Exploring South East Asia -2017

Exploring South East Asia in three weeks – 2017

Blog post 1 – They say dramas don’t start in the airport…

South East Asia is an amazing place I’m told…it enters your heart, soul and leaves a golden token of spirituality and love which changes your perception of things. I hope this is true as in many ways I’m on a journey of self discovery myself, having gone through some challenging times over the past few years.

So here I am…in Gatwick all ready for a trip I’ve been longing and procrastinating to do for too long!

Booking it on a whim last August (2016) I can’t actually believe how quickly it’s come around and I can’t quite believe I’m going to be travelling 5918 miles across the world on my own! But I’m hoping this experience will show me things about myself I never knew or maybe did know but didn’t dare to show…

Unfortunately the trip is not a year, it’s not even 3 months but 3 weeks and that will have to do for now…I have a mortgage to pay after all BUT OH MY WORD SOUTH EAST ASIA here I bloody come!!

Before I get into the really exciting stuff I have to say…how difficult is it to find the Emirates check-in desk…is it just me or is that not the hardest desk to find (I am obviously going to be FINE finding my way round the streets of Bangkok and Cambodia and Vietnam! 😬🤞🏻) So after asking three people (yes three!! Don’t judge and anyway in my defence there were no screen listings!) I checked my rucksack in and was astonished that it only weighed 10.2kg…I’m either a pretty awesome packer, the scales were broken or I will literally be wearing the same clothes for most of the trip…I go for option 1!

So…what could possibly go wrong now?! All checked in, I’ve found departures (hooray!) and can’t wait for an English Breakfast tea (thinking it actually might be my last strong cuppa for a while). Just as I’m about to sit down the fire alarm goes off and everyone is directed out of the airport…great or worrying start to my trip?!

Thankfully it must have been a piece of toast on fire or something minor (and not a terrorist attack my mum so reassuringly suggested on the phone!) since it takes the fire brigade only a few minutes to sort out…and who says dramas don’t start at the airport!

The flight to Dubai was actually pretty good! Two films down (Lion with Dev Patel and Collateral Beauty with Will Smith – both great poignant films!) two meals, and two bottles of red wine…I’m getting itchy feet (or rather swollen ankles) and just want to get there!

After 19 hours of travelling I arrive in Bangkok, a bit sweaty, red eyed but none the less very very excited!! It’s funny how you even meet chatty ‘friendly’ fellow travellers in the airport. Waiting in the passport queue an older man started chatting, casually asking why it was taking so long…after the third time I felt like saying “How the f**** do I know…I’m not Mystic Meg!” but being the polite person I am…I let him go in front of me since he was in that much of a rush…

After walking the wrong (and I might say directed way) to the oversized baggage area I walk back to belt 23 like someone who has no idea what they’re doing and picked up my rucksack (which I had been praying would not get lost in the Gatwick fire craziness!).

Finally after walking round in circles (maybe it’s just airports I struggle to navigate?!?) I find a Thai guy holding my sign…so pleasant, he hands me a bottle of water and directs me to my private ride. After about an hour in chaotic car swerving traffic which is utterly normal to the Thais but makes me nearly want to pee myself, I arrive at Astera Sathorn Hotel greeted with an orange juice and HUGE smile.

So here it begins…my South East Asia trip where the sun sets like an orange blazing fire and the kindness of the local people fill you with peace and hope.