Yet Another Cambodia Visa Run

April 14, 2009 at 12:54 am (expat life, Thailand tourism, travel)
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Although I swore I would never do it again, I made another visa run to Cambodia by bus. The one I use leaves from the coffee shop opposite Ekamai Bus Station at Sukhumvit Soi 31. It leaves at 9:30 AM, which is an OK time for me, and returns about 7PM the same day. It costs 2000 baht, and you need your passport (of course), 2 passport photos, plus a photocopy of the ID page of your passport.

It’s one day, there and back by bus. It’s a big tour bus, but no toilet, but they do play DVDs. It’s 4.5 hours there, 1 hour at the border, 4.5 hours back, more or less depending on traffic.

It’s hard on the bum. There is a toilet break half way both directions, and they feed you a free lunch. It costs 2000 baht which is about Cdn$72 currently. Half goes to the Cambodian government for a 30 day visa which is issued and then immediately cancelled. The bad news is that this visa takes up a whole page in your passport, it’s not just a stamp.

Coming back into Thailand, they give you only a 14 day visa. It used to be 30 days and an unlimited number of entries; now it’s 14 days and a max of 3 entries. While Thailand desperately needs tourists and the Tourist Association of Thailand is advertising worldwide, the Immigration Dept is making it more difficult. It’s the Thai way.

Cambodia is dirt poor, literally.

The village at the border has few paved roads. There are always a dozen or more children begging for money. One of the little girls that I gave some money to a couple of years ago, when she was 7, is now about 9, I think.

Two years ago, when I gave her about $1, and some other kids lesser amounts, they all ran over to the local shop and bought potato chips and gum and candy, so I don’t give them money any more.

The kids go to school (I asked) but learn only pissah khmen (Khmer), no Thai, no English, at least at that age. However, the kids understand and speak some Thai, which is what I use, and the 9 year old girl now understands and speaks some English, which she apparently taught herself in the few brief moments while trying to wheedle money out of the farangs. Poor, yes, stupid, no.

The kids call me “papa”, which is the word they use for all old guys. The kids are downright cute, I can understand why people want to adopt them. I believe Angelina Jolie adopted a Cambodian boy after making Tomb Raider there.

Two years ago, when tanks rolled into Bangkok, the military closed all borders and people were stranded for a week. I was praying that would not happen again, and it didn’t.

The worst part, other than the long sitting, and the often crappy movies, is the toilets at the highway rest stops (gasoline stations with an attached market), which are awful. First thing I do back in Bangkok is walk to the Landmark Hotel and use their toilet. Last night I also had dinner at the Landmark’s Huntsman’s Pub in the basement, something I rarely do because it charges Western prices. However, I needed real Western food, other than hamburgers and KFC, and so had an English meal: pork chop, baked potato, apple sauce, carrots and peas, and a Yorkshire pudding (not as good as my mother’s, though). But the Coke Zero was 106 baht (more than $3) and the entire dinner cost 455 baht (an arm and a leg). I often eat from a street vendor for 40 baht, and did so tonight.

I hate this trip and each time vow never to do it again, but it’s cheap, and I needed a delay until I get my new software product done. I have to leave Thailand again on the 26th.

Surprisingly, the day after the trip, I always suffer from “bus lag”; I am always exhausted, no energy, short attention span, sleep a lot.

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Pink Nipples

December 13, 2008 at 10:27 am (health and fitness, Thai Culture, Thailand tourism, travel)
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Tonight I was in Boots, the UK pharmacy that has 106 shops in Thailand, buying some pain pills for my sore back. All pharmacies in Thailand have many skin whitening creams because almost all Thai women think they are “too black”.

Nanomed Pink Nipple Cream

Nanomed Pink Nipple Cream

While we white-skinned Caucasians appreciate their golden beauty, they equate darker skin with poverty, because poor farmers work all day in the rice fields. Every Thai woman I know slobbers whitening cream on her face every night before bed.

Today, though, I was surprised to see Nanomed Pink Nipple Cream. Being a white skinned, red-haired, blue-eyed Caucasian, I was born with pink nipples and whenever I get naked with a Thai woman, that is the first thing they comment on. But I never realised until today that they would actually slobber cream on their lovely brown nipples to turn them pink.

