Monday, August 28, 2006

Part XXX - Sure to be blocked by mail marshal

Absolute friggin madness!!

I am now back in Malaysia. The teaming metropolis of KL no less. 3 nights ago I was right up near the top of Thailand in a seedy hotel, just across the river in Laos making up my razzudock how I was going to get to Singapore before the 30th. I knew it was doable but wanted a couple of spare days to chill out and sightsee / relax near my destination. I am now a 5.5 hour bus ride away from Singapore leaving 2 whole days to leisurely explore this insane monument to capitalism and no need to stay in Singapore which I don't like anyway. Excellent!

The 2 day slow boat ride up the Mekong was rather laid back. I was really hungover the first day, well, probably still drunk when I got on! I stumbled on late, yelled out 'Hello fellow travellers!' then curled up under the seats and went to sleep for a couple of hours. It was surprisingly comfortable down there. My fellow travellers were a diverse but good bunch. Swiss fulla, English fulla, a Japanese chick and too uninteresting Danish girls. Took bloody ages though. 10 hrs the first day followed by a stop off in a small village perched on the side of a mountain range, then another 9 hours to the border town. I could have done the whole trip in 7 hours by speed boat but it looked pretty damn unpleasant. They're sleek little boats, taking about 6-8 people and apparantly chew through 250L of fuel for the return trip. Saw quite a few of these fanging past, 4 cylinder car engine going full noise the whole way making a hur of a racket. Fun for a couple of hours I thought but not 7! Especially when it rained for a few hours on the first day. We convieniently got into town half an hour after the border post closed. As a daily route, this is obviously no accident. Was running low on kip too and there aren't a lot of ATMs in Laos, certainly not in small towns but got across to Thailand with 100baht to spare $4 NZ. Woo hoo.

I got my self on an over night bus to Bangkok which was reasonably comfortable and no crap karaoke videos, just the thai language version of U571. It was still entertaining except it was hard to tell the germans from the americans due to the fact they all spoke Thai! Got into Bangkok at 5am but the local buses we already running so headed straight off to Khaosan Rd, everything running smooth. I decided to once again walk to the railway station. Mainly for the excercise after 10 hours attempting to sleep on a bus. I didn't take the scenic route through Chinatown but have concluded that yes, it is still a long way. Sorted a ticket for a train all the way to Butterworth (right beside my beloved Penang) in Malaysia on a train with sleeper, sweet. Just a few hours to kill in Bangkok. I then walked to Siam Square, a major shopping district which, unconveniently didn't open for another 2 hours. No biggie, cos its actually on one of the 2 bus routes I know so got back to Khaosan for a whole 7baht (40c).

I went to this awesome exhibition at the Bangkok gallery. (This is why the Tao led me back to the Khaosan area and not shopping!) I nearly forgot it was on but I saw a poster for it. A contemporary chinese painter called Xi Shang. This dude rocks! Works on a similar vein to what I'm up to at the present which was really inspiratational. The woman at the gallery told me he'd be there in person after 2. Alas, my train was at 2:45. I tried in vain to get there first but events conspired and I missed out.

The train ride was pleasant. All 22 hours of it! I was sitting next to a fulla from New York and a guy from Gambia. Great conversation was had the whole way, well, other than night time where I was in blissfull slumber in my bunk. Probably more comfortable than most of the beds in Laos. Kapoc affairs they are, that are as compacted as a dirt floor!

The transfer in Butterworth was sweet too. Got to the gate of the station and a guy says "taxi?", I said "no, bus" so another guy took me to a bus. Which left almost straight away and rapidly headed off along the toll way, only one stop and 6 hours later I'm in the middle of KL with time on my hands. Went for a walk through the night market before and the shopping looks pretty good, its going to be an interesting couple of days.

1 comment:

Alan Howard said...

Hey, you haven't updated for a while. I hope everything's going ok, and that you're saving up all those stories to tell us.

Make a comment of some kind, just so we know you're ok.

Cheers mate