I’m still in Bangkok but I’m leaving soon. I haven’t found my backpacker footing just yet since I’ve been staying with my buddy Ryan. This means that I haven’t met an exorbitant amount of fellow backpackers who have the 411 on how and where to go in Thailand. Luckily I’ve been tapping into my new and extensive network of friends that I have met in previous travels. People who have been to Thailand already (the backpacker route) are sharing all sorts of helpful tips.

One very important errand that I had to get done while in Thailand was acquiring a visa for China (to be visited in a few months). Here’s where the title of this post comes from. I could purchase a visa that would take a week to be ready, or for an extra fee of $40 I can have it in 4 hours. I thought that in that amount of time, they wouldn’t even have time to read my application, let alone check any of my sources. In that amount of time they barely can peel the sticker. So I did it; what the hell. The last thing I wanted to do was to wonder who was holding my passport for the next week.

The Chinese embassy was very close to my friend’s flat. In fact, it was 3 blocks away. Believe me when I say that I have no sense of direction, and Bangkok is full of corners and alleys that look exactly the same. Luckily there was a ominous landmark that absolutely no one could miss. It is the “True Tower”, an 80 some odd story tower that has been converted to a giant billboard for the cell phone company “True”. True has an increadible deal for people living in major cities. Roughly 3 cents a minute to call anyone (land line or cell) in America, Thailand, UK, and pretty much anywhere else in the developed world. The secret is that they hook your phone up to a data network so it works like Skype. At this price, I don’t know how they can afford to pay their employees who help you set up your SIM card. My helper left the language setting in Thai which is lovely.

Paying real money for something ($100) really gets you to the front of the line though. It gets you a pass into a communist nation that has relatively high security in a few hours. I was afraid that the people in the Chinese embassy were going to be strict, but all of them appeared to have adopted the Thai culture very well.

Speaking of the Thai culture, I owe you a dichotomy from a few days ago. He it is: the country seems to be completely tolerant and ok with prostitution, sex shows (ping pong show ((use your imagination)) and transvestites (lady boys), but is completely against vulgar language. For instance, when on the internet in Thailand (which stands for Free land by the way), you can not download this video:

Or others like it. Our culture is completely different of course, where this clip (a censored version) aired on the ever popular Saturday Night Live. Our culture loves it but is appalled about two people of the same sex trying to have their love recognized in the culturally significant standard of marriage. Oops, I just got political

Well America would barf in its own mouth if they had as many transvestites as active members of the community. But hey, that’s why this place is great, it’s different. Some of the differences seem silly, but that’s just a sign that I don’t really get it just yet.

I can say that when walking in the streets, the cars and the people have to share the roads and they do it very well. With great patience, no one honks their horn; no one gets hit by cars; and everyone gets where they need to go quickly. And believe me it is crowded. They just don’t see a reason to honk. It’s understood; it’s not your road or mine, it’s everyone’s road. Imagine that.

I’ve almost got my plan of attack now for where I’m going to go, so the posts will be less frequent since I’ll be on the road a lot more. I’m heading south to the beautiful tropical islands to see some beaches, do some diving, and make my way to Malaysia and Singapore.

I’ve also been working out some technical problems as of recent. I purchased a new camera that records 720p HD Video as well. The problem is that my Net book is underpowered and doesn’t have a disk drive for the software driver needed to dumb down the data and process it. Did anyone just follow that? I wish I had an external disk drive right about now but I am trying some creative avenues to get around it. So maybe no video for a while.

But Here is a 711 in Bangkok

“The Club”  Bangkok

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