(received 2-25-99) Thailand - part 4 (January 5th) After deciding that we were going to go down and visit Ian that afternoon, we caught a river ferry that bounces up and down the banks of the river. For only eight baht, it is an efficient way to get to the center part where the famous wats and the Grand Palace are located. It is also an excellent way to see some of Bangkok from a comfortable seat as you buzz past huge barges, their decks almost submerged and covered with the shacks and laundry of the people who live and work on them. This part of the river is full of little tour boats servicing many of the fancy hotels that line the edge of the water. That morning, we toured the Grand Palace and accompanying wat (see photos of reclining Bhudda, stone statuary, etc.) Again, beautiful architecture and decorations that are better left to the photos. There should be a photo of the three of us with a short, local man. That was ‘Sin’ (nickname I hope), our guide for the tour. We decided to hire him when, just at the entrance, he offered his services for 200 B. I was a bit miffed to find that free English language group tours were offered inside but realized that with the group, we wouldn’t be able to linger or go back. It also turned out that Sin worked at the Palace for many years as a soldier in the ‘entertainment’ division. We never quite figured it out but think he was some kind of entertainment director/servant for visiting dignitaries and diplomats. He had met Nixon and other important people. This gave him many interesting anecdotes about life in the palace. His English wasn’t great, but he was friendly and energetic. In the heat of the noon sun, we decided to walk to China Town. It took us some time to figure our way there, with lots of confusing streets and signs. However, it did give us a chance to see many streets and the life of ordinary Thai people. Bangkok is a very military city with soldiers armed with M-16s and FALs standing on many corners or at entrances of buildings. It often felt like a military base. Camouflage clothing is also very popular with the people, especially U.S. BDU trousers with cargo pockets. Many bazaars had Army-Navy Surplus stalls with a variety of war paraphernalia. Ian says that Nazi stuff is pretty popular. China Town is actually a loooooong alley that is about ten feet wide and filled with about 1,000,000 people (see photos). I didn’t find it to be particularly Chinese; we only saw a few signs with Chinese characters. It was very interesting to get away from the touristy part and see where the locals shop. With people flooding both ways down the narrow alley, it is not for the claustrophobic. The most common shop was a fabric store with bolts upon bolts of bright fabrics. There were also the ubiquitous food vendors filling every spare corner and space, hawking their wares. The most annoying thing were these tables filled with watches and other electronics. A popular item was a large, white, plastic cat alarm clock. I guess to reassure potential customers that they worked, all of the clocks had the alarm turned on. This filled the alley with a loud, arythmic beeping. I wanted to hit their snooze buttons as we walked past. After not finding a Chinese place to eat, we stopped at a little sidewalk place and pointed at food in warming trays and chowed down (see photo of Joe and Joan at table; she is holding a guidebook, not reading!). We took a short cut straight to the river and caught a return ferry, a pleasant break after being on our feet all day. We said good bye to Mr. Tavee and family and caught a taxi to the "Ekamai" Eastern bus station. Bangkok has a elevated freeway system that supposedly makes things faster but has a toll of 40 B. Our driver wanted to take the freeway, but looking at the map, I couldn’t see why. It turns out that even though it might be a little faster, it is definitely longer - i.e. a higher taxi fare. So we nixed the freeway idea, and our driver went on the city roads, talking to himself and us about how bad the traffic would be - all in Thai, of course. He kept making a ‘cooing’ sound, maybe to show his distress about the traffic? Well, we made it there with no problems for a little over 100 B and with no hassle, got tickets and settled ourselves in to a comfy, Greyhound (early model) style bus for 57 B. We were the only passengers and thought, "Wow, this will be nice" Just on the edge of town, we stopped at a large, open air market, and a bazillion people got on. The ride was uneventful, except for the motorcycle accident described earlier. We left the outskirts of Bangkok, passing through the suburbs of homes and apartment buildings. The scenery changed to palm trees and pineapple farms, with occasional small towns showing up now and then where the bus would stop and the ticket person who throw people on and off the bus - I guess they had a tight schedule to keep. Ian had told us that the bus would drop us off in the center of town and that we should call him on a pay phone when we got in. Well, at 9:30 PM, the bus did drop us off but not in the center. It paused in the middle of a non-descript block on a non-descript street, somewhere in Si Racha. A phone call revealed that Ian had gone out to get dinner for his parents