China Town, Bangkok, Thailand
I have a knack for doing dumb things in life. Take last night for example:
I was working on this blog, trying to get things set as I like, burning the mid-night oil away. I ran out of soda and smokes so decided to go down to my friendly 7-11 store, one on every street corner in Thailand, and pick some up. As I slammed the door shut to my condo I realized that I didn’t have my door key or card for entry to the complex. The common 4-letter words started and lasted for about 2 minutes before I just laughed at myself for the dumb thing I just did.
It’s 0200 in the morning, I have on shorts, a t-shirt, flip-flops and am carrying some money. So it could have been worse for me, like the time I locked myself out of my girlfriends apartment in North Carolina with only shorts on while it was raining. Shirtless, cell phone less, shoeless and did I mention it was March! That time somehow the door “magically” opened when I tired it again and to this day I have no clue how it could have.
This time I wasn’t so lucky for the “door fairy” to visit me. I even thought about busting a window out but who knows what a window in Thailand cost for a foreigner these days. I’m sure the locals get it at a great cost but the stranded, dumb Western isn’t afforded that privilege most likely. So when God gives you lemons, your suppose to make lemonade right? I decided to skip making the Kool-Aid and would just sleep in a chair in the parking garage instead.
I’ve never been to proud of a person to not sleep on a bus bench, ditch or graveyard. Some of the best nights sleep I have had have been in places like this when the situation called for it. Again, tonight was not one of them as the mosquito’s were eating me alive in that chair. I gave up and decided to go on a Thai walk-about. Like Forrest Gump I just started in a general direction with no set plan.
I had been walking for about an hour, seeing Thai people working. I thought to myself how nice it must be to be them. They actually have a reason to be there, whereas I didn’t. I felt worse then a homeless man and to be honest it was pathetic. Just when i was about to contemplate suicide I seen a bar called “Jack Daniel’s.” It’s 0300 in the morning and when there is nothing else to do in Thailand…you drink! Went in and they had one of the best Asian bands I have ever heard. The female lead singer whaled like Janis Joplin, the group had every instrument you could think of and people were dancing it up like 1969.
My good fortune was short lived, as I only got to hear 4 songs before they shut the place down. Killed 30 minutes, only 5.5hrs to go and made a mental note to come back to this place again. Depression set in though when I was leaving. Seeing all those people leaving, laughing, hi-five’ing each other, knowing they had a warm place to go almost made me sick. I needed a plan before I choked myself!
What stays open in Bangkok till the wee hours of the morning that I can hang out in without being thought of crazy…ding ding a club! There are two types of clubs in BKK. 1) is the kind full of hookers, dress code is zero if you want it (I’d recommend it as you might even get a better deal) and closes by 2am. 2) the kind that is full of off the clock hookers and regular people, dress code is somewhat required depending on the place you go and some stay open till as early in the morning of 7am. Finding option (1) is easy, just ask any tuk-tuk driver and they’ll take you to any one of a million places in BKK. Option (2) though is harder to find if you don’t know where your going. What did I care…I only had all night to find Option (2)!
So I left the bar and kept walking down the road following the SkyTrain. I thought I knew a place and where it was but knew it would be far. About that time a cab driver pulled over to ask me if I wanted a fair. I hopped in and said “Phloen Chit BTS stop.” ”Closed, how about disco?” he said back. ”I know it’s closed, just take me there or not?” “No disco, disco open?” Ok, your wondering why I don’t get in and go, right? Well because to me I’m thinking he’s saying Option(1) (the one full of hookers, massage joint exc exc) and I don’t want to go to his place that he goes to for a “quickie” or some place his sister works at. Finally i just give up and get in. 1/2 the time thats the best thing to do when you don’t speak Thai here. We get going and in his broken English he’s still trying to talk to me into going to his disco. I ask how far it is and if it’s got good music (ie; good way to know if it’s option2). He says yes but for some reason I’m not convinced. We finally get to Phleon Chit and I realize I have no clue where I’m at, as nothing looks familiar here.
Decision time! I look at him and give in “Ok take me to disco, use meter and we’ll see. How far is it?” ”30min maybe” he says and I say “Make it in 5min and I’ll go!” Time is now 0400 and don’t fancy walking for another 5hrs down side streets. He takes off and no doubt he’s trying to make it in 5min, as we are flying through red lights, passing cops, hitting food carts and everything else you can imagine. Why did I say 5min??? To his credit we make it there in about 8min and I see Western girls outside, which means it’s not Option(1) at least.
I get inside and have to say it was a pretty cool club called Spicy. You could smoke inside, which is rare for Thailand, had good music and the place was packed. I ordered a beer at the bar and stood in the corner nursing it. Of all the places I have been in BKK, this place had more drunk dumb-ass Westerns dancing then any I have seen. They had 3 tables in the middle of the place that you could dance on-top of. There was some Thai girls dancing there but mostly Westerns and I mean like 40-50 year old male westerns. They all dance the same routine, something like a live chicken being deep-fried that has body Tourette Syndrome or something. But in fair credit they all looked like they were having fun.
7 beers and 5hrs later, I left at daylight and got a taxi back to my condo. When I got there the service counter was open for the building and asked they lady if she could call my landlord (remember I don’t have a cell phone). She tried for about 3min until she finally remembered she wasn’t in BKK, as she left for the week to Phuket for a vacation. Errr…so what now I ask. She calls a locksmith to come and says it will be 300BHT and would be 20min before he gets here.
Locksmith shows up, whips out some heck-key looking thing and in 20sec had my door open. Paid him 400BHT (guess 300 BHT is for local’s only) and went straight to bed. In all it cost me about 2,100BHT (400 locksmith, 1,500 club and for the 200 taxi’s) for the dumb ass mistake I did…but to be honest it was fun in a way (looking back on it now of course). First thing I did was put my spare key and card in my money bag before hitting the sack.
What is the dumbest thing you have done before? Let us all know and don’t be shy.
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