Getting Started in Bangkok

We arrived in Bangkok the afternoon of February 5th, made it through immigration with our two month tourist visas (secured at the Portland, OR Thai consulate before we left the States), and proceeded to jump in a taxi and quickly get stuck in Bangkok’s notorious traffic. We were headed to meet up with two friends (Iven and Kashmira) at the condo of another two friends (Roy and Bonita), who graciously let us stay at their condo while they were back in the States for a couple of weeks. Iven and Kashmira are working with YWAM in Bangkok with prostituted males. Before moving to Bangkok they had been living in Seattle. We never got a chance to meet them in the States but connected with them in Bangkok on our last trip here in November 2007 because of a mutual friend. We really enjoyed their company and they evidently didn’t dislike us because this trip they have truly welcomed us to Bangkok and done whatever they can to be helpful in getting us situated. (We will write more about both Iven and Kashmira and Roy and Bonita in coming posts.) That night we ate the first of what will be many wonderful meals from street vendors with Iven and Kashmira along with Van, another mutual friend of both of ours from Seattle who also just happened (unbeknownst to us) to be in Thailand exploring opportunities in her native land of Laos. It really is a small world.

The last three plus weeks here have been a bit of a blur. We hit the ground running. Thanks to Iven and Kashmira we started Thai lessons the first Monday after our arrival with their former Thai tutor. Phii Oo comes to teach us Thai 4 days a week for 3 hours each day (we each get 1.5 hours with him). Despite Phii O insisting that “Thai is easy, easy,” there are sounds my tongue refuses to make and I have literally had to resort to holding my tongue with my fingers (not in polite public of course) for a certain sound I still cannot make. I’ll let you know when I can.

After our Thai lessons during our second week here we pounded the pavement in different areas of Bangkok looking for an apartment. We were hot, tired, very dirty (SMOG!!!), and a little irritable (okay just me). Finally at the end of one day after walking miles, we came along New Petchburi Road, a very busy street, to look at one more place, called Union Tower. When we saw the outside of the building it looked a little run down and partly because of the busy road and immediate surroundings we thought, ‘This isn’t going to work.’ But we decided to look at it anyway and when we saw inside it was the nicest place we had seen, and of all the places (about 30) it was the only place that we liked, could afford, AND could actually move into right away. You can't judge a book by its cover. . .

The next day (Friday Feb. 20) we told Phii Oo that we were going on a field trip for our Thai lesson, and he graciously agreed to go back to the building to meet with the manager again to make sure there was nothing we had missed due to lack of language ability. It was really encouraging to see him negotiate (in a very Thai way of course) with Phii Fai, the manager, over anything that he thought we could get cheaper, looking out for us but also helping build a great relationship with her at the same time. Everything looked good and so the following Monday (a week ago today!) we loaded all of our stuff into a taxi and drove the ‘short’ distance (short being a very relative term depending on the traffic) to our new home which you can see in a previous post.

We had hoped to get a place here between US$200-$300 per month and with everything included (including internet but not electricity) we are paying about $310 a month. Thank you to those who were praying. We could have found something cheaper but by paying just a little more we got much more in terms of space and light so we are very grateful. And we have a pool up on the roof which we are also really grateful for.

The windows in our living room face west toward many of the high-rises of Bangkok including the Baiyoke Tower, the tallest building in Thailand (85 floors). Thus we have some nice sunsets brought about from the not so nice pollution. The busy Petchaburi Road runs in front of our building east –west and is parallel to Sukhumvit Road which becomes Ploenchit. Immediately across the road is Saen Sap Khlong (Canal) which is an easy and cheap way to move east or west through the city. More on transportation later. Behind our building, or the view from our balcony/sink is to the North. Right below is a set of railway tracks that are in regular use throughout the day as well as a new rail system that is due to open in August linking the downtown corridor with the new International airport to the south-east of us. There is still a lot of work going on around this new transportation link so it feels a little industrial and is a little loud some of the time. Beyond the tracks you reenter somewhat normal (albeit pricier) Bangkok neighborhood, with large houses intermixed with high-rises.

