only went to the 7/11 to buy some coke and more smokes as we ran out of smokes.

We got at the hotel and the manager asked us do we want to take a swim upstairs. We looked at each other and said:  ’’Why the %$#@* didn’t you asked sooner??!!”

So we started our day of with a big hot bang when we arrived in Bangkok, and finally checked in to the hotel. When we got our room of course the first thing we wanted to do =  sssshhhower!!!!! And after that my words to Brian: “DUDE I’m off to bed now” left us in the bliss of dreamland from about 2.30 pm to 5pm. My stomach (that has a whole life of its own) told me it is time for McDonald’s - the McDonalds that I saw earlier that day when we were on our way to the hotel. Off we went starting to explore and hopefully find the McDonald’s (I was not ready yet for the weird food that Asia has to offer).  After walking for a while Brian (it felt like a half marathon to him) said:  “ Dude where is the McDonalds that you saw ’’  I was hoping he would not ask THAT question… cause my internal GPS was still kinda screwed in the new city. We both agreed - okay we are lost in this big city and decided to call in the help of a Tuk Tuk (Thai taxi).
 

We showed him our small card with the hotel address on and he said he will have us back at the hotel in no time. He overheard Brian mentioning to me that we wanted to go to the McDonald’s and now we have to settle for something else. Very excited the Tuk tuk driver replied from the front: “Oh go McDonald’s…” We didn’t even let him finish before we replied with a (very) desperate “YES!” (By this time I don’t know what was louder – the sound of the little engine or the sound of my over-hungry stomach). Finally got to the McDonald’s and the Tuk tuk Driver offered very helpful:  ‘’ I wait here. You go quick’’. We got our McDonald’s after staring at the menu for hours deciding what to get. (The typical situation where one takes longer to decide what to eat than what it is going to take to actually eat it). We thought that we will have to walk back since we took so long, but nope - the tuk tuk driver waited on his spot and took us back to the hotel (we realized that we were not lost since it was only about 2km’s from our hotel that the guy picked us up). After stuffing ourselves with Western food we were ready to really go and explore ‘’The Big City ‘’. The first destination to go explore would be a night market that we saw on our way back to the hotel. (No we have not learned our lesson of going to places “that we saw” on our way somewhere.) Brian suggested we practice our Thai bargaining phrases.

Crazy Bangkok Part 1

Sitting in the car of a mad, tiny Thai lady we tried to absorb everything that we saw - pointing out new and weird cars, giving excited yells whenever we saw a temple or anything “Thai”. And even with all of this happening around us, it still did not fully sink in that we are actually in a different country. It just kind of felt as if we were at some unfamiliar place in our own country - or at least until the Thai lady suddenly starts speaking to us in what sounded like Thai. Steven and I looked at each other with faces that spoke of both confusion and excitement. Confusion – what the heck did she say?! Excitement -  whooohooo, we can test our Thai phrases that we studied.

After a wild trip with the maniac Thai lady (skipping the traffic lights, looking in her mirror while talking to us, cutting in front of other cars, going up one way streets  to name but a few) she finally dropped us of at the hotel, gave us our luggage and disappeared of into the big city ….

Brian and I went into the hotel and the lady greeted us with a big smile, and the customary “Sawatdee kha” with a nice little “wai”.  We then wanted to check into the hotel the lady asked for our names because obviously we made reservations. She checked for our reservations and the dreaded: ‘sir we can’t find u on our list” happened to us. Brian and I looked at one another and the thought: “ *#%@#% is this a scam???? “ crossed our minds for that one second.

        

Brian checked on his phone to get the number of our Thai-agent. After looking at the email (that we received from our agent) that we showed her, she said ‘’ oh, this is not the right hotel’’ and she gave us directions to the right hotel.

Brian and I were thinking by ourselves: “what are we going to do if this is a total scam?”  We got at the “new”, checking in attempt number 2 - she looked on the system and then . . .  

‘Brian and Steven welcome to H-residence Sathorn”. RELIEVE!!! Now we can check in and take a hot shower and reeessstt, but…unfortunately you can only check-in at 2 pm. Not the best news for travelers at 8 am in the morning.

