It turned out that our trip to Thailand (mainly just Bangkok and Pattaya) was one of our top trips ever. Probably the reason was the focus on relaxation instead of destinations, but it could have been the warmer weather, the delicious food, or the spending power we enjoyed thanks to the strong yen.
One big impression I had was that the Thai people were very friendly. At first I thought it was because maybe they were hoping to make money off of us, but as time went on and I found myself in situations that had nothing to do with money people were consistently friendly and smiling, and this was a big contrast to my time in other countries.
The first day we dragged our exhausted selves out to Sannomiya early and caught the bus to the airport. After working straight up until the departure we had to do a rush job on packing, but once we got on the bus we could just relax and go with the flow. Kuniko slept, and I did some last minute study on the Thai language.
We had a long wait through customs and security, but once on the plane it was a three hour flight to Manila and then after an hour wait there we flew on to Bangkok. Originally our tickets were direct, but somewhere along the way they changed to one stop in the Philippines. I didn’t mind – I liked seeing other countries, even if it is only the airport.
The first thing we noticed about Bangkok was the heat. Just like Manila – it was over 30 degrees C in the airport, while in Osaka it was close to zero when we left. The airport in Bangkok was much more modern than the older one, and the taxi system into the city was a very good system – just tell one lady where you are going (in English) and she translates for a taxi driver who drives you there. The driver did a good job, and we tipped him a little once we found our hotel. At first we had the feeling that we were in a bad neighborhood, but it turned out that the location was good, and the hotel was very nice. We found a nearby restaurant in Kuniko’s Japanese guidebook and had a pretty good (although not spicy at all) meal there with some cold beers before heading out for some shopping. We ran across a pretty good sized supermarket near the hotel, as well as several convenience stores, so all in all it was a good spot. Also, we were close to the red light district for our area, and it was fun to check it out. Right off the bat we noticed that everywhere you saw white guys walking around with Thai hookers, and it was very interesting to see how open everyone was about it.
