Mostly Good
Been back now a couple of months since my first trip to Bangkok and found it good enough to plan another trip in August.
Being so different from my home and the total chaos are why I enjoyed myself. Traveling alone as I am wont, it is about the only place where an almost 40 year old can wander and people watch without feeling odd. Getting around was easy, but I just kept myself within a km or so of the skytrain.
Reading the stories on this site definitely helped me not getting totally ripped off, and seeing a young German guy paying a few thousand baht to the Police on the walkover to MBK, his loud excuse of not being able to find an ashtray didn’t get him anywhere. I felt sorry for him, but not enough to get involved and had a bit of a giggle when I saw two ashtrays hidden behind the pylon as I headed towards Siam. His Euro would make it easier for him. Much better than my South Pacific Peso, which started at 31 baht when I got there and headed south till I left.
I visited the beer bars all along Sukhumvit on the six nights I was there and had a good time just watching and enjoying the spectacle of it all. I waited till the third night to actually barfine a girl, short-time because I was scared from reading the stories from this site that I would be buying her family a buffalo or whatever the next morning. The last two nights I gained my confidence and barfined different girls each time both long-time.
I have a bit of a problem with the morals of my behaviour and would never mention my adventures to anyone, family or friends at home. I also might be getting morals mixed up with guilt from being found out, and looking like some deviate. But as there is no God and you only live once, in the end, it just doesn’t matter.
I can’t for the life of me understand how anyone can fall in love on a short holiday and send money back to these working girls. Every night, on my way out for the evening, I stopped and had three Heinekens at bar off soi 33 and even from my pathetic experience, I, due to reading from this site, did ask a few questions after getting a bit chummy with a girl who I bought a couple of drinks for over a few days with no chance of barfine and joking to her, I asked her how many are sending you dollars? She gave a little smile and said only one, as if she was a failure. She went on to point out other girls in the place and one of them, a gorgeous little thing she seemed jealous of, had bloody three. Who are these fools sending money! Hopefully they are young and will learn from it.
Grit in my eyes, dodging maniacs disguised as drivers, the thick smog, disfigured beggars, little girls dressed up to the nines selling flowers after midnight, you buy dirty movie incessantly, exasperation at ordering stuff from menu’s in restaurants that take ten minutes to discover they don’t have, humidity, pavements or whatever they are and adults rising for children on the skytrain. These are random thoughts going through my mind and I can’t believe all the above contributed to me having a good time.
I’ll be moving out from Sukhumvit on my next trip a bit more and hope I have the balls to try some of that excellent looking food from the street stalls. I’ve booked a week in Bangkok, a week in Pattaya and left a week and a half free to decide when I get there. Thanks to all the other posts which, I’m sure have helped heaps of people like myself to not make too much of a fool of themselves.
Letter writing is a skill I’ve lost, due to SMS and emails so I hope I haven’t wasted your one minute.
Stickman’s thoughts:
Don't worry too much about getting lost. Just jump in a taxi and show him a card for your hotel and you'll be right. Or simply say "skytrain" – all the cabbies know that word!
