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I had an interesting journey from Bangkok airport to the hostel to meet Anette. I met a German girl getting off the plane; I quickly suggested to her that sharing a taxi would be a good idea to save cash if she was heading to my part of town. She agreed, we purchased a bottle of rum each from duty free and then joined the taxi queue.
Unfortunately I quickly learned that the protesters were in fact camping outside my chosen hostel, Lub D, and the taxi drivers wouldn’t go down that end of town!
I pleaded with him but he wouldn’t budge. I wasn’t so bothered. I know how the media likes to hype things up so I decided I would get out as far as he would take me and ask advice from a few locals from there. The nerves started to hit a few minutes down the road with the Germans panic at the sheer volume of army and police on the roads, however, I was in luck on our arrival, presented with a large glass of free red wine by the Germans girls local friend, I enquired and she called me a taxi to drop
me as close as he could to my hostel, Lub D in Si Lom Road. On the way I discovered the problem; huge blockades’ of steel wire, tyres and huge bamboo sticks and I must say I began to find it a little uneasy.
The hostel, as recommended by Nozza, was indeed fantastic; beautifully air conditioned, 24 hour cheap food and drink, nice rooms and friendly staff. However, it was dead. The whole capital appears to be dead. The deadest capital I have experienced, flying in the face of what I have heard from so many people. It is a shame I have coincided my trip with such a terrible time for this country but it couldn’t be helped.
I found Anette and we spent the evening catching up our stories from the last 2 months. I can’t believe it had been so long already! We got to bed around 4ish and arose for the much awaited Burma visa experience at 7am. Weary and very, very hot we slumped down to the embassy.
The heat here is very oppressive, very sticky and humid. It is harder to deal with than the dry 45 degrees in San Fernando,
Red Shirts
(if anyone in my family is reading this...i did not go and purposely seek them out...) Philippines. It turns out I am here during the hottest time of the year, so I guess I brought it on myself!
In the queue for the visa applications, we met an Israeli dude called Elan who was traveling to Yangon the following day. He advised us of an express visa application within 6 hours, which we decided to do as we both thought it best to get the hell out of the capital asap. Elan decided to join us on our crusade to quickly book flights and get money sorted.
Due to internet problems we had to head down to Khoa San Road to sort out flights so we took a ride on the passenger boat down the river, which was lovely to get a good view and some breeze at the same time!
We walked through backpacker-central, most tourists have moved down this way to get away from our end of town and the protesters. It was nice to have a chat with a few people but in general I am glad I stayed where we were, this place wasn’t really our thing. Too many drunk Brits embarrassing the nation by falling about in the
street and knocking over stuff, pissing everyone else off so we slipped down a side alley and the three of us ate a nice lunch at a lovely Jewish restaurant. God, I love middle eastern food!
We eventually found the AirAsia office and had to restrain ourselves from making sweet love to the air conditioning unit. We each booked flights to Burma for 3 weeks and headed about town to find a place to find the specific USD to change up in Burma. To enter Burma you must have crisp, clean, brand new dollars which are not to have a mark, crease or fold on them, and change them into Myanmar Kyat. We went to several banks and exchange kiosks before we waited 30 minutes while the helpful Thai girl sorted out the money. We changed $300 each to be on the safe side (they don’t have ATMs in Burma!)
A brief visit to Wat Arun and a stroll around the centre to get some protest photos and before we knew it, the day was up. We exchanged information with Elan to meet in Yangon, Burma and arrived back at the hostel to get ready for the evening.
We met with Emily, Anettes friend from Norway who worked for the Norwegian embassy to take us to some good bars and eateries on the other side of town. I’m grateful for this because honestly, there was no one staying anywhere near our side of the capital!
After a few drinks at the stripper district, a street off Sukhumvit, we looked up at the huge, bright and beautiful moon to discover it was almost full...
We decided to finish up our evening with Emily quickly and head back to the hostel to investigate the possibilities of another Sam-styled 24 hour trip to a random place on the hit-list; Phuket and Ko Pha-Ngan for the full moon party.
Originally I was never too bothered about doing this; there is nothing traditional or cultural about it, it’s purely laid on for the tourists and seemed altogether too fake for my liking. However, I have picked up a taste for the night life and party scene and it just seemed like fate to turn up for a 3 day stint and it happened to be in the middle, so I put my bad experiences of Filipino beach festivals behind me
Wat Arun
Central Bangkok and faced the music for a Thailand beach party of a lifetime!
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