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Returning to Bangkok

December 9, 2008 at 10:36 am (travel)
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A couple of weeks ago, I made the decision to walk away from Canada and my ever-increasing debts, and return to Bangkok, where I can live on my small Canadian pension. I have enough frequent flyer miles with Air Canada’s Aeroplan FF program that I could get to Bangkok for free. But then the People’s Alliance for Democracy (P.A.D.), which as far as I can see, wants to destroy democracy and impose military rule along with a few elected people, closed the airports.

I spent the first night in Montreal, and that was a hassle… it took 90 minutes to check into the airport Holiday Inn because there was a huge crowd of people, mostly Muslims, ahead of me. Apparently a parking garage had collapsed in the city, and a man was killed. The Red Cross evacuated everyone to two hotels after they had stood around for 8 or 10 hours. They did not notify the hotels, just packed people into buses, drove them to the hotels and unloaded all these people with a certificate saying the Red Cross would pay. The Holiday Inn could not cope… they only had 3 people at the reception desk, but could have used 5 more. Eventually they found 2 more, and after 90 minutes, I got to register.

The plane left at 8 AM next morning, (I had to get up at 5, of course), made it to Vancouver OK. Watched 2 movies during the flight. Air Canada charged me $2 for using their earphones; cheap bastards. Sandwiches also cost money, but the soft drinks were free. Air Canada is definitely the worst airline for service and most expensive I have ever used, bar none, and I have flown all over the world for more than 40 years.

Walked a couple of miles inside the Vancouver airport terminal to change planes, then flew to Tokyo, which I think was an 11 hour flight, I forget. Watched 3 movies. Food and drinks free, earphones free. Flight was ANA, a Japanese airline.

When I arrived at Tokyo Narita airport, a smiling hostess handed out flyers to the 5 or 6 of us going to Bangkok saying the Bangkok airport was closed, and ANA recommended returning to my home country. I didn’t think much of that idea.

Checked into the Holiday Inn with no problems. There was free Internet access, so I used my computer and Skype to make phone calls and try and re-route my Tokyo to Bangkok flight. Could not get through to ANA’s call centre, so the next morning I took Holiday Inn’s free shuttle back to the airport and went to the ANA counter and basically got nowhere. Flight was cancelled and they would not pay compensation for the night at the Holiday Inn. Went up 3 levels of management, smiles all the way, but no satisfaction.

Back to the hotel, and using Skype, called Aeroplan because these flights were free, using my frequent flyer points. Spent half an hour waiting on hold, but eventually got through to the Aeroplan call centre. Friendly lady was able to change my flight from Tokyo to Bangkok to Tokyo to Singapore at no charge (money or points). Spent half an hour researching hotels in Singapore using the web, then booked into a cheap 2 star hotel in the historic Geylang area of Singapore, which I had never visited in my 8 or 10 visits to Singapore.

Next day flew to Singapore, watching another 3 movies, and arrived at the hotel around 9 PM or so. Was surprised to see at least 50 or 60 beautiful young women lined up along the sidewalks around the hotel. Checked in, and discovered the first 5 floors were short-time rentals, and top 3 floors were regular hotel. Being a 2 star hotel, the room was basic but adequate. Wandered out onto the street, got propositioned at least 20 times, and found my way to a Thai restaurant where I had Thai food and a Pepsi for less than $5.

Singapore is very near the equator, so it’s hot and humid, 24 hours a day. The incessant cough that had plagued me for 18 months in Canada vanished. Sinuses working fine. Seems I am now allergic to cold climates.

Next day I bought an Internet access card for $5 and spent a long time figuring out how to get from Singapore to Bangkok, the main airport in BKK still being closed. Best I could do was book a flight to Phuket, which is 800 km from Bangkok. There is boat and bus service from Phuket, but no train; nearest train station is a 4 or 5 hour bus ride away. Bus takes 14 hours, which I did not really want to do.

