Red Shirts and Rafthouses

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Sunny 'dry season' Southern Thailand isn't as dry as one would imagine. We have been in the south for 3 days, and have seen 2 huge thunderstorms. Not that I can complain, being from the plains of Texas- I love thunderstorms, and it's a nice break from the insane heat and humidity.

We left Chang Mai a few days ago, bound for Bangkok.. and arrived after a miserable 14 hour bus ride plus traffic jam upon entering Bangkok. I think I expected Bangkok to look like a South East Asian version of Shanghai or Tokyo- enormous futuristic expanses of sky scrapers and high rise apartments intermingled with older neighborhoods and poverty... but in reality Bangkok is a very short city. A short city that shows no signs of any kind of urban planning whatsoever.. and just kind of continues forever with no clear public transportation or central theme or plan. I think that my first impression of Bangkok was probably harmed significantly by the Red Shirts who had shut down the major streets with their protests.. making transportation in the city highly improbable. All the tourist touts on Khao San Road (Backpacker Mecca, Earth) told us that the protests were very dangerous, but we needed to get across the city to restock our supplies of oatmeal and peanut butter, and I didn't believe it anyhow. So I convinced John it would be a good idea to walk across the city through the protests in a sort of post-Apocalypse Oatmeal Mission, which actually did turn out to be a good idea. The protests weren't dangerous at all (during the day time, of course) and were really a lot of fun, seeing the old ladies and little kids all wearing red and cheering and shouting. It was all very interesting and a little silly since I doubt that the prime minister will dissolve the entire government just because 100,000 people wear red and ask him too (and paint banners with their blood, throw grenades at TV stations, and march on the army). Almost all the shops in the whole city were closed, so it gave the city a sort of ugly doomed look.. which I think is what gave me such a bad impression of the place. But I am proud to say that John and I did manage to buy oatmeal and peanut butter- mission accomplished.

Then we went to Kachanaburi to see the Bridge over the River Kwai.. the real bridge.. not the movie. It's a big metal bridge... not too terribly exciting, but fun to see nonetheless. It was great to just relax there and sit by the river, after the craziness of Bangkok. We stayed in a rafthouse.. which is a sort of floating hotel that sits on giant metal barrels on the river. We may or may not have had an interesting run in with the mafia one evening here and may or may not have heard someone tell someone else that "X" "sleeps with the fishes". After hearing this we probably would have felt sort of nervous and excited and laughed about the fact that you never wants to hear that someone "sleeps with the fishes" when you are sleeping quite literally.. with the fishes.

We left Kachanaburi and endured another hellish 14 hour bus trip to come down to Ranong, a crappy little border town next to Myanmar which also connects with several islands on the Andaman Coast. This afternoon we made a border run to Myanmar to update our Thai visas.. For Travellers: You can take Saiganthaw (sp?) number 6 (the blue one) from the bus station to the pier for 15 baht. We caught a long tail boat across for 100 baht there and back.. though I think we over payed.. and I advise to just pay for a trip there and catch a different boat back so you don't have to wait for the boat to fill up again on the other side. The whole thing is relatively painless- you need a passport copy, a pristine USD $10 bill with no folds, and an umbrella for the sun. =)

Tomorrow we are going to an island off the coast called Koh Payam- reputed to be cheap, undeveloped, beautiful and relaxed.. with good snorkeling! I think that we will spend 7 or 8 days on the island, and then head back to Bangkok to spend a week there (shopping) before we come home! So little time!

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