What not to do

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March 4th 2009

Published: March 4th 2009

Feb. 25/09 22:13
Well we have had an interesting few weeks. Life in Bangkok is the total opposite to any life we have ever known in Canada. Even with all our age acquired smarts we are still capable of making “dumb” mistakes. We have, between us an accumulated age of 120yrs and still we can be naive.
Tonight we took the Sky train to check out the bus station. We want to take a bus to Pattaya, this is a beach as well as a place where a lot of sexually ambivalent people live. It is a must to see apparently even according to the locals including those that are trustworthy.
So, we were so proud of ourselves, found the station, no prob. So then we hopped the train to find Patong (a more seamy area of the city) well, that was a little more challenging. We finally found our destination and were so proud of ourselves we decided to stop and have a beer. Ha-ha. The name of the place was the Super Pussy. Do you think that should have given us a clue. Well, we went in and had a beer. This is the first time in all our travels we have been scammed, How many of you can say you have honestly had a $35.00 beer. Well we have. We had a show of girls shooting ping pong balls and smoking cigarettes from area we didn’t know could shoot or smoke. And then we had to buy our lovely companions a coke (as in coca cola) and the bill for our 2 beers, 3 cokes and five minute show was 2000baht (drop a zero and divide by 3) you get the picture. But, we don’t speak the language and we don’t know what we can refuse without consequences so we paid and left . lesson learned.
It really was funny in a sick sort of way. Bangkok is a melting pot of everything from soup to nuts and in certain areas there is emphasis on the nuts.
So we hopped the train back to our safe little neighbourhood and decided to save checking out the Super Pussy till daylight hrs.
We lucked in when we rented our apartment. We are in a central area, with much to do in a neighbourhood that is relatively safe. We are close to the Sky train, entertainment, restaurants and busy enough to be reasonably secure.
We have had an interesting situation with our bank also. We opened an account in a major bank that has affiliations with Scotia at home. Requested a chequing account so we could pay our rent and utilities.
As it turns out, no foreigners can have chequing accounts, ATMs etc. Ok so we talked to our real-estate rep and she said that was not a problem because our landlord, the hydro company, the satellite and the internet would only accept cash payments anyway. OK So we requested our bank in Canada wire a certain amt of money to our account in Bangkok. No problem. A week later we went to check our balance. Big problem. The money was 1/10th of that requested. Why. Who made the error. We were assuming Bangkok. No it was Canada. A keying error. Thank god we weren’t buying a multimillion $ business not just trying to pay our bills. Everything is an experience.
We are having a great time. We have reservations to go to Cambodia on the 8th for 3d will return on the 11th, just in time to pay the rent. We are looking forward. Talk Soon US

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