Southeast Asia Trip Part III: Don't Thai Me Down

The bus to Bangkok was a big, pink double-decker bus with the words “MYFRIEND TOUR” on the front.  There seem to be two types of buses in Southeast Asia: the regional transportation that locals take, and the tour-type buses that backpackers and tourists take.  While the more authentic bus experience tends to be cheaper and more frequent, the tour buses are often more direct, faster, offer hotel pickups, and aid in crossing international borders more smoothly.  Crossing from Laos into Thailand, we decided to take one of these “tour” buses.  As a result, what could have been a bus crowded with Laos men, was a bus crowded with high Aussies.  It was an overnight bus with reclining seats, and we expected to get into Mochit Bus Station in Bangkok at around 5:30am.

The border crossing went smoothly, and we got our Thai visas as we crossed.  Early in the bus ride, the air conditioner started making a high pitched squeal, and after several moments of mass frustration, I got up and gave the vent a nice hit with the side of my fist, which instantly quieted the noise.  The Aussies cheered and called me the Fonz, but after a few moments the noise started again, and was mostly incessant (despite repeated further attempts) throughout the ride.  To our surprise, the bus stopped at around 4:30am in the center of Bangkok, and the driver threw everyone’s bags out onto the street.  We poured out of the bus only to realize that this was most definitely not Mochit Station.  Instead, they’d dropped us off at Khao San Road, the main expat hangout in Bangkok.  A bit confused, Ariane and I strapped up our packs and started walking to try to figure out where exactly we were at such an early hour in Bangkok.

We sat down outside of an Israeli-run Tourist Café, and reorganized and settled ourselves.  Behind us, a woman rolled herself a joint.  Backpackers from our bus and others were trolling the streets, looking for hostels, drugs, internet cafes, or possibly all of the above.  On Khao San Road, a group of expats was sitting on the ground in the middle of the road, playing the guitar and singing.  Sleazy men were directing their hesitant-seeming prostitutes back to their rooms.  Cab drivers waited to rip off their drunk patrons.  Our plan had been to end up at Mochit Station, and to take a bus from there to Khao Yai National Park to do some trekking and see some elephants and waterfalls.  Ending up at Khao San Road instead of Mochit Station, we were not entirely sure of the best course of action.  So, we found an internet café, tried to find some information about the area, and then hopped a cab to Mochit Station.

I should first mention that cars drive on the left (wrong) side of the road in Thailand. I sat upfront next to the driver while Ariane was in the back.  Our driver started out going really fast, asking us questions in really bad English.  Were we married?  Why not?  Where were we from?  etc. At the first red light, he took a small white bottle out of his pocket, took a good sniff, and kept driving.  Faster and faster.  He started tapping his foot heavily to the music, massaging the shifter, and bobbling his head.  Every stop, another sniff.  He was high as a kite.  Ariane asked me what was going on, and I told her in Chinese.  We finally made it (alive) to Mochit Station, still dark outside, and went in to find our way to Khao Yai National Park.  We got bus tickets to Pak Chong, in the area of Khao Yai, and decided we’d figure things out from there.  In the meantime, we resettled ourselves in the bus station, were pleasantly surprised to see a Dunkin’ Donuts and 7-11 (neither of which can be found frequently in China), and had some bad coffee before boarding our bus as the sun began to rise.

When we finally arrived at Pak Chong several hours later, we got out and started asking people how to get to Khao Yai.  For the most part, people there were very helpful, and one lady eventually led us to the [[songthaew]] (two-rowed open air ‘bus’) headed for Khao Yai.  The other passengers were all locals, including a monk and his female counterpart.  We were unclear as to whether we wanted to stay overnight or take a tour.  (We’d heard that the elephants and other animals were best seen on night safaris.)  My indecision left us standing at the gate of the National Park, with our packs.  We managed to get student prices without having our student IDs, after I pulled the desperate student routine looking everywhere in my bag for my ID.  The man at the front gate said we should hitchhike to thse visitor center (since they have no free transportation available), and that he’d flag down a car for us.  He flagged down a pickup truck, and we threw our bags in the back, and hopped in the second row of the cab.  Our drivers were a middle-aged Thai couple, and the guard told them in Thai where to take us.  After 15 minutes, we saw the visitor center come and go, and not quite clear where they had been told to take us, we didn’t speak up.  Ten or so minutes later, still driving, we began to wonder if they knew where to take us, and looked through our guide book for any phrases we could ask to get that point across.  We would ask them “Khao Yai?” with a rising tone to indicate our question.  Of course, Thai (like Chinese) is a tonal language, and they simply repeated us, saying “Khao Yai”.  I was a bit hungry and tired, and not altogether with it.  An hour later, the car finally pulled to a stop, and we realized they’d driver us all the way through the park to the other side!  We emphatically expressed our desire to get out, and had the English-speaking guards at the gate explain what had gone wrong.  They had us wait and flagged down another pickup truck headed back the other way.  This time we hopped in the back with our bags, and enjoyed the ride back to the visitor center.  Monkeys lined the roads, hoping for snacks from tourists passing through, cyclists rode the way, but the park did not seem at all what we’d been expecting.  The flora seemed as if it were right out of North America, not jungle-esque in the slightest.

