Alaska- yes we flew over Alaska and Russia! |
It was a long plane ride.
Thirteen hours to Hong Kong, four hours in Hong Kong
and another two and a half hours to Bangkok.
We both watched three movies on the plane so our brains were slowly
turning into cauliflower. I know lots of
you have done longer plane rides or bus rides or such like. So, you win.
I did a twenty-four hour bus ride once, though, when I was young and
foolish. The key words there were
“young” and “foolish”. Now, I am old
and foolish and so it is not so easy anymore.
By the time we got to Bangkok it was 1:30 am here and
we had left at 6:00 am Victoria time. By
my calculations we had been up for about 24 hours by the time we arrived. It is a good thing that the check-in at the
hotel was smooth as neither of us was actually functional at that point. The amazing thing was that the roads were
busy and people were on the street. At
1:30 am at home the roads are deserted and if you walked into a hotel the
person who checked you in would have hair sticking out in all directions and
they would sound like Elmer Fudd.
Bangkok has a reputation. It changes your perception
of what you see. When we arrived at the
hotel there were quite a number of provocatively dressed Thai women standing
around in the lobby and walking in and out of the main doors. My first thought was that they were there to
make money. Later I learned that there
is a nightclub in the hotel. Now those
girls don’t look any different from any girls one would see in downtown
Victoria outside of the clubs. I am
obviously not as free of prejudice as I would like to be.
Breakfast at the hotel this morning was what they
considered at “western” breakfast. They
did have fried eggs, some variety of sausage, pancakes and toast but they also
had myriad stir-fried dishes, chicken congee, and a variety of local
fruit. Nothing like eggs covered with a
peanut stew that tasted like baked beans!
So far, in our limited exploration, Bangkok appears
shabby. Lots of the buildings in this
area appear to be crumbling and mildewed. They don’t appear well kept. The streets are narrow and straight lines
appear to be a concept not known to the construction trade here. This gives the city a certain charm and an
intriguing character. You can be
wandering down a claustrophobic winding lane and suddenly come across a
beautiful Buddhist Temple alive with Monks.
There are street vendors everywhere cooking food that I have no idea
what it is but smells fabulous. Shops
that seem to be simply concrete rooms with the street wall missing are
everywhere selling the weirdest stuff.
One that we passed today had just toilets stacked up everywhere – all
covered with dust.
Bangkok from our hotel window |
The locals try to promote the city by calling it the
“City of Smiles”. They are not
wrong! The people here are very friendly
and smile at you all the time. The
normal greeting is hands held together like a prayer with a slight bow and a
dazzling smile. It is called Wai. There
are some complicated status thingys associated with it which only a native
Wai’er would understand but it is a very warm and elegant greeting and makes
you feel friendly and accepted. I like
it!
The World Meteorological Association rates Bangkok the
world’s hottest city. That is probably
because they had their annual conference here and saw all those pretty Thai
girls…
We only got in
last night and are still jet lagged and groggy but we are very thankful that
our room is air-conditioned. On our
brief walk this morning we found it very hot and very humid. Bangkok, reputedly, has some enormous
shopping malls – all air-conditioned. No wonder Thailand has such a strong
economy – everyone goes to the cool malls and spends all their money…
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