Bangkok

This was my first experience really being in a crowded city in Asia. My mind was soon to be blown many times but this was the first major occasion. The airport was super busy and crowded upon arrival, and we had to retrieve our four huge bags from baggage claim. They dragged on the ground on either side of the relatively small carts they have. We took out some Thai Bhat currency so we had cash to pay the taxi driver and buy food with. The minimum atm transaction was 5,000 bhat which translated about $160. We ended up spending almost all of it. We loaded up a taxi van and set off for our hotel in central Bangkok, which was about an hour drive since it was rush hour with traffic. I thought Los Angeles traffic was bad, this is next level. There are way more vehicles in a cramped area, plus the addition of motor bikes weaving throughout.

The driver was nice, his English was fair at best, but we got by. I liked him anyways. An hour later through Bangkok rush hour traffic we arrived at our Hotel, Asoke Residence. On the way I was highly entertained by the tons of motorbikes piled high with passengers, and the haphazard flow of traffic, I saw a few stray dogs that looks pretty sickly, and cats with nubs for tails. I small boy splashed about in a large bathtub, in a very comical way. Our hotel room was freakishly large, especially for the $40 it cost. Much bigger than our old apartment in Los Angeles, fully equipped with kitchen. But of course the toilet got clogged almost immediately, apparently you can’t flush the toilet paper down.

I took a nap and woke up extremely irritated and un-rested. I’m sure I haven’t gotten a proper nights sleep in the right time frame for days now. But we had to get up and go find another duffel bag and some luggage locks. We weren’t supposed to bring more than 30kgs checked luggage on the flight to Nepal, half of what we had currently. So the plan was to leave two big bags at a hotel nearby for Aditya’s family to bring back with them upon returning from Thailand in a week or two. We called our same cabbie from the morning to arrange for him to pick us up in the morning. Then we set off the mega-mall down the road a few blocks. It was super hot and smelly outside, but we braved it anyways and arrived at the biggest most stuffed with stores mall I have ever been to, Terminal 21. Had I not been in such a terrible physical and mental state I would have totally loved it. But, not only did we not find any reasonably sized or priced bags to buy, we also had a very hard time finding anything remotely vegetarian friendly, even for me who will eat fish. Finally we found a place where I could get sushi and Aditya could get pasta. The trip was mostly an epic fail but at least we got food and a few locks for our bags, and got to see the town a little bit. I definitely want to return to visit. It seems like a fun and interesting place with cool people there. 

The morning we both awoke at 4am, due to the jet lag again ruining our sleep schedule, so we ate some Pocky in bed and then got up to reorganize our bags. Next stop, Kathmandu.