Funny Bangkok

I’m sure that for a very good reason just about all of the international flights out of Chennai depart very late in the evening. Coordinating the global itineraries for the multitude of planes criss-crossing the region can’t be easy and there have to be some places where that get the short end of the departure stick. As far as India goes, there is always going to be a much more important airport than Chennai’s Anna International Airport—Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, heck even probably Hyderbad—so there’s a short-hand analysis of why we were leaving at 12:25am for a 3 hour flight to Bangkok.


In order to squeeze the most out of our flight plan back to the US, we decided to break up the first long stretch of the itinerary to Japan and stop for a full day in Thailand. We’d only been in the airport a few times (I was actually in Thailand for two weeks in 1993), and it seemed like a fun idea to take the cosmopolitan center of South-East Asia (don’t tell Singapore). Yet there were a few things that worried me—one that the flight was so short and we’d be arriving at around 4:00am Chennai time, and that Kaia’s cough and illness was getting progressively worse. The stress of the last week has been really high for all of us and Kaia has not been sleeping or eating properly. As a parent now ‘experienced’ in long distance moves with children, this was/is to be expected. I can remember when we arrived in Japan in 2003 in the dead of winter and Kaia was running a high fever, our national health insurance had yet to kick in, we didn’t have any transportation, and we didn’t have the first clue about finding a good doctor. In retrospect, we rather freaked out and asked this woman whom we didn’t know to drive us to the local clinic because our son was running a high temperature. I’ll never forget this 60-something-ish woman blazing through the backroads of Nishinasuno in her K-Car as if she had someone in the back giving birth! It was quite the riot.


For me, living in Chennai at times has felt intensely isolating. There is so much to immerse yourself in that if becomes easy to lose touch with other forms of living—that everything doesn’t function (or not) like it does (or does not) in India. Being in the Bangkok airport reminded me of this very quickly. The (Indian) Thai Airways clerk in Chennai checked our bags all the way to Japan every though I made it very clear that we wanted them checked to Bangkok. So, after watching Jyothi Kumar’s red suitcase circle the baggage claim carousel for the 40th time, I realized that there was going to have to be that dreaded confrontation with the people at lost baggage to located our three bags. Kaia and indiamama were trying to get some sleep (I couldn’t sleep at all on the plane and never do) and I went to deal with the problem.

But here I was pleasantly surprised. They located our bags within 20 minutes and brought them out to us, no problem. I can remember when we first arrived in Chennai and it took them 30 just to find a stroller that was checked at the gate! We were recommended by a friend to take a Thai Airways ‘limo’ from the airport to the hotel due to the early arrival, all our bags, and a fussy Kaia, and it was a great idea. We were whisked away in a spacious Mercedes-Benz and, with the smooth ride, I could feel that these were not Indian roads where folks cannot drive much more than 60 km/hour lest they lose their front axle in a pothole or run over some moving mammal. Thai drivers are known for their breakneck speeds, and as we neared 100, it actually kind of scared me!


Our hotel, the Pathumwan Princess, was a really great recommendation as well. For $100/night it was a great deal with really nice amenities and a central location that allowed us (or at least me) to take in as much as Bangkok as possible in a full day. Unfortunately, Kaia and indiamama were feeling very ill, so they stayed in and slept from the time we arrived at 8am until the late afternoon. I took a short nap, and then headed out to find some pirated software and eat the streets. On both counts I was successful in finding what I was looking for (man, Thai street food is GOOD!), even managing to take a taxi, tuk-tuk, be asked if I wanted sex 10 times, be befriended by a Thai cameraman getting ready to go to Europe for the World Cup, and watch someone eat some wicked looking fried insects and grubs from a street vendor. When Kaia felt a bit better, he and I ventured back out in the streets and a nearby huge and sprawling shopping center in the spirit of American department store and boutique shopping (Siam Center). Indiamama had a Thai massage scheduled from 700-800pm, so Kaia and I looked for some dinner. I was not quite sure what I was up for and we looked at a number of restaurants. But it was not until I turned a corner and saw the sushi bar that I truly realized what I had been missing—raw fish and lots of it. Akasaka is a very weak (and horribly overpriced) facsimile of even the most marginal Japanese food (but the people are wonderful), and since I’d heard that the Japanese food is as good and cheaper than you can find in Japan, I was all over it. I think that the restaurant staff was a bit taken aback by how much I ordered, thinking that there was no way that Kaia could eat that much!

Anyway, at 9pm we left for the airport and made it through immigration and onto our plane to Japan without incident. Kaia’s cough wasn’t getting any better, however, so we increased the cough medicine dosage and hoped he’d pass out on the five hour plane ride…at least, we thought, that when we get to Japan, it’ll be on familiar ground and we can do whatever we need to do once we get there.

Why I Love this Time: “Papa, we’re in Bangkok! That’s a funny name!”