Next day, I got to the airport with several hours to kill, so I went to Singapore Airlines and asked if I could fly into U-Tapao military airport as I had read that Thailand had opened that airport, and it turns out they had just scheduled some flights. So I booked a flight from Singapore to U-Tapao; they said there was a free bus service from U-Tapao to Bangkok. Then I tried cancelling my Singapore to Phuket flight, which was with Silk Air, a subsidiary of Singapore Airlines. They don’t have a counter at the airport. I could not get through to their call centre and there was no hold queue. However, Singapore Airport provides free wireless Internet access throughout the terminal, so I checked in for my flight, had lunch and set up my laptop with Skype and kept re-dialing until finally I got through. Yes, they could cancel the flight but it would take 6 weeks to get the refund. Funny how these airlines are always quick to take your money but have a great big problem with refunds.

The flight to U-Tapao was mostly empty, maybe 50 people in a plane that could hold 400. Short flight, too, less than an hour. No facilities at U-Tapao, which looks like something from the late 50s or early 60s. There were at least 35 or 40 planes parked on the tarmac. Bus ride to Bangkok took 2.5 hours, a lot longer than I expected, and they dropped us at a 5 star hotel, the Sofitel, which is not far from the area I was staying. A 20 minute taxi ride later, and I was checking into my hotel, the Woraburi on Sukhumvit Soi 4.

Next day, Pad (the lady that owns and runs Thai Culture Publishing) and Kik (former assistant) showed up and we looked at several apartments; settled on one a half kilometre behind the Woraburi for 6000 baht a month, which is Cdn$218, using today’s exchange rate. Wireless Internet is an extra 500 baht ($18) a month. The room comes with a bed and a wardrobe, and a bathroom, which is pretty basic, and a small balcony. There is air conditioning, but no hot water, and no bathtub; as usual with cheap Thai places, the shower head is on the wall and the bathroom itself is the shower stall.

Next day, Kik arranged for a van and 2 guys and they moved some of the office stuff from Pad’s place and the office (which is now closed) to my room, so I now have a desk and chairs, etc. There is no fridge or hot plate.

Yesterday I went with Pad to HomePro, and we picked up a flash water heater and some expanding shower curtain rods and a shower curtain. Installing the heater was not a big deal; I had to use the expanding rods because the apartment management won’t allow holes to be drilled in the tiling. It works fine, but the hoses are too short; today I will go back and get longer hoses.

Living here is great. Food is cheap and there are many restaurants. Everyone is friendly. I can breathe properly with no hacking.

However, it’s obvious that tourism is way down. Sukhumvit Soi 4 is a tourist area, but tourists are few and far between. This is high season now, but there is nobody here; like Bali after the bombings, the place is devoid of people spending money.

My Thai visa is 3 months long. The goal is to switch to marketing mode and promote the 27 web sites I now have, with emphasis on the Thai sites. Hopefully, this will bring in enough income to pay Pad and re-establish the office. I have discussed with Pad what I want her to do, which is basically research each subject and write articles (in Thai) about various aspects of Thai culture; we made a list of 20 broad subject areas. We will post those to her Thai blog; then I will translate them into English and post them to my sites as well as submit them to ezines for wide distribution. In this way, we should get a lot of visitors to our sites and thereby increase the revenue.

I’m starting from scratch (again) but feel excited about it; my depression is completely gone. This is where I belong.

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Tips for Learning the Thai Language

November 23, 2008 at 12:36 pm (learning Thai, Thai Culture, Thai language, travel)
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Thai uses a simple sentence structure: Subject, Verb, Object. If the subject is a pronoun, you can leave it out if the context is clear:

I live in Rayong –> live in Rayong –> yoo tee Rayong.

Verbs are not conjugated; past, present, and future all use the same word; you use time words to indicate the tense, and the time word always follows the verb.

You indicate past tense by putting “already” (lay-ow) at the end of a sentence or by using a time word (such as “yesterday”). Example, “I ate” –> “I eat already” –> gin [with a hard G] lay-ow.

Future is indicated with “will/shall” (ja). “I shall eat in 2 hours” –> dee-chun ja gin ny song? cheu-mohng. The word for 2 in Thai is “song?” with a rising tone, which is why I put a question mark. In English, questions rise at the end of a sentence.

Plurals are either generic or specific, as in English. With generic plurals, you double the noun. “teeth” –> “tooth tooth”. (This is also true in Malaysian and Indonesian.)

