Blogged out!

It's Monday evening and I'm in an internet cafe on Sripoom Soi 1 in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand. I meant to blog yesterday evening, but by the time I'd checked my emails and my bank account and sorted out booking a flight back to Bangkok on Thursday, the inclination had long gone. To tell the truth, the inclination is a bit lacking now. I'm tired and it's hot, humid and thundery. I spent so many hours bringing my blog up-to-date that last day in Melbourne that maybe I'm a little blogged out!

We are staying in a guesthouse around the corner from here, the SK House on Moon Muang Soi 9. We have a room on the ground floor, next to the swimming pool, which I went in for the first time today.

I arrived in Bangkok last Sunday evening, but the reunion with Paul didn't go quite according to plan. The flight was due in around 10.30 p.m., but was late landing. We were circling the skies above Bangkok for what seemed like ages but was probably only 15 minutes at most. Anyway, the result was that there seemed to be a surge of passengers all disgorged into the airport at one and all trying to get through immigration control. Immigration control were taking their time. By the time I got through immigration control, picked up my baggage and walked out into the main concourse of the airport it must have been getting on for midnight. I was immediately assailed by smiling Thai people all vying for my attention, offering me taxis and hotel rooms and all kinds of other things besides. Then I heard my name being called over the PA system. I presented myself at the information desk as requested, to be greeted by Paul demanding 'Where have you been?'. It wasn't quite the reunion I'd anticipated! Of course he had not bothered to make a note of the flight number that I had emailed to him, so had not been able to check whether the flight was in, or when it got in. When he had made enquires at the information desk he'd been given all kinds of conflicting information.

Bangkok was hot, dirty, smelly and heavy with the fumes from many buses, cars, taxis and tuuk tuuks. Just getting around was difficult, due to continual harassment from people who wanted to either take us to places we didn't want to go to, or to direct us away from places we did want to go to ('The temple is closed today ...') in order to take us to somewhere in order to take us somewhere which might have some financial benefit to them (and cost to us).

So, here we are in Chiang Mai, where we have been since Wednesday morning, travelling overnight from Bangkok on the train, in a 1st class sleeper. Chiang Mai is great!