Needless to say, this trip has its ups and downs, its excitement and its dull moments, and of course sheer and utter terror at times. In the following blogs I am going to attempt to fill you in on as many of the small details of my LONG 13 day vacation as I can. Keep an eye out for these because they will be published daily for the next week or so until I get everything out.
The first day of the trip we were lucky because Kansai was unusually warm for this time of year which allowed us to leave our coats and home and not freeze on the way to the airport. You see, where we were going was about 4 times warmer than where we were coming from and no one wants to backpack with a puffy coat.
We arrived at the airport and boarded our first flight to Seoul, Korea. To our surprise we were fed a meal on this short 1.25 hour flight. This was so shocking because in the US we are lucky to get peanuts (or pretzels because some people are so nervous about the peanut allergy) on a short flight, let alone actual food. After this we had a short layover in the airport where we proceeded to find a row of empty seats so we could relax before boarding out 6 hour flight to Bangkok.
This is when I noticed something interesting. In Korea, at the Seoul airport, they have many small shops/booths set up that are Korean "Cultural Experience Centers". There you can do a Korean craft, see women in traditional Korean dress, and listen to classic Korean music with original instruments. Now what I find truly strange and a little distressing about this situation is where the location is. It is a wonderful idea, but what is the world coming to if we have to force people to learn about a culture at an airport? It felt so forced in the center of such a busy travel hub and even though people were enjoying this experience during their wait to board, it was just something to fill their time. I wonder if they will even remember what they saw in Korea when they arrive home.
When we landed in Bangkok it was 9;30pm. We were lucky because a friend of ours from Japan was going to be in Bangkok the following night for a week and he booked his hotel an extra night early for us to stay there for free. It was a nice place, called the Grand President, right in the middle of the busy night district. We threw our bags down and headed to the street to explore even though we knew that we had to get up very early to catch a bus to our next destination.
Upon reaching the street, we noticed there was a surprisingly large amount of westerners that had chosen to spend their holiday vacations in Thailand. We were suddenly surrounded by English, and the cat calls of prostitutes, both men and women, tuk-tuk drivers looking for gullible new passengers, women wanting you to sample the world famous Thai Massage, and street vendors looking to sell you a variety of crispy creepy crawlies.
We walked along the main road looking for a place to grab a bite to eat. The roads were lined with street vendors all looking to sell you knock off designer products, lighters, handicrafts, and even pornography (which is illegal in Thailand).
We finally found a small place with very good prices that looked like a nice place to stop. We sat down and ordered our drinks. For the first time in about a year I had a Diet Coke. In Japan we have Coke Zero, but everyone knows that Coke Zero does not taste the same as Diet. I was very happy about this and ordered it alongside an order of Thai Fried Rice. My travel partner opted for the green curry, which even looked too spicy to eat, and judging by the beads of sweat that formed on his brow as he ate, the spice was at maximum heat.
After our meal we headed back to get some rest, we knew we had a big day the next day, but not before stopping into a local 7-11 to check out the Thai selection!
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