Travels in Thailand
Working for five months in Thailand may actually be more fun than vacationing here for two to three weeks. I am beginning to find a routine that is actually pleasant. My office environment is very nice and my daily five minute walk to work is interesting and a bit of a joy – there are so many cool sights, sounds, and smells.
I feel surprisingly relaxed. When I am vacationing in a foreign country there is a lot of rushing about trying to see everything. Living here seems to allow my experiences to unfold sensibly and slowly. I see the same street vendors, traffic cops, and shops each day – it’s kind of comforting. Ok, I must admit that I am in a very good situation. My company is treating me very well and my Thai office mates have gone out of their way to make me feel welcome. Having my beloved wife Kathryn here would make it perfect, but using Skype every night helps me to share my experiences with her. I am looking forward to the day she arrives! So, I am feeling incredibly fortunate. If you get a chance to do something like this, do not pass it up. If you go to the bathroom in our office, the cleaning lady will sometimes be in there as well. She is very nice, and always greets me in a gracious manner. She is very considerate and politely refrains from talking to me while I am taking care of business.
Here are some pictures of me, Tuk, Jule, Tal, and Gade during our big outing.                      Today, four of the young women from the office took me to the Royal Palace and Wat Pho. They were all very sweet and kind and I had a great time. We took the Skytrain from Asok station to the Saphan Taksin station and then took a boat up to the Palace and Wat. In between snacking, and sightseeing, we all decided to get a massage at Wat Pho.
It was simply the best massage I have ever had. Although it is Thai massage it was never painful, but there is a lot of range of motion work. Please put this on your bucket list. Yesterday, I had a milk shake made from green tea (Starbucks) and today I ate garlic toast sprinkled with sugar. Actually, both were quite good.
But I was speechless when I watched my Thai friends pour ketchup on a Pizza. If you look at the pictures from my first day at work here you will see that I was given a beautiful garland as a welcome gift. I proudly hung it on my cubical wall. Today, I was told that I might want to throw it away since it was beginning to whither and die.
I protested that it was too wonderful a gift to throw away. After a lot of polite discussion, I was told it was "creepy" to keep something that was dying in my cube. So, I put it in a plastic sack and brought it back to my apartment. I guess the karma of a dying garland was too unpleasant for the office environment. My Thai compatriots took me to lunch again today. I just eat what they order for me - typically, I only know what it is about two nano seconds prior to putting it in my mouth. But, as usual, it was delicious.
Every day they ask me if I have had any "tummy" troubles. I can proudly say that I have neither thrown up nor had any kind of GI trouble. I think this is remarkable considering the restaurants look more like a worn out garage. Neeedless to say, I trust them with my life. I have been treated with great kindness and generosity by the staff and company. OK, this is more on the serious side. You need to be very careful when crossing a street in the BKK. Looking both ways TWICE is the bare minimum for safety. You cannot predict the direction from which a car, motorcycle, or tuk tuk will come. I'm not sure the sidewalks are any safer though. On the plus side it makes my daily walk to work very interesting. Click on each photo to view full-size.    | ArchivesSeptember 2010 AuthorI am a 50-something man working in Bangkok for six months, running a programmer boot camp for an American-based company. |
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