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barefootbeautician · 6 years

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Getting lost in Bangkok

This is usually the first stop when coming to South East Asia. A place full of weaving motorbikes, honking tuk tuks, the smell of meat being grilled by the side of the road and intense humid heat. This is a love or hate kind of city and it can take a while to get used to its high pace busy ways. I believe you can get all your exploring and sightseeing done in 3 days.

So you step outside the airport in Bangkok and have the fun part of trying to figure out the cheapest way to get to your hostel. I recommend not to just give in to the honking and shouting of "taxi taxi!" from the drivers as they charge a ridiculously high price. The best way to get into the centre is by the metro, it's fast and a lot cheaper. Once in the centre, and probably still lost, you can get a taxi or tuk tuk which won't cost as much as it would from the airport.

Accommodation

In my opinion, it's best not to actually stay on Khao San road which a lot of backpackers do. It's full of loud cheesy music, drunk people stumbling around and people waving scorpions in your face. If you don't plan on sleeping or can sleep through the bass of the music, then this is the street for you! If however, your like me and need sleep to function, then I suggest any hostel a few streets away in any direction to get some peace and quiet.

"Sloth Hostel"

Really liked this hostel! Very central place and just a 5 minute walk from the hustle and bustle of Khao San Road. Can't go wrong with comfy pod beds, clean rooms, free basic breakfast and hot showers. Everything you need from a good hostel.

"Casa Nithra Hotel"

If your looking for a bit more luxury, this place was great in old town Bangkok! Big rooms, comfy bed and a peaceful rooftop pool. It has a restaurant that sells yummy food plus your a short walk away from Khao San road with loads of restaurants, clubs and shopping.

Temple hopping

Our temple hopping was a lot of fun! Mainly due to getting kidnapped by a very nice tuk tuk driver who took us around to 4 of the temples and of course, a suit tailor shop. It only cost us 30Baht for the whole thing plus he got us a river boat ride for cheaper! You have to be careful with this as we heard after about a lot of scams from getting a tuk tuk day tour, we were just very lucky.

"Wat Pho- reclining Buddha"

This temple is home to the massive 46-meter long golden reclining Buddha and is definitely a must see! It's one of the oldest and largest temple complexes in Bangkok.

The temple compound is also the national headquarters for the teaching of traditional Thai medicine, including Thai massage.

"Wat Arun- Also known as "Temple of Dawn"

This is probably one of the most beautiful and most famous temples in Bangkok. The full name of this temple is "Wat Arun Ratchawararam Ratchaworamahaviharn". It is named after the Hindu deity Aruna, the god of the dawn. In the centre stands the impressive 82 m high beautifully decorated Khmer-style tower,where you can walk up the steep stairs and admire the view of Bangkok and the surrounding rivers.

To get to the temple you have to cross the Chao Phraya River, this costs 5 Baht each way by shuttle boat. It costs 50 Baht per person to get into the temple and remember when visiting any of these temples to cover knees and shoulders as a form of respect.

"Grand Palace"

This is one of the busiest tourist stops in Bangkok and a definite must see. It's situated on the banks of Chao Phraya River surrounded by four tall walls holding in the impressive Grand Palace complex.

Walking into this historic place, it's hot, crowded and full of big excited tour groups. It costs 500 Baht per person and if you really want to learn about the history, you can hire a guide at the ticket kiosk. Or you can rent an audio guide for 200 Baht = US$ 6 for two hours.

"Wat Intharawihan- The temple of the standing Budda"

This impressive 32 meter standing gold Budda is a Buddhist temple complex close to the Chao Phraya river. It is decorated with glass and 24K gold mosaics and dates from the early Ayutthaya period.

It's not a massively popular temple and there isn't much else apart from the Budda but if you have spare time it is definitely worth checking out the size and beauty of this standing Budda.

Chinatown

This vibrant street is a maze of little alleyways, hectic markets and yummy authentic Thai street food.

I found it was best to visit at night to experience the bright lights, hustle and bustle of the markets and of course the amazing food stalls with there lovely plastic chairs and tables in the street. I had the best BBQ sea bass I've ever tasted in one of the little restaurants along this road.

Khao San Road

This is one of the craziest streets I've been on! It has quite a mix of things to do and see. Starting from street venders selling clothes, people waving barbecued insects for you to eat and random souvenirs sold all down the road.

As the evening turns to night, relax in one of the many street-side bars and enjoy an ice cold Chang as you watch the mixture of backpackers and families wondering the busy street. The later you stay, the crazier it becomes! The battle of the music from the many clubs, dangerously strong buckets of alcohol and people dancing in the streets. Every night this street was a sea of people crowding the road!

