Trip to Takuapa

Sa-wa-dee ka!!
"Sa-wa-dee" is hello. You add "ka" at the end if you're a woman and "krap" if you're a man.

So... Greetings from Bangkok! Yes... I'm still here.

How are things for you? Thank you for the e-mails. I am really enjoying them and appreciate the thoughts.

Today I was suppose to fly to Phuket where Kellie's friend Fiona would pick me up to take me to Yaowawit. (Kellie is my contact at the school). Small problem though... the Phuket airport is closed due to the protests and they don't know when it will re-open. I had to go to the Bangkok Airport to confirm the closure though because I couldn't get accurate information and I wasn't sure if I could refund my ticket. Definitely closed and there is no way to know when it will reopen. Options:

- Stay in Bangkok for several days in hopes that the Phuket airport will reopen or
- Take a train (these are canceled as well though!) or
- Take an 11-12 hour bus trip to Takuapa.

After talking to Kellie though, I decided to catch a bus and meet Fiona in Takuapa. There are 3 bus stations in Bangkok and the one I needed was about 45 minutes by taxi ride to southern Bangkok. (Unless of course the taxi driver ripped me off). He did try to charge me 100 baht at the toll station which is actually 25 baht. Nice try. By the time we got to the 40 baht toll station he only asked for the 40 baht. Looking at the map though, I think he took me the long way but I didn't feel like arguing as I wasn't entirely sure of where I was at and I'm a bit over trying to smile and argue with someone pretending to not understand. :-)

The train to Takuapa is about 11.5+ hours. I'm on a local bus (I think) so I imagine it will take longer. It took me until about 1:00 pm to get to the bus station and the next bus out is at 6:50 pm. SIGH. I have another 5 hours of waiting.

For the curious, the bus is 632 baht, has A/C and a toilet. There are ones that are VIP and potentially nicer as well as ones with no A/C or toilet. I didn't really care - just wanted the next one out and had trouble understanding what the options were anyways. Express? Local? I have no idea which ticket booth offered which and I had to go to about 5 different booths to figure it out.

I will arrive about 7:00 - 7:30 am Monday morning. Fiona will pick me up at the bus station which is very sweet of her. She was even willing to pick me up at 1:00 am so I'm very grateful! I'm not sure what the plan is from there - if we will go directly to the school or if we will be in Takuapa for a bit (?). I'll have to google Takuapa to find out where it is. [Okay... I have since TRIED googling it and it's in Thai!! You get English until you zoom in and then it all turns to Thai words and characters]!! Ah well.

I'm finding that much of this trip requires an ability to adapt and go with the flow. I'm actually not bothered by the five hour wait as I can update this blog (at an internet cafe called "The Next Internet" for 30 baht for an hour) and eat at any or several!! of the numerous food kiosks or just journal or write. There are of course touristy gidgets and stuff here as well.

The bus station is actually pretty nice. In addition to th shops and food, the place is pretty large and has A/C, quite the contrast from the Greyhound stations in the US! I was able to purchase an international calling card and minutes for my Thai cell phone at the 7-11 here. They are everywhere!

For those interested, e-mail me if you want my Thai phone number. I still haven't figured out how to access voice mail (the challenge of buying a used phone) but I do have text messaging. It's a pretty basic Nokia phone so I'm sure I'll figure it our or google for the instructions.

Happy Labor Day weekend!
jaz