Just got back from spending a week in Thailand for work. Yes, I know you are all envisioning Leo D.C. and his backpacking friends all hanging out on a beautiful beach, smoking pot and running from the law, but my adventure was not quite the same.

First off, flew to London Heathrow where I was greeted by our old time MIA friend, Nigel Hayes. I had a great layover of 8 hours at Heathrow so the distraction was welcomed. We jumped on the Heathrow Express and jetted into town to meet Arlie at her work. Arlie was - well, what you do at work - working so Nigel and I ventured over to the goth bar next door to wait for her to finish up. After a few glasses of wine she finally appeared. Ended up in Yo! sushi, our old favourite haunt, for a bit of motorised sushi and big Sapporos. Then back to the aeropuerto for my midnight economy class flight.

where giles stays in thailand

Arrived to Bangkok on Friday afternoon, but thankfully didn’t have to go to the office until Monday morning so caught another flight to the north of Thailand to Chiang Mai for a little R & R for the weekend. Almost missed my flight. Ended up running like gangbusters through the Bangkok air terminal and then through a tunnel of 12,000 air conditioning units to get to the domestic terminal. Ewwww.

Got to Chiang Mai at about sundown. Had a taxi waiting for me to escort me off to the beautiful Ban Sabai Village located outside of the city. Got there and was greeted with a nice cup of tea and then whisked off to my little villa.

Wow. The villa was just what I needed and expected. Totally cute. My own sauna and steam room on the bottom floor. Upstairs a nice bed covered in mosquito net and bathroom outside under the stars with jacuzzi bath and shower. Sweet deal.

my elephant

Arranged for a 3 hour massage, body scrub and facial downstairs to help relieve me of the jetlag. Ordered up some banana curry and bottle of white wine and CHILLED out. The weather was perfect although a bit of a storm was coming in. Passed out.

Got up in the morning and had another massage. Headed into the wonderfully dirty city of Chiang Mai to view the delights of Thai prostitutes and the German middle-aged men that stalk them. Ended up in the evening eating something that was vaguely reminiscent of dog food and drinking Singhas. Then to the Cherry Bar where aforementioned Germans were busily playing Connect 4 with young Thai women whilst being flattered into thinking that they weren’t getting worked for their money. EWWWWW.

Next day off to the jungles in the north with friendly Thai driver - Mr. Jim - to visit the elephants. Jumped on one and rode around in a large circle for an hour or so. Riding an elephant is not that rapid or comfortable for those of you who have wondered. But they are amazingly pre-historic looking creatures. My elephant was a bit disturbed and didn’t want to stay on the trail. She even freaked out when a moto sped passed and yelled at it in a very frightening tone.

That evening flew out to Bangkok. Went to dinner with Russ and Tomaz from work and then passed out. Basically spent the rest of the week trekking to the office from the Bangkok Boutique hotel. Whoohoo. Oh and buying a fake Rolex Submariner 50th anniversary watch. They are pretty damned accurate if you must know. Even the movement is near Rolex quality.

thai ronald

Oh and did I mention that I went to see the Pussy Show? Yes, I said it. Yes, I did go and see it. For a total of 12 minutes I witnessed the Pussy in all its natural glory doing things that would make Cirque du Soleil cringe. Pussy shoots darts and blows up balloons. Pussy blows out candles with straw. Pussy picks up rings and places them on bottle necks. I left wondering if there is some pussy training camp that I somehow missed out on as a teenager…

Finally went to Pantip - the technology mall - and bought a really cute little Toshiba Libretto L1 for the bargain price of 350 Euro. It is super cool. Less than 2 LBS, 600 Mhz processor, 10 gig harddrive (which I have upgraded to 60 gig) and 128 MB RAM (which I have upgraded to 256). Very cool!