Arrived in Munich
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We´re in Munich ahead of schedule, as we were transferred to a Lufthansa flight from Bangkok to Munich, instead of flying from Bangkok to Helsinki, staying there for 12 hours, then flying into Munich. Believe it or not, the Finnair flights we were booked on were overbooked (apparently those Finns like to get out…)and we were asked to transfer to a direct flight. Groovy with us – so here we are, ahead of Chris Soyk, who we´re meeting for a couple of days of goofing off.
So, here´s a few observations about Vietnam and Thailand from our last two days there:
1. What is with the widely practiced and accepted habit of obvious and public nose picking (digging?) in these countries?
2. Really, the spitting isn´t half as disturbing as the nose picking, but it´s certainly worth a mention here…
3. Why was there a guy with an abundance of ass crack running towards immigration and passport control in the Bangkok airport ahead of us? I can see it now – “I´m sorry sir, but we can´t allow crack into the country – what would the Chinese think?” For those of you who don´t know, China denies it has a drug problem, but raw opium is carried across the Laos and Burmese borders daily by yak herders. Thailand has a death penalty for drugs…
4. Explain the need for the hotel we were staying at in Bangkok to post this notice on the coffee tables in the lobby:”As a courtesy to other guests, please refrain from lying on the couch.”
5. How drunk does a tourist to Thailand have to be before they will submit themselves to the needle of the KaoSahn tattoo mini bus (really, a Volkswagon) parked in the middle of a pedestrian street? Apparently not too drunk to remain conscious – we saw people being tattooed on the side of the street in the van, beside the storefront of the “Wholesale Tattoo Supply Shop”.
6. Explain why a respectable hotel would feel the need to frame a newspaper article titled “Dirty Public Bathrooms Tarnish Our Clean Public Image” and mount it on the wall it their lobby bathroom? Let me tell you…no, you don´t want to know.
7. What is with every moto driver´s need to drive close enough to pedestrians to clip them, regardless of an infinite amount of road space available to them? Every street is no less than six lanes wide, and there are almost no cars on them – it´s all motos and bikes and cyclo drivers.
8. Explain the penchant for grown men to wear flowery women´s socks with sandals out in public…I wouldn´t wear them myself.
Of course this is not all we remember from our trip in Asia – it´s just a list of some of the questions we´ve been left with in an attempt to lighten some of the emotional load of Cambodia´s … what? Autogenocide, and it´s aftermath? Tragic history? Desperate but hopeful poverty? Beautiful but damaged people? It´s difficult to describe, but necessary to see and experience. Not to understand – you can´t understand, because it makes no sense, but to help develop a dimension of compassion in yourself that you did not realize was necessary before you went to Cambodia.
Today our vacation begins… we´re off to our hostel, then in search of a bratwurst!
As always, we miss our families, friends and doggies,
Noel & George
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