Back at the visitor center, we had a quick lunch, stored our packs, and then tried to get information from an annoying Thai park guide.  He told us that the park had no transportation available, and that to go see any of the waterfalls we’d have to either rent a car or hitchhike.  We went to get information on the night safaris, and began asking the what it entailed.  Beside the desk, there was a bulletin board with pictures of the different animals one might expect to see on the tour.  Seeing photos of tigers and elephants, we asked them, “we will see tigers?”.  They responded, “No tigers.”  “What about elephants?”  They laughed, “sometimes elephants”.  Since the other animals, included only bears, porcupines, and deer, and the cost would be fairly high to do the tour and stay overnight there, we decided not to do it, and that we’d head home after hiking a bit and seeing some waterfalls.  So, we tried to hitchhike out to Haew Suwat Waterfall.  Unfortunately, every car that stopped for us, had no interest in taking us all the way out of their way to go to Haew Suwat Waterfall, except for an exorbitant amount of money.  Giving up on the hitchhiking, we went back to “rent a car”, which it turned out meant “hiring a driver”.  The driver, of course, ended up being our favorite annoying tour guide from earlier, and we were on our way for a fairly high price.  Upon our arrival, we were all but impressed at the medium-sized waterfall, but decided after spending so much money, that we’d enjoy ourselves and take our time nonetheless.

Back at the visitor center, we did some hiking before eventually trying to head back to Pakchong.  The park was closing, and no cars would stop for us.  When were about to give up and pay exorbitantly for a ride once again, an off-duty taxi (a guy driving his sister to Pakchong) stopped for us, and agreed to take us.  They were very nice, stopped to feed the monkeys, and brought us directly to the bus stop.  I gave them a bit more money than they asked, and we got out, finding an immediate bus back to Bangkok.

We eventually made it back to Bangkok, and then to Banglamphu (an area near the river), where we walked around looking for a guesthouse, getting more and more discouraged as one after another guesthouse was either too full or too expensive.  We finally ended up at the Mitr Paisarn Hotel, a seedy-looking motel-like hotel in the alleys behind Samsen Road.  It was hot and humid.  We put our stuff down, and then went to grab dinner outside down an alley.  After dinner we stopped at a 7-11 for water.  It is worth mentioning that 7-11s in Bangkok are like Blue Safety Lights on college campuses in the US—you can literally see at least one other 7-11 no matter where you are.  They’re everywhere, and it’s actually a bit ridiculous.  In fact, there are 1500 7-11 stores in the city of Bangkok itself, compared to the 5900 stores in all of the United States.  Who would have thought?

We walked around Banglamphu a bit, and tried to head down towards the river under a bridge.  Tuk-tuk drivers were asleep in their tuk-tuks on the side of the road, and as we reached the end of the street, we saw a few homeless men, guarded by a pack of stray dogs.  Sensing our approach, the dogs got up and headed us off, growling viciously as a sign to us that this was their place and we were not welcome.  Their “owner” tried to call them off, but they would listen.  A bit scared, Ariane backed off behind me, and I tried to calm the alpha dog as he got closer and closer.  When he wouldn’t back off, I threw some water at him, and then backed off slowly myself, my knife ready in my hand in case they attacked.  When we were comfortably distant from their territory, the dogs stopped growling and “escorted” us back out to the main street.  We called it quits, and went back to the comfort of our filthy, but air-conditioned room.

The next day we had a flight to [[Phuket Province|Phuket]] in southern Thailand.  Phuket is Thailand’s largest island, located on the west coast of the [[Kra Isthmus]] in the [[Andaman Sea]].  Our bags came out soaked, and we realized it was pouring outside.  Fortunately, the next day proved nicer.  After some research and advice from our guesthouse, we decided to go to [[Ko Lanta]] by ferry, another 4 hours south of Phuket, and somewhat more secluded.  We found a small, family-run resort with cheap bungalows, and enjoyed the beautiful uncrowded beaches, the warm blue water, and the complete peace and company.