Andrea

Our Bangkok Apartment

Welcome to our new apartment! There has been a lot of interest in what our apartment looks like in Bangkok (even though we know we still need to catch you up on our last three weeks), so let me give you the tour! Just, please, take off your shoes first as this is what Thai people do (very helpful in not tracking in whatever you just stepped in on the street).

We are on the 5th floor (but really it is more like the 10th because of a few floors of parking and businesses) of an 17 floor apartment building that we suspect used to be a hotel. The building is Embassy Suites style (for those of you who have stayed at that hotel chain), meaning the middle of the building is open from the top floor to the lobby floor. This makes the building much brighter. The other fun part is that the elevator is glass so that you can look out (or not look out as Duncan does) and see the rapidly approaching ground.

We have a coveted corner room. This provides us with much more natural light than the other rooms at a bit more of a premium. We knew that this would help save our sanity though, so we gladly coughed up the extra baht. When you enter our front door you are in our living room/kitchen. (It came furnished with what you see.)

Here is our living room (looking from our front door).

Here is our 'kitchen' in the living room. We looked at about 30 or so apartments before finding this keeper and none of them had kitchens as we know them in the US. Part of this is because space in Bangkok is expensive relative to the working wage; because you can fix up a small kitchen by buying a fridge, a kettle, and a small wok with a portable gas/electric burner; and also because there is tons of cheap street food (more on this later). We are renting this fridge for about $11.50 USD/month.

Our bedroom.

And our lovely bathroom! Behind the shower curtain is a shower sprayer with just cold water. If we want hot, we flip a switch in our bedroom, but we haven't needed to flip the switch. That should tell you something about the temperature here. :)

And finally our balcony! This is traditionally where our portable kitchen would go (burner, etc.) but we don't have all those fixings yet. In a later post we'll put up some of the pictures of our view from our windows and in particular the view from the balcony looking down. It's a long drop!

More updates soon. . .

Andrea

Ostrich Mating Dance Video

Come on, you know you want to watch it!

This is actually the sad story of unrequited love. This male ostrich has fallen in love with either the beat up truck that carries his food or the farmer that spreads his food on the ground. Neither is going to reciprocate the love.

Here is his dance of affection. . .

Playful Monkeys and Red Duiker(?) Video

Attached are two videos that we took in Cape Vidal, South Africa from our campsite several months ago. This adventurous red duiker (?) is playing with the monkeys. Thought some of you might enjoy it despite the shaky camera work. :) And as a suggestion turn down your volume before you hit play.

3.5 Months on the Road - Diabetic Travel Update

As the first portion of our trip is finished it is time to update you on my general diabetic health. The 3.5 months were a wonderful experience and have given me a gift of not only great travel but a reminder that anything is still possible for me - it sometimes just takes more work. Securing the 9 months of diabetic supplies was probably the most tangible example of this. (See post titled '18 Bottles of Insulin and 2700 Test Strips - Securing Diabetic Supplies').

In the past 3.5 months I have been generally healthy. It has been a little more work to figure out food and carbohydrate counts of meals, but this is a daily diabetic task wherever you are. However, what I wasn't expecting was getting colds once a month. Right after we first arrived in Europe I got a cold. Then right after we arrived in South Africa I got a cold and finally another one almost a month later.

I chalk this up to 'new enviroment = new germs' and a generally weakened immune system. However, of all the illnesses to get I am thankful it was just colds.

Besides taking malaria pills there was only my toe problem that had to be dealt with. There was nothing else that had to be treated or prevented. In the spirit of transparency about diabetic problems, despite my strong aversion to talking about my feet, I will explain the problem for all who care to continue reading.

For several years on and off I have had problems with infections along the side of the nail of one of my toes. This problem has nothing to do with diabetes but the necessity of getting it healed quickly has everything to do with diabetes. One of the complications of diabetes is nerve disease (neuropathy) which results in limited feeling or no feeling especially in the feet and hands. I have the very beginning signs of neuropathy in my feet. Neuropathy can cause diabetics to not realize when they have cuts, infections, blisters, etc on their feet and thus can subsequently result in a lack of treatment which in the case of infections can result in gangrene and amputation.