Specific plurals follow a specific pattern, and surprisingly, we do the same in English in certain circumstances. In English, we can say “I have 3 children”, but in Thai, you have to say “I have child 3 person” –> mee dek sahm? kohn. The “child” is the noun, “person” is called a “classifier” or “group word”. An example of this in English is “The farmer has three head of cattle”.

Questions are asked by making a statement and then plopping a question word on the end. “When are you going to the market?” –> “You go market when?” “What is that?” –> “that what?” (which you probably know is nee arai or ahn nee arai). [“ahn” means “thing”. “ahn nee arai” means “thing this what?”]

Negatives are formed by putting “mai” (pronounced “my!” with a falling tone) in front of an adjective or verb. Mai chai, as you probably know, means “not correct”. “Mai bai” means “don’t go”, “mai dee” is “not good” or “no good”, “mai suay” is “not pretty”.

You can also ask a question by pretending you are Canadian, and sticking “eh?” on the end of a statement. In Thai, “eh?” is “mai?” with an upward tone. “This is good, eh?” –> ahn nee dee mai?

Don’t be afraid to learn the Thai alphabet, those funny looking characters are just our letters drawn differently. Thai letters always have a noun attached. For example, “G” is “gah guy”. “Guy” is the Thai word for chicken, as you know, and it begins with that letter. Thai consonants have an implied vowel, which we don’t do in English. A K in English is just a consonant, but in Thai, a K has an implied vowel “ah” or “oh”. You can override the implied vowel by writing a specific vowel.

Thai has several Ks, several Ps and Fs, etc. They use the noun attached to distinguish. We say “B is for Baby”, “C is for Car”, which is the same thing, but in English we can say the letter name by itself, B, C, D, etc. In Thai, you always say the noun so you can distinguish one K from another, one P from another, because all the Ks are called “kah”, all the Ps “pah”, etc.

By the way, English has 3 Ks: K, C, and Q all make K sounds: kitten, cat, quit all have a phonetic K.

We also have 2 Js: John and George both have phonetic J.

And we also have 2 Ss: Cecile and Sam.

And two Zs: amuse and zoo.

So English has some of the same peculiarities as Thai, and these result from the same reason: the historical roots of the language.

Many of the Thai letters are exactly the same as their English equivalents; they are just drawn differently. A hard G in English is a hard G in Thai, but it is drawn in a different fashion.

One other oddity: Thai vowels can appear above, below, behind, and in front of a consonant, but they don’t wander around. A vowel is always pronounced after the consonant, no matter where it is drawn.

And now that you are thoroughly confused, let me leave you with this final mind-blowing thought.

You have been brainwashed since the age of 6 or 7 to accept the English alphabets as normal and natural. We actually have four separate and distinct alphabets, each of which is drawn differently, and each letter in each separate alphabet HAS THE SAME NAME AS IN THE OTHER THREE ALPHABETS. This is very, very stupid, but you accept this as natural because you have been brainwashed. A six year old does not question why the language is that way. I am referring to upper and lower case printing and writing. There are 4 different ways of writing an A, a B, a C, etc. Thai only has one, which makes far more sense. There is no upper and lower case in Thai, and there is no “writing” and “printing”; the Thai word for both [kee-an] translates as “drawing”. So you have to learn one Thai alphabet. Thai people have to learn four English alphabets.

I hope you found this useful, and I wish you fast progress with your Thai. I have had many, many people thank me for writing Speak Easy Thai and making it available so cheaply. In the 45 years I have been programming in Canada, France, and Australia, nobody ever thanked me for my work, but in Thailand, it has been a frequent occurrence. I lived there for 2.5 years while I was finishing the software, packaging it, and getting it on the market. I will be returning November 29, 2008.

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Videos About Thailand

September 24, 2008 at 12:10 am (ladyboys, learning Thai, Thai bar girls, Thai Culture, Thai Food, Thai language, Thailand tourism, travel)
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Videos about Thailand, Thai Culture, Thai Food, Learning Thai, Thailand Tourism, Thailand Ladyboys, Thailand Bar Girls:

http://www.learn-faster.org/Thai/Videos/

Also check out: I’m Live! Asian Adult Video Chat

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Why I Like to Travel

July 8, 2008 at 10:29 am (travel)
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Where the hell is Matt?

http://www.vimeo.com/1211060

If the video is jerky, press the pause button and let the buffer fill up, then press play again.

