Off to see the wizard...
My teaching placement in Thailand wrapped up a week or so ago, and I bid a fond farewell to Takua Pa and Khao Lak. My last night in the south was spent at the pub quiz (we didn't win, but we beat the other volunteer teams, and that's what counts), and my last day on the beach sunning myself before the bus to Bangkok.
Having spent a lot of time on overnight buses and trains in India, long-distance buses in Morocco, and heard everyone's horror stories of the Thai bus system ('it says 12 hours, but actually takes 15...', '...and there's some Thai bloke hiding in the luggage hold going through your stuff...'), I wasn't looking forward to the overnight from Khao Lak to Bangkok. I booked the 4.30pm bus, figuring that with the inevitable 3-hour delay it would get me there by breakfast time and I could find my hotel in the light. This proved to be an unnecessary precaution - the bus turned up on time, was air conditioned, included scheduled rest stops where your meal was included in your ticket price, had working reclining seats, and gave you blankets. It also ran only 20 minutes over time, which meant that I arrived in Bangkok before the crack of dawn, dirty and disoriented in the dark.
Thankfully Bangkok public transport runs all night, and the lady I was sat next to adopted me, dragged me to the local bus stop, found the right bus (not the one the hotel had told me would take me there!) and put me on it. Half an hour later I was dropped off at the end of the right road and walked the rest of the way in less than 5 minutes. I got to the hotel at 6, waited an hour till I could check in, and fell asleep until a bunch of loud Danish girls came into the dorm.
This became a regular feature of my stay - the loud Danish girls woke me up every morning and evening till they checked out the day before me.
After a bit of a sleep, I started exploring. I expected Bangkok to be a lot more foreign and oriental than it was - the city, like most parts of Thailand I'd been to, was very cosmopolitan. But for the humidity, I could've been in Manchester. I don't know whether I was relieved or disappointed. But I dutifully bimbled round looking at temples, palaces, markets and shiny bling for a couple of days, and planned to go up to Ayuthaya to see a bit of the less-travelled north on my last day.
That didn't really happen - having learnt my lesson about monitoring flight schedules after the disaster in Morocco, I checked my flight status as soon as it *should* have appeared on the website. It didn't appear to exist. Cue panic. The lady at the hostel's travel desk was very nice though, and managed to find my flight, booking and online check-in facility through some arcane internet magic. By this time it was mid-morning, so I thought sod it, bought some soft drinks and loaded up my Kindle, and spent the day reading.
After a few more temples on my last morning, I headed out to catch the airport bus in the early afternoon. When it didn't turn up, I had a quick, hot walk down to the Skytrain station and beat the traffic the rest of the way by going by rail. Thank the gods for high-tech Asian transport systems. Arriving at the airport, I decided I was glad I'd come early, because the Air Asia queue, even for pre-checked-in baggage drop, was huge, and I didn't even get in the line for security until about an hour later.
As an aside, I can never understand why online/self check-in exists. Maybe for passengers without baggage, who only need their documents OK-ed, but for luggage, you have to check in beforehand, stand in the queue, check your stuff in, and in my case check-in again in the 'oversize' baggage drop. It's exactly the same as before, and it doesn't even save paper, as even when you print your boarding pass, they give you a new one at the counter. What *is* the point?
Anyway, the flight was uneventful, the stop-off at KL low-cost-carrier terminal was boring, and the connecting flight was made more difficult by a small baby that screamed the whole way through - in the seat next to me - the overnight flight. I arrived in Perth, got picked up by my uncle (nice of him to come out at 6am and get me), had a cup of tea and went to bed for a few hours.
This week has mostly been renewing my memory of my old home, which has changed a lot since I was last here, and a *whole* lot since we came back to England 20 years ago. One of my cousins is married with 4 kids, and walking into her house was like stepping back in time 25 years, they're so much like me, my brother, and my cousins at that age. The other 2 are both getting married this year, although I'm leaving before the weddings :( I've done lots of walking round the city and suburbs, and may go down to Fremantle today to see the coast again. By the end of the week I plan to head out and hie down to the south to tour the wine regions, as I'm getting itchy feet again. Plans to catch up with old friends have so far stalled, but hopefully I'll be able to see them before I leave.
