On the road once more... to BKK!
Trip Start
Dec 21, 2009
1
12
22
Trip End
Aug 07, 2010
Bangkok, Thailand
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Hello everyone, sorry for yet ANOTHER blog post but I just thought I'd inform you of my recent forray into the world of solo traveling and my trip to Bangkok for the weekend.
Firstly, I'm sure you'll all be aware that the reason for my trip was to head to the French Embassy and sort out the loss of my passport and to hopefully get a new one. I took a bus on Thursday 8am, for 12 hours, and got into Bangkok at about 8.30 that night. Believe it or not, but the journey itself wasn't actually too bad. It cost 600 baht (£12) and included lunch and had seats that leant back a little bit, so it was by no means uncomfortable. Plus I had Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone to keep me company (silly yanks and their bad translations/ changed storylines!).
An old family friend of ours called Sam picked me up from the station. He's half Thai half Taiwanese (if I have my facts right) and runs a hotel on the island of Ko Chang, which we went to a few years ago to spend Christmas. Mum met him in Canada over 25 years ago, which is pretty strange to think about. Anyway, Sam took me for dinner on the Sukhumvit somewhere (I couldn't bring myself to tell him I'd just had a KFC......) and he took me to this outside stall where a guy cooks prize-winning, world-famous Pad-Thai and other dishes. Oh. My. God., the food was incredible! I suddenly found room for it all and ate it in no time. Mum even called as the food arrived so it was nice to talk to her back at home and for her to have a nice little chat with an old friend!
Sam then drove me to the house of another family friend, called John, where I was staying for the next couple of nights. I think I mentioned him in one of my first posts and he's an absolute legend. Think Peter Griffin from Family Guy and that IS John down to the T. Anyway, he had 4 of his kids staying over (who are all awesome) and I slept in the sitting room with the cat...who
did NOT like sharing. I've never been bitten by so many mosquitos in mylife (I have a feeling it was actually just the one mosquito that had taken a dislike to me), but oh well - at least I had somewhere to stay!
The meeting at the French Embassy was ok, if not a little confusing. My meeting was at 12.40 so, knowing my luck (and previous history), I left an hour and a bit early for it. Just as well as I had because when I turned up at the French Embassy (and it did say French Embassy on the sign), they told me they didn't do anything passport related and that I was in the wrong place! APPARANTLY it's cool to have two buildings in two locations that both have a sign outside calling themselves the French Embassy and not tell you on the website which does which. Anyway, it's just as well I'd left the time to spare because I managed to get a taxi and reach the embassy before my meeting time. Not that there was anyone there other than me, mind. I also appreciated the irony of being asked for some kind of ID or passport to prove that it was really me...
Once inside, the woman proved to me why I've always thought that people who work in administration at embassies and government offices have failed in actually becoming what they ever wanted to be in life... she was extremely unpleasant, as per usual (which old me I was in the right place at least) but I was in no position to complain - passport or prison! I managed to accidentally subject her to my own for of revenge when my coke bottle fizzed everywhere and all over her floor. Needless to say, that made her even more pleasant to deal with. Having gone through the whole process, the woman then exacted her own punishment on me by taking my passport photo quickly and without telling me... making me look like something of a blonde mischievous vagrant on my passport for the next ten years. Great.
Spillage/photo/forms/fake courtesies all over, I could finally leave the embassy and do my own thing. I went to the Siam Paragon shopping centre and headed to the cinema to go and watch George Clooney's latest film 'Up In The Air.' It's a great movie, incidentally, but I was impressed the quality of the cinema-goer's experience in Bangkok.. the screen was huge and the sound/picture quality were by far superior to most cinemas I've visited in England. Oh, and it didn't hurt that I had a reclining seat in the middle of the row, near the back of the cinema, and that it only cost me £3.40.
The film now over, I walked around Bangkok a bit and took the skytrain back to John's house, where we had dinner (ordered Pizzas....yummmmm). We ended up watching the movies 'Deathproof' and 'Righteous Kill' on tv before going to bed (me still in the sitting room lol).
Got up on Saturday and went to book my train back to Krabi for that evening with John...apparantly you can book that kind of thing at cinemas too! Then went to Khao San road to meet up With Zulquarnain (Z) who was also in Bangkok for the weekend to meet up with his dad who was there on business. Hearing about the first themed party of the term made me jealous to have missed it, but I had never really had much of a choice as to sorting out my passport.
Having had our nice little catch up (strange to be out of Ao Luk together like that), I headed to the station and waited for my bus. I hadn't actually seen the departure area of the station - it was HUGE! There were 60 departure platforms with big coaches at each. What was also interesting was that the coaches were being chaperoned by what I can only descibe as 'bus stewardesses,' in their uniforms and everything. The bus back was a 'VIP' bus, costing me slightly more (900 baht - 18 pounds) and arriving in Krabi slightly quicker than the non-VIP bus (not that it would have bothered me, another 2 hours). I could also lie down almost horizontally and was able to read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, which I'd bought in Bangkok (it was the only one missing from here at base).
Around 10 hours later (and without once even reaching for my iPod!), I arrived. From here I found out that the bus I needed was one to Phuket, so I hopped on that and got off 25 minutes later when it passed through Ao Luk. Walked back (no running this time!) and got back to base about 8 this morning. Everyone was still asleep, leaving me to write this post! A few people are up now and I think I'm gonna go grab some food.
I hope that you're still alive after yet another envigorating post and I look forward to hearing how you're all doing! Do comment, like, message this blog to let me know how you all are. And don't forget to look at the photos that I'm putting up (including those from the last post that I never got round to doing!).
Take care and be good! xxxxxxxxxxxxx