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On Construction Standards

January 29, 2007 at 10:42 am (construction, quality control, sidewalks, SkyTrain, subway, Thailand, travel)

The new subway, opened in mid 2005, is first class, very well designed and very efficient. On a scale of one to five, I give it five stars. The stations are wide, escalators are fast, trains are fast and clean and bright. And it’s not expensive to take a trip anywhere.

The SkyTrain, built a few years ago, is efficient, but not as well designed. There are only 3 cars in the trains, although the stations can handle 5 or 6 cars, so the cars are always overcrowded. Worse, there is typically only one escalator, so there is always a mad crush. On a scale of one to five, I give it two stars.

Bangkok’s sidewalks are dreadful. Most are a haphazard collection of mismatched concrete and tiles, difficult to walk on. Cracks and holes are everywhere. Sewer covers are frequently damaged and have gaping holes. Occasionally I see new construction where a sidewalk has been torn up for some reason and replaced; the new work is very sloppy, uneven, hard to distinguish from the old.

I find it incredible that a country that can produce such an amazing subway cannot build a flat sidewalk.

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In a German Restaurant

January 29, 2007 at 10:35 am (holiday, Thailand, travel)

One night, I and my two assistants were sitting in a German restaurant near my place, when there was a funny kind of HONK! at the door. It was a baby elephant, poking his head inside. His handler was selling food, probably sugar cane, to feed the elephant. This doesn’t happen very often to me in restaurants in Canada or Australia, but here in Thailand, it is not unusual.

Expect the unexpected.

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Ritual at Bar in Nana Entertainment Plaza

January 29, 2007 at 10:34 am (bars, holiday, Nana, NEP, nightlife, superstition, Thai rituals, Thailand, travel)

Near where I live is the multi-storey, slightly sleazy Nana Entertainment Plaza, which has many licenced bars.

Almost all of the 30 or 35 bars or clubs have a standard bar with stools, bartender, and a mirror behind the bartender, just like any other bar in the world. They also have a carousel (some have two) in the centre of the floor, and three rows of bench-type seats, successively higher, more or less in a semi-circle around the central floor area with the carousel.

The carousel holds about 10 or 12 girls, who dance, mostly lethargically, occasionally energetically, to annoying music, as the carousel turns slowly. After 15 minutes or so, the DJ calls out something (probably “All change!”) in Thai, and the girls on the carousel descend and put on a T-shirt and jeans, or a uniform peculiar to that bar, and another set of girls strips to their bikinis and gets up on the carousel.

Nudity is forbidden, the girls must wear bikinis, and they can’t be too revealing.

One evening, I happened to be walking around Nana just before 7PM, which is when the bars and clubs open. At one bar, the interior lights had just been switched on, and there were a half dozen beautiful bar girls standing around chatting.

One girl took some jasmine necklace wreaths and a wooden bat, about the size and shape of a milk bottle (probably the wooden pestle used to make som tam, the spicy papaya salad), and rapped it twice on one of the vertical wooden poles holding up the floor above. She gave one wreath to one of the girl dancers. She rapped on two more poles, then moved to the doorway. She ran the bat up one side, across the top, and down the other side of the doorway. Then she rapped it twice on the floor inside in front of the doorway. She held a shiny metal pot filled with water, and poured water over the bat, then rapped it twice on the floor again. She put the pot aside. She hung a jasmine wreath on a hook by the door.

She moved back into the club, and walked around stopping often. She squatted down, rapped the bat twice on the floor, then stood up and moved on. She did this 6 or 7 times around the floor of the club. I couldn’t see any particular difference in the floor at the spots where she rapped.

She then walked around the carousel and rapped each brass pole twice.

At the end, she gave her final wreath to another dancer.

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Why I Feel Old

January 29, 2007 at 10:33 am (ageing, aging, bars, Nana, NEP, nightlife, Thailand, travel)

I was talking to a beautiful young girl in a bar at Nana, which is near my apartment. “How old are you?” I asked.

“Twenny foh,” she replied, “how ole you?”

“Fifty-nine,” I said.

“Oh,” she said, “same same father me.”

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