Knowing that we were going on this trip and knowing that we would be walking everywhere made the reoccuring infection really irritating. The problem arose again in June 2008 and I went to a podatrist who treated the infection. Two and a half months later the infection was back and I was particularly worried. The podatrist suggested that I have part of the nail removed from that toe and a chemical put on the skin so that the nail would not grow back, hopefully solving the problem. I had this procedure done in September only two weeks before we took off. For the first few days I seemed to be healing fine but then I got a horrible infection, much worse than I had ever experienced before. A full course of antibiotics helped the infection to go away but the toe remained puffy and irritated. For the next month and a half on the road I soaked my foot in hot salt water almost every day to keep infection away and try to get the toe to heal, but it would not heal.

It wasn't until we were in Nelspruit, South Africa that we had the time and relationship with people to understand how the health care system worked and get the recommendation of a good podatrist. In the private sector of health (South Africa also has state run health care) you are able to completely choose your doctors but you are also fully responsible for the bill. And while private care is certainly much more expensive than state care, compared to US prices even when insurance is paying, it is ridiculously cheap. I paid a total of $30 USD for the entire appointment. Another bonus of the South African private health care market is that doctors have more time to see you. In the US I am generally given just 15 minutes with my doctor which is never enough (for me or any other patient) and which usually results in doctors running late for all their appointments.

Dr. Fuhrie (in Nelspruit, South Africa) saw me for an hour and explained many things that my podatrist in the US should have explained to me before the procedure, namely that the chemical he put on my skin to ensure that the nail would not grow back is harsh acid and often times wounds the skin. Thus the reason for my horrible infection. The acid also made the good (not removed) part of the nail splinter which resulted in a piece of the nail sticking into the toe making it red and puffy. Dr. Fuhrie removed this piece and the toe healed in a week.

When we were back in the States briefly in January I had my regular, every three months, appointment with my endocrinologist and I had my regular labs done. I expect my A1C (three month blood sugar summary) to be higher than normal, not because of travel, but because of getting three colds. When diabetics are sick it is much more difficult to control blood sugar. Because of this back-to-back cold record I fully expected to get another cold when we arrived in Bangkok (again, simply because of being exposed to new germs) but I'm happy to report that I haven't seemed to pick anything new up yet.

Thus, my conclusion from the 3.5 months of travel is that while there is a certain inherent risk when traveling internationally as a diabetic I believe that with a lot of forethought and work before the trip any diabetic travel. Also as a result of this trip there is a certain courage that has replaced some of the fear that I used to carry as a diabetic, and that far outweights the struggle of getting supplies and three colds.

I hope this will encourage other diabetics to not feel limited in their travel dreams.

Andrea

January 17 – February 5 Part 2 CPT to JNB to AMS to SEA to PDX to NRT to SIN to BKK – 4 Continents, 2 weeks

This is where our travels get a little goofy and kind of cool if you are into somewhat odd things that can happen. Because we are using miles for all our flights we had to take what we could get, so we started out our Asian leg of the journey separately. Duncan left the evening of February 1 and flew to Portland for the night. From Portland he left at 12:20 PM on February 2 on the Northwest flight to Tokyo. 40 minutes later at 1PM, Andrea flew out on the Northwest flight to Tokyo from SeaTac. So we were both flying across the Pacific at the same time actually both sitting in 29A. We’re not sure how often that happens but we don’t think it is every day that spouses fly across the ocean together but in different planes. Somehow Duncan got to Narita a little early and Andrea’s flight was a little late so Duncan was already getting settled on the next plane to Singapore when Andrea came running through the concourse to catch it as well. All was well. The Wilson’s were reunited in 29 A and B. And then Duncan had to go throw up as he wasn’t feeling well. Then the flight got better and both slept most of the way (another 8 hours) to Singapore arriving just before midnight on Feb 3.

Not sure why I’m writing in third person but hey...

So we woke up on Wednesday February 4th in Singapore at the Fragrance Pearl Hotel which for $30US was a great deal but was also located right in the middle of Singapore’s red light district. If you know anything about Singapore, and it’s fierceness in going after littering and gum chewing, you might be surprised that it has a red light district but it does. Andrea might write more on this later.

