Thailand vacation and more

Last month I went on vacation to Thailand. It was awesome. I spent 6 full days there, and probably wouldn't have come back if I didn't have all my stuff in Korea.

The first few days were spent in Bangkok. I explored the old palace, and a Buddhist temple. The temple is the one with the giant statue of the Reclining Buddha. I stayed on Khao San road, which is an area famous with backpackers and travelers for its cheap lodging. My room was tiny, but unlike other rooms in the area it had air conditioning. Plus it was only around $20 a night. A block away from the hotel was the Khao San road market. It was pretty fun to walk around, especially at night. It was also interesting being accosted by tuktuk drivers that wanted to take me to ping pong shows or to get a girl for "boom boom". If you can't follow that google it. I also went to the MBK shopping center. It's basically a huge grey market disguised as a mall. There were all sorts of counterfeit goods being sold. You could bargain your way to ridiculous prices. I was able to pick up a backpack to carry all the stuff I bought for only $3.

After Bangkok I caught a flight south to Phuket out of what had to be one of emptiest airports I've ever seen. It was the Don Muang airport, and I guess it used to be Bangkok's international airport until the new one opened up on the outskirts of Bangkok. The terminal was probably the length of a football field and there were at most 50 people there.

Once I got to Phuket I hopped in a minibus to Phuket Town. I stayed away from the touristy Patong area since I wanted to wander around a more local area. My first night I asked the front desk person what I should do and he/she recommended that I should walk down the road. I didn't understand why at the time but it ended up being a good move. I stumbled upon the Old Phuket Town Festival. All of the various ethnic groups that formed the town came together to have a huge festival spanning about a kilometer stretch of a road and its offshoots. There was a shrine set up to celebrate the Chinese New Year and all sorts of street performances. There was also a section set up by the local food vendor's association that had all sorts of good food. The next day I walked around trying to find some of the places recommended in the guide book I had, but most of them ended up being closed or were replaced by new buildings.

From there I met up with a guy I had met at my orientation for my job in Korea and we headed out to an island called Ko Phi Phi Don. We took a big boat out to the island and checked into a bungalow. While we were unpacking a group of small monkeys walked through the yard in front of the bungalow. I wasn't quick enough to get any pictures though. We were able to book a half day snorkeling trip through the same guy we booked our room with. We ended up somehow missing the boat and chartered a small wooden boat called a longtail to catch up with the group. Luckily it wasn't too far away and we only missed some time at one of the less interesting beaches.

From there we went out to a small island called Ko Phi Phi Leh. It's an amazing island that houses some type of swallow whose nest is harvested for birds nest soup. Some Chinese guys live there year round to protect the birds and collect the nests once they migrate. The first stop was a reef in a small cove of the island. Me and my friend asked the tour guide where to go for the best views and he recommended snorkeling along the island's wall. It was more dangerous because of the currents and the long tail boats driving by, but the views on the ledge were amazing. I managed to get stung by what seemed like a thousand jellyfish, but they weren't any worse than a mosquito bite. After that we headed to Maya Beach, which was made famous in the Leonardo DiCaprio movie "The Beach". It was beautiful, but the beach itself was pretty crowded from all the different tours. We decided to hop on a kayak and paddle back to the boat to pick up snorkeling gear. We managed to get an extra 45 minutes of snorkeling in while everyone else was stuck on the beach. After that we watched the sunset while eating some chicken curry and fresh pineapples. The best part was that the tour was less than $20.

The next day we chartered a longtail boat to go fishing. We had to catch our own bait, so we ended up using handlines with sabiki rigs to try to catch some. It took way too long to catch some decent bait and we ended up only fishing for about an hour before our time was up. It was still pretty fun. After we got back I booked a flight back to Bangkok and caught a boat to Krabi. From there I caught a flight to Bangkok. At the Krabi airport we had to walk on the tarmac to get onto the plane.

I got back to Bangkok at 9:30 PM and booked a hotel to stay until 4 AM so I could catch my 7:25 AM flight back to Korea. That was the end of the awesome trip. I had a stopover in Taipai, Taiwan. I got onto that flight and fell asleep. Once I got back to Korea I hopped on the tram to the immigration booth and realized my wallet was missing. I checked with the flight to make sure it wasn't there. No one could find my wallet. Luckily I still had my passport and was able to clear immigration. However, I had no money, or access to money. I had to talk a cab driver into taking me back home whereupon I would be able to pay him with money I had at my apartment.

After cancelling all of my cards and filing for a new alien registration card, my wallet was mailed to me from the Incheon Police Department. There was no explanation of how they got it, but all of the money was missing. The good thing was that all of my cards were still there.

So now I am back and getting into my routine. The new school year has started so classes have resumed. We have a new head English teacher at work, and we are trying to hire a replacement for the foreign English teacher that left. The school has also asked me to renew my contract for the next year.

The local hockey team is in the playoffs as the top seed and they are up 2-1 in the five game series. Soccer and baseball season are just starting, so that will fill the void left by the hockey and basketball seasons coming to an end. Unfortunately I will have to travel to those games since we don't have any local teams.

I am looking into rescuing a dog from a shelter. I haven't decided what type yet, but it has to be small enough to be comfortable in my apartment.

The weather is starting to warm up and I am looking forward to some outdoor activities. I might try and play baseball with the local foreigner team. I also want to start driving my car to some farther away places now that I don't have to worry about icy roads and snow storms. Plus, I now have a fishing pole and I want to explore some lakes and rivers.

Two weeks from now I will be going to some performance called NANTA. It's supposed to be fun and they do a lot of audience participation. I'll let you know how that goes. Look it up if you want to see what it is about.

I have some decisions to make about my future soon. I have to figure out how long I want to stay in Korea, and what I want to do when I make it back to the States. I have no idea what I want to do, but I feel like if I don't make a decision soon I will just end up staying here too long and missing out on things in the States.

I will post some Thailand pictures soon.