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Published: February 26th 2009
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It's hot, which isn't surprising, but a lovely breeze blows, especially in the evening. I am so glad I cut my hair short - though perhaps shorter would be better - and I just keeping thinking about the snow we had to shovel to get out of the driveway on Monday morning when I feel tempted to comment on the temperature.
I’m starting to adjust to Bangkok time, though Jaz’s body clock is still somewhere between here and Southeast Asia, perhaps over Greenland. She slept from 6:00 am until noon on Wednesday, then fell asleep just before 9:00 pm, which I thought would be good enough to get her internal clock adjusted, but no luck. She was awake again at midnight, and nothing succeeded in getting her back to sleep. I woke up off and on all night, and every time I rolled over to see if she had finally dozed off, there she was, watching DVDs or chatting online with friends. When I left at 7:30 in the morning for my Bangkok Medical Center check-up (such a deal!), we both thought she’d probably sleep while I was gone, but I came back at 2:00 to find her still awake,
though with circles beginning to form under her eyes. After staying awake until 7:15 or so this evening, she is finally out cold, and I can only hope her sleep lasts a good 12 hours or so!
So far, our adventures together have consisted mostly of walking around the neighborhood, eating street food, taking photos of ridiculous T-shirts (photos to come), and a little bit of pool time. We swam for a bit on Wednesday afternoon and then went to Khao San Road, also known as the “backpacker’s ghetto.” This is an area full of cheap guest houses, internet cafes, and vendors selling everything from clothes to food to pirated DVD’s to fake ID’s. One can get pierced, tattooed, or have one’s hair made into dreadlocks. You can buy an international press pass, a California driver’s license or a college diploma - though I’m not sure the diploma would pass muster considering the sample on display was for a “Bachelor Degree, Tcaching”. The streets are full of young backpacker-types and Rasta wanna-be’s passing through, and a few who look like they arrived about twenty years ago and forgot to ever leave. There are
Hmong women by the dozens, walking
up and down the street in their traditional headwear, hawking silver jewelry and wooden frogs that make a croaking noise when you rub a stick over them. There are shops where you can have movies downloaded straight to your iPod. And there are a plethora of T-shirts - some with strange characters and slogans like “Angle Devil Human - What You Select To?” and “Happy Your Dream Come True!” and “Welcome to Funer Land”. (There are also a lot of Barack Obama T-shirts, though none with misspellings or strange slogans.)
We’ve eaten watermelon, pineapple, chicken satay on a stick, pad thai, crab-flavored potato chips, and mangosteens. Mangosteens are an interesting fruit I’ve never seen in any other part of the world - a thick, woody, purple skin covers the soft, sweet, juicy segmented flesh - and I couldn’t wait to get my hands on some. I once found them at the Jean Talon Market in Montreal for $25/pound; this evening I bought some for the equivalent of 65 cents/pound. At one point as we were strolling, we spotted what looked like chicken wings on a vendor cart, so we bought about 60 cents worth, which was more than you
could pile in your two cupped hands. However, when we bit into them, it was quickly apparent that they were not chicken wings at all. It took us a while to identify the taste, but finally realized they were deep-fried bananas coated in sesame seeds. They tasted great, but not when you were expecting chicken wings! While I was gone today, Jaz ventured out and bought three various meats on a stick and a small bag of mangosteens. The mangosteens turned out to cool her palate when she discovered that the meat was very spicy! I love her sense of adventure when it comes to food - she also tried a cricket, a bamboo worm, and a HUGE grasshopper. (Her assessment: “Not bad.”)
I have rediscovered, as I always do in a hot climate, the joy of a cold beer. I absolutely never drink beer at home, but it is exactly what I want when I’m here. And not surprisingly, it’s cheap too.
(I hope all the references to prices isn’t too obnoxious. We’re just always amazed at how inexpensive things are once you get here. It kind of makes up for the price of the plane ticket…)
My medical check-up today was an interesting and very efficient process - a sort of medical assembly line. The Bangkok International Hospital is a gleaming facility with nurses wearing starched white uniforms and caps and white pumps. The hospital offers a variety of packaged medical check-ups, and I opted for the “Ultimate” package, which is recommended for those of us 46 and over. (According to my hospital bracelet, I am 46 years, 8 months and 8 days old.) I was checked in, photographed, and whisked efficiently from one exam and procedure to the next. Blood work, EKG, cardiac stress test, vision exam, bone density scan, ultrasounds of various kinds - you name it and I had it. I can hardly pretend that I know anything about the state of Thai healthcare, but it was an interesting (and relatively inexpensive) experience, and Dr. Paiboon Siriponwishet has given me a clean bill of health. The clientele with whom I shared the common waiting room appeared to be mostly Thai, though I saw one other Western couple and several women in burqas.
Jaz and I headed back to Khao San Road this afternoon. She wasn’t sure she could manage much more
than this given her lack of sleep, but wanted to do something to stay awake until evening. We enjoyed more people-watching and she took more pictures of crazy T-shirts so she could show them to her friends and take orders for souvenirs. We managed to find chicken that was actually chicken and not fried bananas, and we stopped in at McDonald’s to see what was on offer: “Pinky Milky,” anyone? Or perhaps “Tuna Pie”? (We passed on both.)
Our plans for travel to Siem Reap (Cambodia) have been a little loose until today, when we decided to stay here one more night and then make the trip by bus/train/taxi on Saturday. We hope that by then we will have adjusted to the time change and that getting up early to begin the journey won’t be quite such an ordeal. From start to finish, the trip should take 7-8 hours, so we should be in Siem Reap by Saturday evening. I will certainly look forward to really unpacking and settling in. So far, my days are punctuated by the sounds of zippers and mumbling to myself as I constantly look for things in various pockets, bags and compartments.
I will also look forward to being in a city of more manageable size, where Jaz will have a little more freedom to go out on her own when she wants. For those of you who listened to the recent NPR story about the new “fad” in Cambodia of gang rape - don’t worry! There will be clear plans about where and when she’s going, and we will take all precautions advised by our hosts! Bangkok is just so huge, and so confusing to navigate, and once we get to Siem Reap, Jaz will have a cell phone and the center of town is easy to navigate.
Thank you to those who have emailed or made blog comments since we arrived. I really enjoy hearing from people at home, so don’t hesitate to be in touch. Steve and I have been able to talk via Skype a few times (sign up - it’s free!) and the emails are flying fast and furious! I think it is only beginning to really sink in just how long we will be away, and while this trip is everything I hoped/dreamed/saved for, it is nice to be able to still be connected to home base. Thank you to everyone who is working extra hard in my absence - you are making this possible.
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dad
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insects
GO Jaz! Have a couple of bugs for me. I promise I WILL eat the tiny creatures next time we're there or you could bring some packaged ones home. I could throw them in a stir-fry! LOVE, dad