Bangkok airport tamasha

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This is a long story that we have to shorten to be able to write out from this internet cafe in some reasonable time.

We had to fly from HK to Bangkok and then take another flight on a different airline to Siem Reap from Bangkok. So far so good.

We didnt want to take our suitcases to Cambodia, so wanted to check them in at some left luggage in Bangkok and pick them up three days later when we landed in BKK again to spend a couple of days there. Again, not too much to ask, and not something one gives a second thought about.

But Uncle Murphy is always just around the corner. We checked in our bags to BKK, to pick them up there and leave in some locker. We land in BKK, and first of all, cannot for the life of us locate the transfer desk for Bangkok Airways. Different people in different variants of what sounds like English keep pointing us in some direction where we can see nothing but departure gates. Okay, we thought, lets get our bags first and deal with this problem later.

So off we go to the immigration counter to tell them that we want to go out, get our bags, leave them at a locker and then come right back in to catch our flight that leaves in 90 minutes (well, the boarding was supposed to close in 60 or so minutes). Now the story gets interesting. We have two different passports. An American citizen does not need a visa to enter Thailand (for 90 days or so), but an Indian does. So I said, okay, how hard can it be? I get my visa now, so in three days when I come back, I dont need to worry about getting it again since it has 15 days validity.

Apparently not! After talking to five different people with five different variants of English, we find out that a visa is only for one-time entry. So if I need to move 10 feet from the immigration counter (we could literally see our bags on the belt just outside the immigration desk), I need to apply for a visa, cough up 1000 baht, plus an application, and a photo, and then walk those 10 feet, pick them up, and walk back in. I felt right at home in the midst of Indian bereaucracy - that papers can only be moved in one way.

Anyways, so we struck upon a plan to maximize our passport representation and time to be able to catch our next flight. The Dr. waltzed out with her passport, picked up the bags, found the locker and checked them in, while I walked up to the transfer counter (turns out the damn airways flies out as domestic airways, and that transfer desk was about a 1000 miles from where we landed), checked myself in, and spent a few tense minutes waiting for Amritha to show up. She ran in thinking that boarding would have closed and all that jazz, only to find that boarding had not even begun! Well, we left about 20 minutes late, which worked well for us.

Sidebar for all the Americans out there. We call it "left luggage" here in Asia, something I had forgotten myself given the number of years spent unlearning English across the globe. Amritha tried to get them to understand "locker" and I think after several successful mime sessions managed to get it across to someone who pointed her in the right direction.

Well, alls well that ends well. Atleast we hope so. We have a piece of paper that shows we left our bags somewhere, and we hope it will be there when we get back to BKK in three days.

And oh yes, to top it all, the receipt we got is dated Feb 6, 2550. Yes you read that right. 543 years into the future. But trust the instincts of the doctor to get that clarified and get them to write what we call this year to be (2007, last time I checked, unless I somehow got into a time machine), on the receipt.

Thats that. Now for the next post that will be more interesting about our day in Siem Reap.


Disclaimer: Parents reading this post, not to worry ... everything worked out well 😊

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