Abu Dhabi to Bangkok

You grab your hand luggage out of the overhead compartment because any other bodily need is now second to your craving for a small puff on your little stick of nicotine. (They claim to have smoke detectors in the toilet on the airplane – but after seeing what that hole in the toilet can do, I WOULD NOT go in there again. You run through all the ninja-dressed people – please do not say “ninja” out loud… You look on your handy watch on your Blackberry and see that you have another hour to fill your lungs with the foul taste of Marlboro. The most important phrase to learn when you go to a foreign country? Where the heck can I smoke and what is the quickest way to get there? You get to the smoking area – you don’t even need to have your own cigarettes, you can just inhale the big clouds of smoke hanging around you. You check your phone to see if you can send a message to the very worried parents to say that you arrived in the hot ninja-filled country and the little Blackberry in your hand automatically updates your time. First thought – COOOOOOL. Second thought – oh shit I can’t finish this cigarette because I have 10 minutes to find (and get through) customs and board the new airplane. 

Give your cigarette to the closest nicotine starving stranger and start running. Nothing attracts more attention than two disorientated foreigners running through a very busy Abu Dhabi struggling to keep their hand luggage intact.

You get through customs in less than 2 minutes – this is a well-oiled machine I tell you. You get to the official and realize he does not understand a word of English or Afrikaans or any amount of hand gestures. Hand him your ticket and he points you to the waiting area. You sit and wait for the plane and think about your cigarette that some stranger is enjoying now. While waiting some sms’s gets sent – now that is expensive. Thank you Vodacom for worldwide coverage and the ability to empty airtime with 3 sms’s… And then you get your boarding call. Down the pathway again to the seat that will provide you with the next 6 hours of torture. Movies, gadgets, games, movies, games, music, gadgets, gadgets, gadgets, movies.

Finally we arrive in the land of smiles and the last thing you want to do is … smile. Go through customs and get your passport stamped and get your Visa paper. Play “I spy” and grab your luggage from the carousel. Walk up and down to find the nice little lady that will take you to bliss – aka your air-conditioned hotel room somewhere in crazy Bangkok. She greats you with a piece of paper that has you name on and you master a radiant smile. Follow her to breath in the air of your new home. OR NOT. You get hit by a wall of humid air and with short breaths you tell her: “I need to smoke”. Lovely little things - cigarettes.

The journey to Abu Dhabi

The journey to Abu Dhabi

So after an amazing (already life changing) 3 weeks in Thailand I decided to start this blog. Follow this amazing journey that Steven and I undertook to the beautiful land of smiles.

The adventure started out on the 10^th of August with Steven and me boarding the train on O.R. International airport in Johannesburg South Africa. One bag of luggage for the both of us to share and one bag of hand luggage for each of us were all that we took with into the unknown. (Don’t be fooled by the one bag of hand luggage each – this only consisted out of one pillow each. Take your pillow with you and you will feel at home anywhere in the world.) Our philosophy – travel light and make the journey as easy as possible. Foreign currency (Thai Baht) stitched into our pockets, Passports in hand and mixed emotions of excitement, sadness and a hint of fear we were ready for the queue at customs. 

After our sad goodbyes we queued at customs. Deodorant had to be taken out of the bags and the bottle of contact lenses solution raised an eyebrow or two. But alas, through we went. Down the narrow walkway all the way up to the Etihad-airways airplane door

 

A very friendly stewardess greeted us with a humble “wai” (this is the Thai way of showing respect. A gesture where you hold the palms of your two hands together in front of you in a prayer-like way and the bow your head.) Economy class it was. Two seat next to each other – one window and one isle seat. Stuffing your luggage into the small compartment above the seats you hope that everything will go well and say your short prayer and ask God to bless the journey.

And so we took our seats. A massive comfortable seat for any midget that is not taller than 50cm. But for two big, above 180cm and 80kg, blokes this promised to be a very uncomfortable 8 hours. And then we started to see all the gadgets – nothing gets any testosterone driven machine as excited as a few high tech gadgets. The monitor in the seat in front of you promised a world of entertainment once you are thousands of kilometers above solid earth and crossing over the borders of your beloved country.

So we started to test the gadgets  - flipped our seats up and down, tested the console to operate the technical box of fun in front of us, looking in the seat pockets what is up for grabs and oh ya we messaged the folks that we are “comfortable” in our seats. You know how family and friends can stress when you are going into the world of adventure and they have to sit at home-boring-home.