A relaxing time, another ferry, one flight, and a taxi ride later, and we were back at the Mitr Paisarn Hotel in Bangkok.  I’d ripped my favorite shorts trekking, and we dropped them off at a tailor to be repaired.  Then we spent the day shopping, visiting sites, and exploring Bangkok.  We met my friend Pat for dinner.  He is a Bangkok native, and took us to a popular modern Thai restaurant.  Then, Ariane and I excused ourselves as we had tickets to a Muay Thai boxing match.  We’d purchased reasonably pricy ringside seats, and showed up fashionably late in time for the main event.  I grabbed us some beers and we sat and enjoyed the matches, trying to understand the rules and pick our favorites.  All of the boxers were very young (some even young children), and when we had the opportunity to have our photo taken with the champion after the match, I towered over him.

After the match, we wandered into a rather chic night fashion market, and Ariane went shopping crazy, as I got hungrier and more overwhelmed.  After several hours of haggling for clothes and accessories (for Ariane), I needed a break and some food.  No street food in sight, and the Thai restaurant closed, we ended up at an Italian place where I got a pizza.  It had been a long day, and we headed back to the hotel to shower and crash.  Despite recommendations to the contrary, we’d purchased “tour” bus tickets from Bangkok to Siem Reap in Cambodia for early the next morning.  We woke up and headed to the travel agency where we’d purchased the tickets for our “pick-up” to the bus.  The “pick-up” turned out to be a woman with a clipboard waiting for our arrival.  She asked us where we were going, we showed her our tickets (which she took), and then handed us a different ticket, and told us to follow her.  After a few blocks, she stopped and told us to wait there while she figured out someone else’s tickets.  After a few minutes, a man shows up, looks at our “new” ticket and tells us to follow a second lady.  We follow her for a while to a few stopped coach buses on the side of the road.  They took our ticket and told us to get on the bus.  Fortunately, I asked them if the bus was heading to Siem Reap, just to make sure, to which they replied that it was not.  It was heading to Ko Chang.  A little confused, we told them we had tickets to Siem Reap.  Of course, we no longer had our tickets.  They told us we did not have tickets to Siem Reap, but to Ko Chang.  At this point, I’m beginning to yell, and tell them that I don’t care how, but they better figure out how to get us on the bus to Siem Reap.  Finally, after a bit more mutual yelling, and the man who’d taken us there claiming he’d never seen us before, they told us to go back around the corner.  I made sure they weren’t just getting rid of us, and we went around the corner to find the bus to Siem Reap waiting.  A bit relieved, we boarded and were on our way.

I’d also mention that at some point during this whole business, I’d stopped at a 7-11 and put 1 Thai baht (about $0.03 USD) in an electronic scale, which subsequently showed my weight to be about 10kg (22lb) lighter than the previous month, and about 20kg (44lb) lighter than when I’d left for China.

The bus took many hours, and stopped at a restaurant just before the Thai-Cambodian border to switch buses and prepare our visa forms.  At the restaurant, we met a 23 year-old local Thai guy named “K”, who had been released from the Thai military 4 months prior, and was waiting for the regional UN Security Station to open to find a job there.

He told us about being a soldier during the ongoing conflict in southern Thailand, and told us an interesting story.  His job, in part, had been to escort monks individually every morning from their residences to their monasteries, protecting them from potential attacks and explosions.  It is illegal for Thai citizens to carry their own arms, and the Thai military offered this escort service to keep the peace.  One day, however, he saw a monk walking alone in the streets, and upon K’s approach, the monk seemed scared and reluctant to speak with him.  K asked him what was the matter, and if he was ok.  The monk, a bit afraid, but not enjoying being dishonest said “if I tell you, can you promise to not get me in trouble?”  K was a bit concerned, and told the monk that he’d better explain the problem.  The monk lifted his robes, and around his neck was an AK-47, which he was carrying for his own protection.  Despite it being a major infraction, and worthy of a severe penalty, K confiscated the weapon, and told the monk not to carry his own arms ever again, but that he would meet him every day to escort him.  You have to imagine, when even the monks are carrying AK-47s, the conflict has gotten pretty severe.

[Well, that’s it for the third installment.  The next post will discuss at least our time in Cambodia, and possibly Vietnam and crossing back into China as well.  Also, Happy Lunar New Year or Spring Festival to all.  I’ll talk next time about the fireworks and festivities!]