And this time in 2 weeks I'll be packing my bags for home. It's nearly at an end now, and I can't make up my mind whether I'm glad to be getting back or not...
Having spent a lot of time on overnight buses and trains in India, long-distance buses in Morocco, and heard everyone's horror stories of the Thai bus system ('it says 12 hours, but actually takes 15...', '...and there's some Thai bloke hiding in the luggage hold going through your stuff...'), I wasn't looking forward to the overnight from Khao Lak to Bangkok. I booked the 4.30pm bus, figuring that with the inevitable 3-hour delay it would get me there by breakfast time and I could find my hotel in the light. This proved to be an unnecessary precaution - the bus turned up on time, was air conditioned, included scheduled rest stops where your meal was included in your ticket price, had working reclining seats, and gave you blankets. It also ran only 20 minutes over time, which meant that I arrived in Bangkok before the crack of dawn, dirty and disoriented in the dark.
Thankfully Bangkok public transport runs all night, and the lady I was sat next to adopted me, dragged me to the local bus stop, found the right bus (not the one the hotel had told me would take me there!) and put me on it. Half an hour later I was dropped off at the end of the right road and walked the rest of the way in less than 5 minutes. I got to the hotel at 6, waited an hour till I could check in, and fell asleep until a bunch of loud Danish girls came into the dorm.
This became a regular feature of my stay - the loud Danish girls woke me up every morning and evening till they checked out the day before me.
After a bit of a sleep, I started exploring. I expected Bangkok to be a lot more foreign and oriental than it was - the city, like most parts of Thailand I'd been to, was very cosmopolitan. But for the humidity, I could've been in Manchester. I don't know whether I was relieved or disappointed. But I dutifully bimbled round looking at temples, palaces, markets and shiny bling for a couple of days, and planned to go up to Ayuthaya to see a bit of the less-travelled north on my last day.
That didn't really happen - having learnt my lesson about monitoring flight schedules after the disaster in Morocco, I checked my flight status as soon as it *should* have appeared on the website. It didn't appear to exist. Cue panic. The lady at the hostel's travel desk was very nice though, and managed to find my flight, booking and online check-in facility through some arcane internet magic. By this time it was mid-morning, so I thought sod it, bought some soft drinks and loaded up my Kindle, and spent the day reading.
After a few more temples on my last morning, I headed out to catch the airport bus in the early afternoon. When it didn't turn up, I had a quick, hot walk down to the Skytrain station and beat the traffic the rest of the way by going by rail. Thank the gods for high-tech Asian transport systems. Arriving at the airport, I decided I was glad I'd come early, because the Air Asia queue, even for pre-checked-in baggage drop, was huge, and I didn't even get in the line for security until about an hour later.
As an aside, I can never understand why online/self check-in exists. Maybe for passengers without baggage, who only need their documents OK-ed, but for luggage, you have to check in beforehand, stand in the queue, check your stuff in, and in my case check-in again in the 'oversize' baggage drop. It's exactly the same as before, and it doesn't even save paper, as even when you print your boarding pass, they give you a new one at the counter. What *is* the point?
Anyway, the flight was uneventful, the stop-off at KL low-cost-carrier terminal was boring, and the connecting flight was made more difficult by a small baby that screamed the whole way through - in the seat next to me - the overnight flight. I arrived in Perth, got picked up by my uncle (nice of him to come out at 6am and get me), had a cup of tea and went to bed for a few hours.
This week has mostly been renewing my memory of my old home, which has changed a lot since I was last here, and a *whole* lot since we came back to England 20 years ago. One of my cousins is married with 4 kids, and walking into her house was like stepping back in time 25 years, they're so much like me, my brother, and my cousins at that age. The other 2 are both getting married this year, although I'm leaving before the weddings :( I've done lots of walking round the city and suburbs, and may go down to Fremantle today to see the coast again. By the end of the week I plan to head out and hie down to the south to tour the wine regions, as I'm getting itchy feet again. Plans to catch up with old friends have so far stalled, but hopefully I'll be able to see them before I leave.
And this time in 2 weeks I'll be packing my bags for home. It's nearly at an end now, and I can't make up my mind whether I'm glad to be getting back or not...