On came the seatbelt light and the captain said “welcome to Etihad airways” we are leaving right on schedule and will arrive in Abu Dhabi right on time – 19:50. The airplane taxied out and we waved through the little windows (which is kind of useless because the folks waving out of the ginormous windows can’t see you through the window that was created for the world of midgets. Then the massive engines kicked in and the excitement grew. We were air borne. Leaving the place that we called home for the last 27 (Brian) and 19 (Steven) years. The only land we ever knew – never going farther than the coastline of home country.

Cool gadget number one that we tested – front camera. Amaaazing. It is a small camera mounted on the front of the plane and you can see how you take off and how the ground is just falling away under the massive iron bird. Obviously this started to bore two add guys within the first 10 minutes and we switched to gadget number two – BOTTOM camera. Again – amaaazing. You can see everything that is going on underneath the plane. Again we were bored after 5 minutes – how interesting can it be to watch cities and trees? So we switched to the next gadget. And this gadget turned out to be our best friend after 6 or 7 hours in the air. This is a nifty little program that shows you your flight path, temperature outside (useless but cool), temperature inside (as if the senses in your skin does not work properly), altitude (scary) and speed that you are travelling at (very cool – will my bike be able to do that?). So this gadget (cool as it was) also bored us after a few minutes.

Movie time! But more importantly – drinking time! The friendly stewardess heaved the massive trolley up the isle and you think by yourself – if they can make trolleys that big why the heck can’t they make seats that big?! And now we were faced with the choice – which (alcohol-filled) beverage should we have first? Dad did warn us about getting drunk on the airplane – apparently jetlag sucks when you are drunk – but then again, most things do!

We both opted for some or other very foreign, very cold beer. Was it nice? Dude its beer… And as with any other foul tasting substance that we choose to put into our bodies in the name of fun it is an acquired taste. Well we got the taste, could not acquire it…

Time for food! Whoohoo. Since we did not have breakfast, we were overjoyed with the promise of steamy tummy filling food. We realized it is not only the seats that are small… We figured the amount of food was kept to a minimum to ensure that we will fit easier on your connecting flight’s seats. 

Movie number two. A bit of tetris. Some music. Movie three (halfway). More alcohol. I need to peeeee. Now this is a very challenging bodily function when you are on a monstrous aircraft full of strange people and ogling air stewards. The main problem seemed to be getting the very narrow isle (how the heck did that trolley fit through here), until you get to the toilet and you realize that even in the air people have to queue. So you wait and see how they prepare your next scrumptious meal (snack) in the kitchen (toilet waiting area). Your bladder is telling you all sorts of things of how much liquid there actually were in that small can of beer and that all of that liquid seriously have to get out – NOW! The door open and you rush into the toilet and gets stopped in your tracks by the wall that is right in front of your nose – good luck Pinochio. And you think by yourself: “Self. How many challenges can there possibly be to get rid of one (tiny) can of beer?”. Well you  shift your (number 32) butt out of the way. Lock and relock … and double check the door. Unzip. Aaaaaah! Then you press the little button next to the toilet and you stay the $%&%^&# away from the gaping hole! If they were to design a Kirby with that suction power you will be able to vacuum your house’s carpet in Pretoria while you are standing in Capetown. The satisfying feeling of relieve quickly subsides when you realize you actually have to get back to your seat halfway up the isle and everyone staring at you know that you have just faced the scary hole in the tiny cubicle and touched your winky.

Finally back in your seat. Let’s watch the other half of the movie. And play more games. Look at the gadget – okay so we have been in the air for a whole of 3 hours 15 minutes. Aaaaaargh. The little airplane on the screen shows that we are hanging somewhere above dark, scary Africa.

After another meal and some Vodka (whatever you do - DO NOT order a double. You see they designed the glasses to be in accord with the toilet space and leg room and windows and seats and… and... and. If you put two shots with one ice cube in the glass guess how much OJ you can fir in the glass? NONE!), you watch another movie – foreign movies of which you do not understand a word suddenly gets very entertaining.

Can we just get there?! And so the sound of the pilot’s voice comes over the monitor: “jkwlfgyw oidahfi isoswosw ugvfty!”. Yup you heard right – apparently it roughly translate to: “Whoohoo we are in Abu Dhabi. Thank you for supporting our fight against big people and enjoying our inflight beverages designed to get you drunk and not full”.