and would be back soon, so we wandered around the street, looking in stores and stretching our legs. The locals all watched us strolling up and down the sidewalks with our backpacks on. Speaking of backpacks, this trip was very educational in that we realized how little we actually need to carry when travelling. Our world tour should be a light affair. A second phone call got us directions to the local mall in the center where Ian would meet us. Our first ‘tuk tuk’ ride took us there. A tuk-tuk, which is the Thai phonetic work for the sound they make as they putter around, are three-wheeled motorcycle taxis that are decorated with chrome and lights. I have a really good picture and will send the negatives for them soon. The was scary. It was exactly like a mall in America with a Pizza Hut, stores, video arcade, security guards weird. We waited for Ian, Joan dropping little subliminal hints about how much she wanted Pizza Hut. "Do you think Ian will pizza here soon?" "I wonder if we will find a pizza room a the hotel?" I was strangely nervous about seeing Ian. I felt like ‘Red’ from the movie "The Shawshank Redemption" after Andy (main character) escaped from jail. "I wonder how my friend is" I want to see my friend, Andy/Ian." There he came, bopping down the sidewalk in baggy, black fisherman pants (like oversize pj bottoms), a funky, ugly local shirt and a pair of flip-flops. After hugs and introductions, he loaded us in a tuk-tuk and jumped on the back of motorcycle taxi and led the way to the hotel. As his parents were visiting, he couldn’t put us up for our visit. The hotel was a very casual affair built on stilts over the water. It felt like a cheap, summer hotel on one of the Great Lakes; small, uniform rooms with a sink in the corner, a table and chairs in front of each one. Everything was salt weathered wood and blue and white paint. You could hear the water sloshing around underneath and even see it through cracks in the floor. You could also hear the toilet drain right into the ocean. Our room was the last one on the pier and looked out over the ocean. It was 300 B for the three of us to share two large beds. Every time I slept on our crappy bed here in Kyzylorda, I think about those comfy beds in Thailand where you could hang your feet off the end and not have to lie on the ridge where the two meet. After checking in and enjoying the comic appearance of many little, fat, hot-dog dogs that were lounging around the reception desk (pets or dinner?), we walked down the shore to a loud, busy bar. Our table was right on the water but not far enough from the rock and roll band playing bad music too loudly. W left ourselves in Ian’s hands for the food, and he ordered a large, whole fish that came in a very hot steel ‘boat;’ he sat there sizzling and cooking during the whole meal. It was all really nice, but the music was too loud for conversation, so we changed to another open-air bar back toward the hotel. Ian is well known there for his singing talents and a failed, confusing, romantic relationship with the lead singer of the band who was described as "psycho." After a beer or two, the band started calling for Ian to come up and sing. With a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other, he took the mike and belted out a fantastic rendition of "Tears from Heaven" by Eric Clapton. His encore of "House of the Rising Sun" was solid but not of the same caliber. At this point, we were curious to explore the night market of Si Racha. A short distance from the hotel, in an open, gravel parking lot space, was a long row of food stalls and carts. Each cart had fluorescent lights, often of different colors, bathing everything with soft light. Music from boomboxes filled the air, creating a carnival atmosphere. Each stall had plastic, patio furniture set out and food displayed in glass cases, often unrecognizable. We walked along, looking for ‘Waterfall Pork’ which Ian claimed was food of the gods. After talking vendors, he found out about a place on the other side of the block. We planted ourselves at a table and ordered pineapple shakes while he went on his mission. He returned with plastic bags of food, and the proprietor of our table brought us plates, silverware and plates of rice so we could enjoy our fare. It was a spicy dish of cooked pork, chilli peppers and mint and was so delicious. We talked for awhile about Thailand and Ian’s experiences until Joan and Joe that they were tired and wanted to go back . At the hotel, we bought some beer from the cooler next to the front desk as well as some bottled water. Even the locals drink bottled water, sold in a uniform, 950 ml, white plastic bottle with a variety of different logos for 5-10 B. We went through a lot of them in our two weeks. They are the most common pieces of trash on the side of the road. Ian and I sat on concrete benches around a concrete table with an inlaid checker board and chewed the fat, catching up since we had last seen each other in Dayton, back in May of 1997. We also played a couple of games of chess on my little, plastic travel board (100 tenge at our local bazaar). We also drank too much beer. I felt really bad for Ian as he had to be at school before eight. Around 2 AM, we staggered our separate ways.