For the next while my blogs are going to be based on diary entries and therefor the tenses may well vary hugely. Also I am trying to use a keyboard set up for French and Vietnamese so the letters are changing on me an awful lot. so if any weird characters appear please excuse!
- So I'm sitting in the lobby of the hotel, waiting to meet up with Em for lunch. I've got about 6 hours left in what, historically speaking, has to be considered the luckiest country in South East Asia. there have been no civil wars of which to speak, there has been no American bombing raids to flush out the Communists, no brutal oppressive regimes that murdered their own people, no Imperial power running the country into the ground for its own ends, and there - probably because of all this - has been relative economic stability.
As a tourist, Thailand's privileged place acts as a mixed blessing. The good thing is that there is a strong infrastructure in place. The roads and railways are both there and work well. The journey estimates are not too bad, and especially on the trains, the level of comfort is high. The medical services which - touch wood, I have so far been lucky enough to avoid using are of a high quality and are able to deal with most problems.
The downside comes "with the westernisation" that money has brought to Bangkok (and a lot of the tourist hot-spots) these places have become overrun with Burger King, McDonald's, KFCs and 7 Elevens. There could potentially be more Thai restaurants in a square mile of NYC than in one in Bangkok.
That not to say that I'll leave with a negative impression. Having been in Asia for long enough to get used to the way of life, I have loved being back in Bangkok - and once they know I've been around I get no hassle from the touts and scam artists.
5pm - Airport
My plane just drove past the window with the slogan "now everyone can fly" written on the side. I just hope that's not the recruitment policy....
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