If your not a party animal you can always just enjoy a comedy show which we enjoyed on one of our calmer evenings out. The street has a mixture of everything so go enjoy!

Lumphini park

Bangkok's biggest park, loved and used by visitors and citizens. It's a beautiful well kept park, perfect for a stroll or chilling on a bench watching people out for a run or watch the peaceful lake with the background of the city. It's also a lot of fun watching or participating in the aerobics that take place all over the park!

Food

"Cabbages and Condoms"

What a funky place to go! It's a little hard to find but so worth it. Forget a quick bite to eat and a movie. Why not have a romantic dinner surrounded by condoms instead?

Mechai, the chairman of Cabbages and Condoms, did not believe that condoms should be seen as a taboo because they’re a necessity to protect people against a number of things, including unwanted pregnancy.

The food is really good and the restaurant supports a number of different non-profit organizations in Thailand, including the Population and Community Development Association (PDA), a sex education and AIDS prevention group.

"Street food"

The obvious one is the amazing Street food around Bangkok. You can find all different authentic Thai food throughout the streets and in the markets.

Pad Thai

Such an amazing dish and so cheap! Made with rice noodles which are stir-fried with eggs and chopped firm tofu. It is flavored with tamarind pulp, fish sauce, dried shrimp, garlic or shallots, red chili pepper and palm sugar and served with lime wedges and often chopped roasted peanuts. Yum!

Khao Neow Moo Ping

The best snack on the streets of Bangkok has to be the skewers of freshly grilled pork paired with a bag full of sticky rice! They taste amazing and are great if you just want something small to eat.

To sum up Bangkok, it is a mixture of modern buildings and historical temples with lots to do and plenty of places to feast on amazing food. As I said 3-4 days is really enough to see everything so go explore this fascinating city!

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mamajeanetc · 7 years

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Re-Entry

We have now been expats for just a little over 9 years -- about half of that time in Mexico City and half in Singapore. As long as I’ve been an expat I’ve heard others talk about how difficult “re-entry” can be -- that going back to your home country after living abroad can be difficult and, sometimes harder than moving to a foreign country -- you’re different from having lived in another culture and people don’t understand that; you miss the sense of adventure that can accompany the most mundane task in a different country, you don’t really feel like you belong anywhere.

I recently spent 10 weeks in the US. I went to share in the celebration when these 2 wonderful young people married in April -- Ryan, a long-time family friend, and his beautiful bride, Courtney.

And stayed to celebrate another beautiful couple’s wedding in June -- my niece, Ashley, and her husband, Chris.

Between those 2 major events I got to attend Ashley’s bridal shower

And help with some of her wedding preparations.

I went on a little roadtrip with Ashley and my dad to see another niece, Adriana, be “pinned” as a nurse and celebrate her accomplishments.

Of course, no California roadtrip is complete without a stop at In ‘N’ Out for lunch!

I spent most of my time at my dad’s house in southern CA. It was great to be an hour from Kelsey and get to see her (and Priscilla) on a regular basis.

And help her with some home improvement projects:

I also drove to Salt Lake City to visit Paul and Maggie for a few days.

And did a little hiking in the beautiful Utah mountains.

So, why would I have re-entry issues when I’m on an extended vacation and it’s all fun and games? Good question. In the 9+ years that we’ve lived abroad, I’ve never found “re-entry” to the US particularly difficult. There’s a certain comfort in knowing how things work and what is expected and acceptable.

But there was one area where I did struggle with re-entry. Over the course of several months prior to this trip I had completed all the requirements and jumped through many hoops in order to get my occupational therapy license in California and sign-on with a healthcare registry company so that I could work during my extended time in CA. Having not worked as an OT in the US for almost a decade, I found it has changed significantly!

A couple of months before we left Indiana the home health agency I worked for began providing laptops for all staff so that documentation could be done electronically and accessed from the field. Knowing I was leaving soon and that the transition would take several months neither the director nor myself felt it was a valuable use of my time to go through the training. Now ALL documentation is electronic. I could not just walk to the nurses station and pull a patient’s chart to get information I needed. I had to go back to the therapy department, log onto a computer and look for whatever information I needed. This was sometimes a bit time-consuming until I figured out where to find specific information, but I didn’t have to try to decipher the notoriously terrible handwriting of doctors, so that was a plus!

