Preface: I have to start by saying that this was the unparalleled, most incredible, most enjoyable, perfect vacation I've ever had. I loved every minute of it. Even the part when my camera got stolen and I fell into an invisible ditch while searching for it, possibly spraining my ankle and definitely scraping up my knees. I would have taken a picture of my black and blue club foot for the blog, except for the aforementioned lack of camera. Regardless, all of my friends managed to hang onto their cameras, and pictures will be posted. That being said, here goes.
Day 1: Seoul/Beijing
Our flight left Seoul at 11am, so we traveled there by train the night before and stayed in a hostel near the airport. The hostel was fun - 3 bunk beds and an upstairs loft. It was my first hostel experience, and I feel like it was a pretty good one. It was Friday night, so none of our roommates were there when we got in and we just had sort of a little-kid sleepover, giddy with excitement about our trip. We woke early the next morning and bundled up because Seoul was FREEZING. Way colder than Busan. It was a bummer because we needed those clothes and coats just for the beginning and the end of the trip, but we still had to tote them around the entire time during the (super awesome) tropical warmth of Thailand.
In the morning, we took the airport limousine (which happened to be just a bus, another one of those things lost in translation in Korea) to the airport and hopped our 2 hour flight to Beijing. Based entirely on the international terminal in Beijing, I think Beijing sucks. It was cold, and really boring, and getting through customs took FOREVER. One funny thing about Asian airports I've noticed is that they are full of designer stores and duty free shops and very few restaurants with bad interpretations of western food, whereas most of the American airports I've been in are full of fast food and places with bars.
Our layover was for 5 hours (terrible plan, not doing that again), and there's only so much Gucci and Louis Vuitton and Coach you can window shop when you're not interested in that kind of thing anyway. They did have a Pizza Hut with a perfect replication of American Pizza Hut pizza, so that lessened the pain. Also we had met a girl another teacher from Busan, Christine, on the plane and befriended her and ran into one of our friends, Jordan, who we knew from Jeju Island, (the flight seemed to be about 90% foreign English teachers on winter holiday), so we at least had some friends to hang out with. After napping near our gate, we finally boarded for our 5 1/2 hour flight to Bangkok.
I had already finished the 2 books I had brought along for the trip by the time we reached Bangkok (being a fast reader has never been such a hindrance before). The English book selection here in Busan is extremely limited, so I'll read just about anything I can get my hands on, but luckily these books weren't just consolation prizes, they were actually desirable. They were The Giver by Lois Lowry and Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk, in case you're wondering. Both were enjoyable, but The Giver is one that will stay with me forever. It is magnificent. (Thank you to the lovely and incredible Angela Tennison for the suggestion).
Night 1: Bangkok
We FINALLY reached Bangkok at a little after midnight (which would have been a little after 2 on Korea time), and I immediately changed into a sundress and flip flops in the airport, having already decided that I was never returning to Korea again. It was just too warm in Thailand to ever imagine leaving. We then had about a half hour cab ride to the area where our hotel was, which was near Khaosan Road in Bangkok, a very popular tourist area. Even though we were exhausted from the trip, we were also much too excited to go to sleep, so we cleaned up a little and walked the short couple of blocks to Khaosan. What a sight to behold... It was teeming with people: street vendors, bars with plastic chairs and tables out on the street, people selling clothes, jewelry, souvenirs, and anything else you can imagine, adorable little Thai kids trying to sell you flowers (I personally think it was past their bedtime). And by this point it was around 2am there, albeit it was a Saturday night, and unlike in Texas, things don't shut down early.
We sat down to have a Tiger beer, the Thai equivalent of a Miller Lite I guess, (also available were buckets - yes buckets - of Thai whisky and coke with a bunch of straws for sharing) and to just enjoy being outside and not being covered from head to toe with 3 layers of clothing. Then, who did we run into? Our new friend Christine and the friends she had been meeting up with in Bangkok. Sometimes the world is so small it amazes me. So we sat for a while, people watching (which we never tired of the entire time - it was just so refreshing to see so many people who were not Korean - mostly there were tanned Europeans and Aussies, very few Americans unless they were Americans via Korea like us), reveling in the fact that we had finally made it to our vacation destination. We eventually went back to the hotel to rest, but not before having the first of the copious amounts of delicious meals we had in Thaliand - pad thai from a street vendor for the equivalent of about $.75. Ah, the food. I will go into MUCH more detail about the food later.
So that was our first night. It set the tone for a fantastic trip. And it only got better from there.
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