Many people find Singapore pretty bland and not so fun to visit, but I think it is one of my favorite cities in the world. For starters it is so clean you can almost eat off the sidewalk – ok, not quite, but you can eat pretty much anywhere and rest assured that you won’t get sick. It’s efficient and organized, beautiful, lush and green, and is so incredibly multicultural, you often don’t know where you are. And for shoppers it is truly one of the shopping capitals of the world. That’s not us, so we spent the day walking, oh and we had roti for breakfast and lunch both days we were there – if you don’t know what roti is, you are missing out on a great treat!

OMF, (the mission organization my parents were with in Asia) has its international headquarters in Singapore on a nice piece of real estate right next to the unbelievable Botanical Gardens (perhaps the oldest in the world?? 150 years) so first we stopped in there to see if there was anyone we knew. It was a bit chaotic as the offices are being remodeled so all the offices are located in the mission home for this year. (Those who know what I am talking about, know what I am talking about! – Too many audiences here!) Then we went and spent the afternoon wandering through the gardens. Again, stunningly beautiful.

The next day we checked out of our hotel and headed back to Changi Airport (consistently rated the best airport in the world – with movie theaters and anything else you might possibly want, including roti!) to catch our flight up to Bangkok. Thanks to my sister giving us a heads up we had been able to snag a couple free flights on Air Asia as they were giving away 100,000 free tickets to Bangkok to help encourage people to visit Thailand after the airport was shut down for ten days in December. So for a two and a half hour flight, we paid the princely sum of $25US each which covered taxes. Thanks Esther!

Approaching Thailand we flew right over Koh Samet (an island) where I have been a couple times so that was pretty cool. We landed in the peak of rush hour and caught a taxi to the lavish pad we have fallen into for our first three weeks here in Thailand. More on this and our first week in the next post!

Duncan

January 17 – February 5, Part 1 CPT to JNB to AMS to SEA to PDX to NRT to SIN to BKK – 4 Continents, 2 weeks

It’s been almost a month since our last post and we have covered some ground by almost every mode of transportation except being pulled by something with four legs. Here’s a brief summary.

The Premier Classe train from Capetown to Joburg was great. If you are ever in SA and want a great way to see the country in style at a really affordable cost this is it. We arrived at the Capetown train station early Saturday morning on January 17 and were welcomed into the Premier Classe lounge where we were offered tea and snacks. Our bags were whisked away to reappear in our little compartment when we boarded later. We’ll include a couple photos but basically we were waited on hand and foot for the next 26 hours as we chugged across the South African landscape. All meals were included, one course after another – we could have rolled off the train when we arrived the next morning after witnessing an amazing sunrise as only Africa can do. It was a great way to wrap up our time in a enigmatic country we have come to know a little better and love even more than when we landed two and a half months earlier. Unfortunately though the experience on the train was great, the powers that be are not doing a great job of promoting it, so there were only 19 passengers on a 20 carriage train that can hold 124 guests!



We flew to Amsterdam from Joburg on an 11 hour flight which turned out to be kind of fun as the Purser was retiring after 38 years flying for KLM. She had all her family on board and all the flight attendants and crew were helping her celebrate her last flight. Her daughter is also a purser for KLM and was also on the flight. We only had a couple hours in AMS and then on Northwest for another ten hours back to Seattle where we were picked up at the airport with a warm welcome by Andrea’s parents (which was good given that it was a little colder than we have grown accustomed to) as well as shortly thereafter by Duncan’s parents where we stayed except for two nights down in Tacoma with friends. We were really thankful for this time with our parents and all they had done for us during our travels so far.



We are also so thankful for our renters who have made our house into a lovely home for themselves AND have looked after the chickens and kept all the plants alive. No small feat! This was really encouraging and reassuring to us and a continued sign of God looking after us. Each of us were able to connect with a few of our friends and catch up on a little of what has been happening in our old stomping grounds over the past few months. Much of our time was spent taking care of business – doctor appointments, getting our taxes done and organizing and repacking for our next leg of the trip. Time flew and it got a little hectic at the end but by Feb 1 we were ready to go again.






Duncan