So, I have to admit I'm not only really getting a hang of this blog thing, but I'm loving it... thus the 7500 word first entry yesterday... or whatever day that was... I'm on the other side of the world which makes your today my yesterday and my tomorrow your last week... but whenever you're reading this one, please know that it is guaranteed to only be a maximum of 14 minutes of reading time because that's all the time I have on my internet card... so here goes...
our story begins upon arrival.... i was greeted by Noo and Jung the only two people I know in Thailand. Noo was a foreign exchange student who stayed with my family for like a weekend about 25 years ago... then he and his wife Jung came when they got married and visited us as part of their US trip... that was 20 years ago.... well they had always invited us to come visit them and at first I'm sure they meant it, but come on let's face it there's got to be a statute of limitations on invites for families that took you in for a couple weekends when you were in college and the only thing you had to offer was hospitality when, but really IF, your host family ever came to Thailand. But really that's more a formality than a real offer...right? I mean you kind of think you are safe offering a family from a tiny town in Wisconsin to come visit you halfway around the world when most of the state i'm from considers Wisconsin Dells a getaway vacation (go ahead and google it if you don't get why that's funny) so...what exactly would you do if the oldest son of the family that you stayed with over 25 years ago suddenly contacted you and told you that he'd like to take you up on the offer that you made on coming to visit?
well one thing that you could do would be to not respond to his email, plenty of good excuses... didn't get it... computer crashed, i thought I replied, you didn't get it... huh that's weird... any one of these would have more than sufficed... but no... what do they do...
they not only actually want to see me, but insist that I stay at a sister's, city apartment (she lives in the south and won't be using it for the month I'm there) for as long as i want... and did they mention it's on the 22nd floor in downtown overlooking the whole city... close to everything and well, please treat it like it's mine...WHAT?
so, i wake up the next morning and sure enough there's the city, my city it feels like, in a Gordon Geko kind of way (again google it) and so i'm off to explore...
within an hour i've figured out how to get 3 stations on the sky train and jump in a tuk tuk, one of those 3 wheeled taxi rickshaw things that despite there rickety nature (thus the name) they can do about 90 no problem... at least it felt like that, and with no seat belts and a driver that seemed determined to break his previous record for driving regulations in a single trip I feel that I may truly have one the one night in Bangkok that they write songs about...
but miraculously i arrive, where, you ask? where else does someone on an extreme budget go on the first day of a two month trip... shopping of course... now in my defense I thought I clearly asked my driver to take me to a temple or a floating garden or a buddha of any kind but I guess what he heard was that I really wanted to go shopping for suits... and boy was he right.
within minutes i was trying things on and absolutely convinced that I had to have a new suit, I mean I can only wear my blue and grey hoodies so long before they both have to go in the wash at the same time.
So for the next couple hours I felt like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, the second time she went shopping.... man do I love attention and they loved my money so we were a match made in heaven...
in the end I got two custom made suits, one armani cut, one hugo boss, and something like 7 shirts and 4 ties... for a couple hundred dollars... frickin amazing... and the best part... i look really, really good in them... now if I can only find some reason to wear them when I get back... anyone need a date for a wedding... or a funeral, bat mitzfa (sorry on spelling jewish friends) whatever, I'm in... I have just the thing to wear....
and so that brings me to the overused but always captivating title of this entry...
-business class flight from LA to Bangkok.......... (free... miles)
-penthouse suite overlooking city (free... taking in foreign exchange students has it's priviledges)
-complete new wardrobe of custom made suits, shirts and ties.... couple hundred dollars
-coming back to the states after a 2 month dream adventure looking even better than when I left........ PRICELESS
sawadee my friends,
j
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