Hello fellow Steemians. It is time to start talking about my travel adventures. Being a bit of a nomad, I thought it would be interesting to start off with talking about my short stint in Thailand as an English teacher. I will first talk about the interesting experiences that many of those on the main tourist path do not encounter.
As I was teaching in Thailand it is mandatory to have the appropriate visas to stay in the country and work. After one month I had to leave the country and go to Laos to obtain another visa. To get there, I caught an overnight van which took roughly 10 hours (from Bangkok to Vientiane). While on this trip I had no choice but to pee in a squat toilet (three times may I add) as we were in the middle of nowhere 99% of the time.
While I don’t have a picture of me squating (that would be gross!), I will share with you a sign that I had found on the wall. Sorry all you Lisa’s out there, Thailand doesn’t like you!
Our van also crashed twice! Yes with me in it. What I found really interesting though, was the stereotypical approach of ‘mai pen rai’, meaning ‘don’t worry’ certainly didn’t take place. Both the van driver and the guy who ran up the back of us got out and had a punch up, which lasted all of 10 seconds. Straight after though both men did the ‘wai’ sign, apologised and we both went our merry way.
While being in Thailand it was hard to get around without your own car or what most people use, a motorbike. After being there a while I brought a motorbike as I wanted more freedom and the opportunity to live off the school grounds (and stop catching motorcycle taxis with no helmet on, naughty I know, but only did it when I had no other option). Crazy me however, ran it into a bush and fell off it. The worst thing was that there were no cars around and it was a straight, wide road! Ok there was something else, I kept accelerating faster as I was trying to brake! No serious injury luckily enough, the last thing I needed was to be stuck in hospital! On the other hand I did stop and did first aid on someone who had a motorcycle accident too.
My motorbike that I had. While going to pick it up the tire popped and I had to run 500m down the road to the next service station. As I only had cheap flip flops on, they broke so I had to run on the boiling hot road. Definitely had red feet after that!
While living on campus there was a cat who took a liking to me (most animals that western society class as pets are scared of humans as sadly they don’t get treated well). I named her Sootie. I fed her and looked after her while I was there. I still miss her till this day. Anyway, I lived on the second floor of our apartments and I hear her hissing at something, so I go outside and I see her chasing a ginger cat. Unfortunately she chased it and it fell off the building, landed on a fence and double flipped off that and of course, as all cats do, landed on her feet. Fortunately she survived and was ok. But a funny sight to see.
The cat I looked after.
Many people go to Thailand to play and feed the monkeys, however the majority of these are wild and can attack. This nearly happened to me as you can see in the photo below. (No, I did not provoke them.) I had to slowly back away. I think the only reason it didn’t try, as he didn’t want to leave the baby and mother behind. Lucky for me.
I managed to get a photo of the monkey that nearly attacked me. As you can see the monkey on the far right is ready to pounce!
A sign warning about the wild monkeys.
As most people know, the traffic in Bangkok is terrible! In fact, it is known to be the worst in the world! So, of course I had to catch a bus in peak hour traffic. A 10km ride took over 3 hours and I wasn’t even halfway home. I would have got out and walked if it wasn’t raining and I didn’t have luggage with me!
Picture of the bus and the amount of people in it. They still managed to fit more people on!
That’s it for now. I hope you enjoyed my first travel post. More on Thailand will be coming very soon.
The health and safety standards in Thailand are high as you can see here.
