Great Start to the New Year

Well, it is time for me to write another of these “blog” things. I really don’t know how to do this, so I’ll just do a brain dump, which means I’m going to ramble and meander my way around and finally just abruptly stop.

Watching the sun set over Bangkok on New Years Eve

First let’s talk about New Years Eve. Our first order of business New Years Eve was to drive to Ayutthaya and pick Jeremy up at the Kantary Hotel, which is not too far from my work. Normally the commute is not too bad, maybe about 1 hour. But because it was a big holiday weekend, everyone was leaving Bangkok, and they all were going to the exact same hotel Jeremy is staying in, so the roads were very congested and it took about 1 hour and 45 minutes. We got there, picked him up and made it back home in under an hour. We walked around Lumpini Park for a while, saw some lizards. On the way back we stopped at the Suan Lum Night Bazaar, or what is left of it…it is basically a rubble pile now.

Next we headed to a bar called Bully’s which is next door to the red light district, so obviously we had to walk though it! I have to say, it was not as raunchy as I imagined. However, we did leave rather fast after a few near misses with fire crackers. Next, we stopped at an Irish Pub for a beer and continued our walk toward home. Along the street we stopped at a street side bar and had a drink while playing connect four, which I sucked at. We made it home around midnight and watched the fireworks from our living room. After that I got schooled in the game of Risk. So to sum it all up, I ended 2010 as a Connect Four loser and started 2011 as a Risk loser. Go Me!

This is my "I can't believe I lost" face.

We woke up at a respectable time on New Years Day and Skyped with everyone at the my parent's New Years Celebrity Celebration Spectacular Spectacular (officially called The Awesomeness). It was hard not being there, but we will be back soon enough! After the call, I think I spaced out for a few hours because the next thing I remember doing was driving to Chatachuk Market. For those who don’t know, this is a gigantic weekend market in northern Bangkok. I kind of looked at a map before we left, so I thought we shouldn’t have any troubles finding it (because my mind is like a trap.) But I soon found out my mind trap sucks, but despite that fact we did find it, and even parked! We wandered the market until it was time to go to my boss’s house for Christmas/New Years dinner. Again, the sucky mind trap leads the way and we got hopelessly lost. We made about 4 U-turns on the same road and passed the Don Muang airport 2 or 3 times, but eventually we got there and right on time too! Booya! The party was pretty good, lots of tasty food and good company.

The way home from the party was going great, we didn’t make any wrong turns and the traffic was light. That was until we got to a toll booth. Tolls are not normally a problem, you just pay them and move on, but this time I paid the toll and started driving away and all of a sudden a police man appeared in front of our car and was waving me over. I’m like, crap what did I do? I pulled over and grabbed my Thai license and gave it to him. I was so proud, like “look mister officer, I have a Thai License, respect me!” but he just looks at me and says “Ticket.” I was like, “why?” He said “ticket, police station” I said, “why?” this kind of goes on for a few minutes.

Then he opens his ticket book turns to the back page which has a 4 point plan of how to get money from white people (okay not really, but it did have 4 bullet points, but I can’t read Thai) He points to the number 1000 in point number 3 and said ticket. So I’m like…Ah Ha! He wants 1000 baht! In my head I’m like, not a chance! So I whip out my wallet, and hand him 100 baht. He doesn’t take it and looks kind of offended. He says “Ticket” again I’m like “why?’ and this goes on for a few more minutes. All of a sudden I get a brilliant idea. I grabbed my phone and told the officer I was going to call my Thai friend to help translate. I start dialing and all of a sudden he is like “200 baht”. I stop dialing and give him 200 baht ($6 US) and he says, “go home” I’m like…okay, bye. And we drive off. So that was a great way to celebrate the new year!