But, when I had to write-up evaluations or progress notes I found the system very time-consuming, redundant, and limiting. Once you know how to use the system, you can be pretty efficient if your patient fits all the preset parameters and you can just click on the reset options, but I found that most patients and treatments don’t fit the preset options (which I’m quite confident were not written by a therapist). I learned how to work around the presets and just write what I wanted to say. I gradually become more efficient; I never reached the productivity levels the department manager would have liked, but I maintained my professional integrity by providing more accurate documentation than clicking on the boxes could do and he couldn’t argue with that!

The other really big change in healthcare since we left the US is how insurance works (or doesn’t) and how that effects the provision of healthcare. My professional judgment regarding how much OT would be beneficial for a specific patient now carries absolutely no weight. Who gets how much therapy was determined by the director of rehab and facility manager based on who’s got what insurance and how much they will pay. It is all about the numbers, and there is horrible misallocation of resources (at least in the facility where I was working).

I’m not going to get on a political soapbox here, but I will say that the one thing that scares me about eventually returning to the US is the uncertainty of healthcare coverage.

So, after 10 weeks in the US I returned to Singapore -- on a “Hello Kitty” airplane!!

Compounded by jetlag and missing my kids, re-entry is always a bit tougher on this side. Our dogs, Tovka and Lucy, were mad at me for being gone so long. They ran to the gate excitedly as I got out of the taxi; then they remembered that they were mad at me and pretty much ignored me for the first couple of days.

Somethings come quite naturally here even though they are very different. For example, I love having a car and driving when I’m in the US. In Singapore we use public transportation and it never even crosses my mind that I would like a car here -- parking can be a hassle and it’s extremely expensive, and public transportation is just so easy and convenient.

But there are always a couple of things that catch me off guard just because I’ve forgotten that things are different here!

My debit card for our Singapore bank account had expired while I was in the US. There wasn’t a new one waiting for me in the stack of mail, so I went to the bank the next day to inquire about getting a new one. Silly me, I forgot to take my passport! I had my Singapore ID (and my Indiana driver’s license), but they wouldn’t even talk to me without my passport. The guy did give me a phone number and suggested I call and see if I could order a new one over the phone.

I called when I got home and learned that my new card had been sent to our old address. We moved 1.5 years ago and I changed the address. . . . I thought. But I now learned that even though all our accounts are joint we have to specifically change the address on each account for Tim and for me. And, of course, I can’t do all of this because I’m just a “dependent” . . . Tim is the primary account holder because he actually has a work visa!! So, when Tim got home we called again so he could provide all the authorizations needed so I could change all the addresses and get a new debit card. And then, I returned to the bank the next day with my passport to actually get a new card!!

The bank is in the same building as the dance studio where I attend aerobics and yoga classes. I had “frozen” my membership class until the following week, so I wasn’t going to class, but on my second trip to the bank I timed it so the class was just getting out and I could say hi to some of the ladies. There’s a little cafe there where a lot of them hang out after class. I was chatting with a couple of the gals when another one walked over and said, ‘You gained weight while you were gone. Didn’t you exercise?” Another one offered that she didn’t think I’d gained weight, but that I looked pale . . . I apparently didn’t get enough sun when I was in California. A couple more gals joined the discussion which then moved on to the length and style of my hair, which everyone had an opinion on. I just sat quietly pondering the concept of “face” while this discussion went on around me.

“Face” is possibly the single most important concept in the social rules observed throughout Asia. It can be described as a combination of social standing, reputation, dignity, influence and honor. Causing someone to lose face lowers them in the eyes of their peers, but giving face increases their self-worth. It is really important that you never point out a mistake or cause someone embarrassment, as that would cause them to lose face! But, clearly, what might cause embarrassment for a local is different from what causes me embarrassment and after almost 5 years, I still just don’t get it.

The following week I returned to the place where I volunteer on Thursdays -- a day program for intellectually disabled adults. My return there was pretty much a mix of my previous experiences -- the clients were thrilled to see me. A couple of the staff snubbed me (like the dogs) my first day back. One of the teachers threw her arms around me and gave me a big welcome back hug, then stepped back and said, “You look so different . . . so pretty!” Hmmmm . . . thanks? A couple of others jumped in on the discussion of my appearance and came to the conclusion that I looked “fresh”. OK, I’ll take it!

I’ve been back for a month now and apparently I’m “back in the groove”. I have access to cash, I’m getting plenty of exercise and sun as I walk to the bus stop, and nobody is either blatantly ignoring me or discussing my appearance in front of me as if I can’t hear.

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