Getting Back To Thailand

The hours ticked away ever so slowly for me on Friday afternoon. I was at work, the last day before I was finally on vacation. The trip that was almost 10 months in the making was almost upon me. Sure, I was not going to leave until Sunday morning at 1:20 am. But there was just something about being able to finally say to myself I was on vacation. Finally say I was heading back to Thailand.

The car was rented, the bags were packed, and the hotel and airline reservations were confirmed. All that was needed was for this damn day to end and I could be on my way. I am certain I was not very productive that day. In fact, I may have not been very productive the entire two weeks BEFORE my vacation.

I was going to meet up with Dart in San Diego first. He had some things for me from his last trip to Thailand that I asked him to get. This was the first chance I was going to have to get them. I thought it would also be nice to visit with him for a while.

As the clock struck quitting time I was off like a prom dress and on the road to San Diego. The Thai music was blasting, my mood was great, and I was damn near falling asleep at the wheel. I didn’t get much rest the night before and it was totally catching up with me. I wanted to make it all the way out to San Diego but stopped in Yuma for the night. Around 5am, I was back on the road, finally pulling into to San Diego in the early morning. It was good to see Dart, but I cut my visit with him short. I wanted to get on the road again to Los Angeles and there were a few old sites I wanted to see from the San Fernardo Valley where I grew up.

I also did a nice tour through Hollywood and tried to find a friends old house in the Hollywood Hills. Ironically enough, I ended up driving through “Little Armenia” and then “Thai Town” trying to find the turn. I thought the turn was off of Hollywood Blvd but it ended up being off of Sunset. After that, a quick drive over the hill to the valley, a quick drive by the house where I grew up, and a stop at the In-N-Out on Balboa I was back on the 405 and heading to LAX.

I arrived at the Tom Bradley International Terminal about 10:00pm and the place was just hopping. I found the EVA Air counter and could not believe my eyes at how long the line was. This is the first of many times I would be glad I purchased that Evergreen Deluxe Class ticket. I had my own check-in counter along with Business and First Class. There were about 400 people in the Economy check-in line. There were five people on the Evergreen Deluxe check-in line.

After I was all checked in I went upstairs and watched an episode of the West Wing on my laptop. I also viewed a few music videos before I went through security around midnight. The plane boarded a little late, but again, I got to board with First and Business Class instead of fighting the masses to board.

When I got to my seat I was not all that impressed by its size. But then after sitting down, spreading my legs out, putting them on the foot rest and being able to lean back farther that I would have been in coach, I was once again extremely happy I bought this ticket. Once we were in the air, on my way to the bathroom, I took a look back at coach and how they were packed in there like sardines. Indeed, my chair was bigger and more comfortable and the 12 ½ hour flight to Taipei was more enjoyable because of it.

I slept about 6 hours of the 12 ½ hours the flight would take. They had 9 video channels and 10 audio channels for you to listen. I didn’t watch any of the movies they had although the viewing screen built into the seat in front of me was nice. I mostly just watched our path and airspeed information. The food was still horrible as I cannot take airline food. The flight attendants were nice to look at and performed their duties adequately.

We arrived in Taipei around 5:30am. I was tired and bored and had three hours to kill before my flight to Bangkok at 8:30am. The only major bummer about Evergreen Deluxe is that you DON’T get the use of their lounge. That would have been nice while in Taipei. I could not for the life of me find any internet stations and the one “information station” I found had internet access, but it was out of order.

Then I found this place called “The More.” The best way I can describe it is a pay per use or membership travel lounge. I only wanted to use two of the things they advertised, but they were two important things. Internet and showers.

So I paid $28 to use their facilities before my flight departed. Some other things they had were meeting rooms, internet access, showers, massage room, exercise room, free snacks and drinks, and a few other things. Here is their webpage. http://www.moregroup.com.tw/main2.htm

I think they also had a membership you could purchase as well. But I was only interested in the shower and the internet. I did drink a lot of Pepsi’s while I was there and the massage chair they had was interesting. It was a good way to kill an hour and half, but they didn’t open until 6:30 so I did have one hour of utter boredom.

On the flight to Bangkok I sat next to a big white guy. He was friendly and we hit it off immediately. I will call him Jon for the purpose of this report. I didn’t know if Jon was a fellow sanuker or not, so I eased in slowly and let him play his cards first. When he started mentioning places like Soi Cowboy and Nana Plaza I knew. But I still played ignorant for a while. Jon is a postman from Northern California and makes two trips to Thailand per year. He has been coming since 1997. He knows a lot of people in Thailand and has a stable of girlfriends waiting once he arrives. He corresponds with them by email and sends them some money for Christmas. He talked about a lot of things I wanted to try. He mentioned these foot pedicures and facials he receives. And he is a walking mailman so he just loves the foot massages.

I finally let on to him that I was going to Thailand for the same reasons he was after I heard his response to my question of where he was staying. “Well. I found this great place a few trips back that I have been staying at ever since. It’s on Soi 11 and it called the Grand President,” he explained.

I then asked him if he wanted to share a cab there as I was staying at the same place. He originally agreed, even though one of his girlfriends was meeting him at the airport. But then he backed out completely after he found out I had a checked bag. He didn’t want to waste any time getting checked in and getting to the fun. So we agreed to meet at the Beer Garden on Wednesday as that was another place I wanted to check out.

He also said after trying almost all the airlines that offer service to Bangkok, he always flies EVA Air and Evergreen Deluxe class. He paid more for his ticket, although he flew from San Francisco to Taipei and I flew from Los Angeles. Don’t know how much of a difference that makes but his ticket was a thousand and change and mine was $880. I booked online through EVA’s website and he went through a travel agent.

He also mentioned a few other things. He says he meets a lot of people in Thailand, Americans, Brits, etc and they all have the same story. Got married young, are now in their 50’s divorced and single. They discovered Thailand and now hate all Western women. Jon and I are much in the same boat. Although he is 40 and I am 27, we both have never been married and have no desire to become married. We come to Thailand for fun and enjoy our time here. I mentioned he should check out Brazil or some other places in South or Central America but he is too focused on Thailand to try something else.

He asked how I found out about the Grand President and I explained to him all the wonderful Internet sites that provide information about this place. He never heard of the Eden Club. I didn’t explain it to him there. I told once we landed I would tell him about it.

It was cool sitting next to him though because the travel time of 3 ½ hours just flew by. We exchanged site information and stories and before we knew it we were landing in Bangkok.

The line for immigration was short, my bag was out in no time and soon I was in a cab on the way to the Grand President. They actually had my reservation this time and I was pulling up in the cab I say and he girlfriend heading over to Tower 3 across the street. That six hours of sleep was all I had in two days, but I was soon unpacked, showered up, and ready to check out Atami and see if Na was still there.

I got cash riding on a 3 per day average for a total of 45. Let's hit the ground running. Let me know if Ohm is still at Atami.

I didn't see her when I was there yesterday. However, she appears to be in the Atami brochure that I picked up.

I look forward to reading your report with much interest, I am returning to LOS in October and will consider your report essential research! Enjoy!

Xen did Ohm, he also did the BamBam girl but didn't get locked in the room with her. He did get pictures of her he'll be posting later.

Wickedwilly, when are your dates? I might go too.