Wandering... (but of course)

7 day room with a view

Hello from Bangkok. Today is day six of my 7 day quarantine in Bangkok. One more full day and then I'll be released on Wednesday. I'm thankful I arrived when I did as two days later and I would have had to do the full 14 days (even fully vaccinated) - Thailand's 'answer' to some Bangkok hi-so locals getting a little too wild at night clubs is of course to make the tourists pay (but I digress!) With this latest uptick in Covid cases (again it's all relative compared to India, the US...they're still at less than 400 deaths altogether in the past year) Bangkok has once again been mostly shut down. From my 23rd floor window, streets appear relatively empty of people, taxis...we'll see once I am released if it is as surreal as flying here...but how did I end up back in this country I love??

Room to stretch out

Airplane food...how I've missed you...

After 5 months in Bermuda, two months in Seattle and more hoops and paperwork than you can imagine,  (see this link from a blogger who captured it nicely so I don't have to recreate all that it entailed), I left Seattle last Monday, flying to Seoul on a Korean Air plane built to carry 300 passengers but having less than 50. After having been through US airports over the course of the last year and seeing life coming back to many of them in recent months, I was shocked to see how empty Seoul's Incheon was. A terminal that is usually teeming with thousands of excited/weary travelers looking like they are wandering through a high end glitzy mall - well you can see the photo  - there were so few people...nobody - but all the stores were still open. And the Korean lounge (that I am not a fan of) that is usually packed to the gills - at the most it had 15 people in it.

Everyone watching the same show? No, no passengers here. 

Empty Incheon terminal

Empty lounge

And then I arrived in Bangkok - along with another 50 or so passengers, just like my flight from Seattle and disembarked hoping and praying that all my paperwork was in order. Taxiing into the terminal, I could see rows of parked planes lined up with engines sealed (as was the case in Korea) waiting for the day that they might take to the sky again. As we exited the plane and began walking toward immigration, plastic chairs were lined up 3 in a row, (of course distanced from each other) and there we sat amid a flotilla/bevy of eager young Thai assistants who quickly lined up to check our paperwork and make sure it was in order...and then did it again 15 minutes later. We had to wait for our turn at the health counter where a nurse or doctor would check our paperwork, vaccine proof and ultimately decide how many days of quarantine to dispense.

Arrive and wait

Arrive and wait

So anyone that has been to Thailand knows that labor is cheap(er), thus the flotilla of helpful people to check our paperwork - probably a greater number than all the passenger passengers - but the health counter only had six medical personnel!  So in spite of good intentions and lots of personnel, a bottle neck was quickly revealed but we were only 50 people so it was ok. But the system clearly won't work when there is anything close to normal in passenger quantity. After the health counter we sat down in additional chairs before being escorted 10 at a time to immigration where (wait for it) there were so many immigration officials at each counter - more than I have ever seen in BKK - and BKK is notorious for sometimes having a 2-3 hour wait in line to get your passport stamped...I wish this many immigration officials would usually be on hand. (hint hint)...and all along the way are other officials directing us, this way and that - and EVERY ONE is masked and gowned, gloves, surgical hat - ok maybe not the immigration people but everyone else. So after a quick stop at immigration, it was a quicker stop to collect my bags and then through customs to be met by more gowned officials outside in the arrival area....which was DEAD quiet! 

Shock number 2 of the day: if you have arrived in BKK or any large Asian airport you know what the arrivals side of the terminal is like. You usually have to push your way through hordes of people and signs and taxi drivers trying to pick you up. This time, silence - no taxi drivers, no family members, just surgically encased officials - one of whom quickly approached me, found my name on a list and escorted me to my taxi that would take me to my quarantine hotel. I was asked to get in the car, take off my shoes which were placed in a red plastic bag and sprayed with something pungent (as were my bags), given a pair of slippers to wear and then it was off on the highways into town - highways that normally can still be super busy and fast even at 2am. Now silent. No traffic. It was really like I had been picked up at the airport to go to a funeral. Very surreal. My driver looked like a surgeon going to do a heart replacement.

And so we arrived at my hotel - a Hilton Doubletree (because...points) where I pad on into a back entrance in my slippers. The whole hotel is being used as a quarantine hotel and they were super organized. I was quickly checked in and finally after a shower and some work emails I slept at 3AM only to wake up at 6:30 or so....

So for the past week my routine has been - wake up early between 2:30 and 4:30 (because jetlag), spend several hours in prayer (just kidding on that one), wait for my meals to appear at whatever time I ordered them - the doorbell rings and a bag magically appears on a saran wrapped chair that sits outside my door. Everything is covered in plastic - even the carpet. I order my meals the day before - breakfast, lunch, dinner - from a rotating western, Asian or healthy menu. I get my KonTerra work done, have spoken with a few clients, do my Thai study, read, try to move a little so I can still squeeze out the door when I leave this room in a couple days...

Every meal arrived in a brown paper bag

Duncan