Made it to LA!

I am sitting here in the Bangkok airport having a very overpriced Jack and Coca Cola Light (they don’t do Diet Coke here…its light instead).  They are very strict, it seems on the 1oz pour for 190 baht (~30 baht to the dollar…so yes $6 drink).

I wandered around Bangkok for a while today.  Didn’t really have anything I wanted to see, but I ended up at the Jim Thompson house so I took a tour.  Who is that, you ask?  Me too!  After WWII, he came to Bangkok, fell in love and moved here.  He “discovered” the cottage industry of Thai silk making and showed the product to the editor of Elle magazine sending shockwaves through the fashion industry in the ‘50s.  The King and I (the movie) used all Jim Thompson silk in their costumes.  They make fairly high priced silk products (shirts, blouses, scarves) under his name.  His house is made up of 6 or 7 traditional Thai houses (basically one room each) connected together to form a large one.  Pretty nice looking place.  He also collected broken statues and pots and what not as antiques.  Thai people believe broken things are bad luck to have in your house.  I also learned that Buddhists believe people with long earlobes will live a long time.  Our guide pointed me out in particular as being blessed…so thanks, dad.  Anyway, Jim disappeared in Cambodia in 1960’s when he went out on a walk on his vacation.  He was 61 and hasn’t been heard of since.  What they didn’t tell us in the tour is that he was most likely a CIA spy too.  There you go.  My blog teaches shit!  Pow! 

When I was walking down the street/alley the house is on, a random Thai dude asked me where I was from.  I told him Portland and then helped him mentally locate it with “west coast America”.  We chatted for a bit about Bangkok and the tsunami that occurred yesterday from the earthquake.  Apparently they had a wave yesterday about a foot high due to the quake…that’s compared to about 30 feet high back in 2004 when all those people died here.  He was a really nice guy.  Works for a bank.  Told me I was leaving a day too soon cause tomorrow is their New Years (Sangkran I think is how its spelled…could be wrong).  It’s a water festival!  I saw the super soakers going on sale a couple days ago.  Apparently its water guns, water balloons, craziness!  Seems like it would be awesome if you could overlook where the water came from and/or how dirty it might be.  Maybe next time.  I have to say yet again, Thailand is awesome.  I love coming here.  The people are so nice.  The food is awesome.  I could live here….during the cooler months. :-D  If you have the means, come visit…and let me know, cause I might tag along!

I do have a sad tale to share with you, dear readers.  It has been a habit of mine to get an animal figurine from wherever I have traveled usually being associated with something I saw while diving.  Starting in Patong (and probably should have started in Khao Lak) I have been searching for a carved manta ray.  Something small….fits in the palm of your hand…costs no more than a couple of bucks.  But searching high AND low (Sophia can attest to this) we didn’t find anything…except for this tiny (dime sized) acrylic manta that I passed over as being too small.  I even looked here in the airport and nothing.  Business idea: make wooden mantas for the tourist market here.  You will make a billion!   So on this trip, no figurine.  But last time I was here (2005), I bought both a Buddha and an elephant so I stocked up for this trip, I guess.  Plus we got free t-shirts from both diving companies we went through (wicked diving and super divers).  So I am good with memorabilia…just would have been sweet to find a manta too.  I am pretty sure I saw one in the Caymans when I was there…so if (or when) I go there again, I will pick one up.

Oh while I am thinking of it, I cannot recommend Sophia enough as a traveling companion!  Not only is she easy to get along with and we shared similar “whatever is cool” attitudes, she is also a blood hound when it comes to microbreweries!  That’s right, its all about the beer, folks.  She found one in Australia and Myanmar before I met up with her and then she found one in Phuket!  The beer wasn’t too bad either (although they could have used something with some hops!).  She even found a listing for one here in Bangkok, but we didn’t get there. 

Instead, last night we ate at a Thai place for one last Thai food blowout.  Which brings about another sad story (keep the tissues handy).  Sophia likes duck and got a roasted duck in red curry dish that was pretty freaking good.  I was going to go experimental and get “Northern Style Chili Sauce with Minced Pork”.  I mean, come on…that could either be awesome, super hot, both, terrible…who knows?  I was going out on a gastronomic limb (especially since Sophia was anti mystery meat from the roadside grillers).  I point it out to our server and hear “no have”…terrible.  I panicked…told her to take Sophia’s order to give me a chance to look for something else (it took Sophia 1.5s to say “red curry duck”).  Then I asked “what do you recommend” and she pointed to the cashew chicken…which I folded and got.  It was good, mind you, but I also could get that same thing in any Asian place in Portland.  Bleh.  So sad.

Btw, on the live aboard, for dinner and lunch, when we were having Thai food (pretty much every time) they had this glass jar full of (I think) fish sauce, chopped garlic and chopped green and red peppers.  The peppers (chilis) were such small little things.  Looking so innocent.  Spoon a little on you food and POW.  You have heat, friends.  They might be little but those things are HOT!!!!  It was awesome.  I spooned that stuff on every time they had it out.

Ok….I have rambled enough for now.  I plan to get this uploaded once I hit LA (and after In N Out…priorities, people!)  Hopefully I can get some videos up on this…for sure I have a few more pictures.  I might do a post-travel update too once Sophia gets back.  She said she would burn me a disk with her photos and videos from here too so you can see the octopus go white.

Made it to LA.  I am staying at Custom Hotel near the airport.  The best thing about this place is this.  Did a quick walk down there and back with a #1 in between.

The flight from Bangkok was okay.  I intentionally didn’t sleep much on the plan to try to switch over to pacific time again.  Bangkok time is “add 2 hours and flip AM and PM around”…so right now its midnight here, but my body is thinking 2 in the afternoon.  I am tired, but not really sleepy.  Oh well…I will try in a bit. 

Here are more pics!

Actually...first...octopus!  Upload speeds didn't completely suck.  Sort of small, but what are you going to do?  I probably need a bit better (more HD) camera for movies, but what are you going to do?  Oh and if you turn on the sound, you can hear me breathing.  Just add a French accent talking about "zee octopoose is moving along zee seabed" and its Jacques Cousteau all over again!

Mantas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  That's our dive instructor, Joa, there at the beginning doing the manta dance.  We were all doing that at one point or another :-D  This was the first time I ever did video on a dive so the framing sort of sucks (I was also pretty freaking excited to get to see mantas!).  Also, the noise that sounds like a rocket taking off at about the 1 minute mark is a boat passing by overhead.  The fish that is swimming along with it is a trevally that was ~3 feet long.  The fish was big..but the manta was bigger.  Just trying to give you perspective.  Tip to tip, the manta was probably 15-16 feet wide.  

Lion fish

Banded Sea Snake

porcupine fish hanging out.

Moray eeel

scorpion fish hanging out on top of the coral

Nudibranch!

Another Nudi!!

The wall dive on Koh Doc Mai has a cave.  I was inside looking out with someone (Sophia?) coming in.  

Dancing Durbin Shrimp behind he sea urchin.  

Black looking lion fish.  Must be a Raiders fan :-D

Love to all

Our time, the people’s time!

Jim