So I left Riyadh and the hotel there. They had good wifi but not a lot of food nearby. Only chicken burgers and a convenience store, so I was eating a lot of chicken burgers and peanut butter sandwiches, ramen, and canned hummus.
First flight was short, from Riyadh to Bahrain, and there my second flight was delayed, so I made small talk with a newly graduated couple from New Hampshire who were honeymooning in Thailand. I made them laugh as I described my life and just now realized how I miss making customers laugh at the video store. Then we were told to go to another gate and I found myself walking with a crowd of people trying to find the new gate and I just started talking randomly with this girl named Rachel and we hit it off. She is a biologist studying turtles, and she needs a paper to write to qualify for her PHD, and she will be studying a not very highly studied turtle species, which I find fascinating. Anyway, we spent several hours talking because otherwise it would have been totally boring. We laughed quite a lot. I remember the thrill of what it's like to make people I just met laugh. The flight to Bangkok I just couldn't sleep because I was so excited.
So I arrive and I got confused because I couldn't find a taxi that would take me anywhere, but apparently you have to take a number from a machine that queues you automatically. Cool! I'm already learning so much here. So I get a cab driver who is delighted I can speak even five words of Thai. The way to the hotel took me past a vast city filled with skyscrapers that looked not so different from other cities and I'm wondering if the part of Bangkok I'm staying in will be boring. Oh no. We pull off the highway and the urban landscape becomes increasingly interesting. I will go out photo hunting later. There was a giant billboard right outside the airport visible from the highway that said "BUDDHA IS BUDDHISTS FATHER. RESPECT IS COMMON SENSE." There are so many amazing buildings! Including a Seashell Museum. What? Oh I'm seeing that shit. You can bet on that. And the cabs here are every color of the rainbow. The cabs here are like a swarm of metallic butterflies zipping around the downtown area.
We get to the hotel, and the fare was 450 baht and I gave him 500, which is about $14 but it feels like I'm a big spender. WHY YES HERE IS 500, KEEP 50 FOR YOURSELF MY GOOD SIR. Ahem. So I get told I have to wait an hour or so for my room to be ready so I stow my suitcase and just walk around with my backpack on (since it has anything valuable inside it and I don't want to let it out of my sight) and I'm just walking around in jeans in 95 degree humid weather like a boss and/or nitwit. I found a stand selling chicken and another stand where I just pointed to some pork fried rice someone else got and all without saying a word in Thai.
So I trudge back and have just been like this at literally everything.
I get back and sit down outside the hotel and a man comes up not too much later and tells me my room is ready. He is Thai and I ask him for his name and he says Ben. I go upstairs and promptly collapse for a few hours. When I wake up its POURING rain and I realize oh yeah I don't have an umbrella with me, because I moved to Saudi and didn't think I'd need one. So I went downstairs to ask where I could buy one. The hotel clerk, a very nice young man, told me I could borrow his and I could buy one nearby at a 7-11. I thank him and he asks if he could borrow a minute of my time because he is very worried about Donald Trump becoming president. The look in his eyes was bewilderment and he told me Donald Trump doesn't like Muslims or Mexicans and he doesn't understand why, because they're just people. He says he is afraid Donald Trump will start a huge war. I tell him not to worry because Hillary Clinton will definitely win and I tell him some reasons why. His face lights up as I comfort him and tell him Trump won't win. I score brownie points around the world for this because people are seriously shitting themselves at the possibility of this happening, because they think he's so filled with hate. I'm just doing my part to make America great again.
I walk up and down random streets bustling with people on mopeds and stalls. It takes me back to Korea, only the smells are different, often a heavier scent of fruit and cooking noodles, and it has a poorer feeling in the side alleyways. I finally find a shop that is run by an older middle aged couple just selling whatever they can, and I decide to buy an umbrella from them and not 7-11 because they're nice. I get back to the hotel and I unfurl the umbrella to see the 7-11 logo on it. Hilarious.
I come back here, thank the hotel clerk for lending me his umbrella, go out and buy some pre-packaged dinner at 7-11 because I'm too tired to explore more (I'll do it tomorrow).
More to come!
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