Friday, July 27, 2018I Didn't Skip Thursday. You're Imagining Things.
I have managed to post in this space every single day for ... a lot of years. EVERY DAY. It turns out that what it takes to get me to miss is for there to be an extra 11 hours in my day and absolutely no internet access the entire time.
Translation: Getting to Pittsburgh from Asia suuuuuucks. It requires two connections and a minimum of 24 hours of travel time and ugh.
12-hour flights are brutal, especially when they're matched up with 6-hour flights. Bangkok to Tokyo was 6 hours, and then Tokyo to Washington DC was 12+ hours, and thank goodness it's only about a 30-minute flight from DC to Pittsburgh. If it had been longer, it's very possible I would have parachuted out and walked the rest of the way home because I was just plain done with planes. The crazy part of it all is that if I just paid attention to the clock, it only took 12 hours to get home. I flew out of Bangkok at 12:30 am Friday and landed in Pittsburgh at 12:30 pm Friday.
In other words, ZOMG was it a long morning.
Remind me of that the next time we're figuring out who is going where for international travel. I generally try to convince everyone else they should go on any and all long trips, but I might need to be more assertive in the future. (I say that knowing full well I'll be going to Australia in the winter and bluuuurrrrgh. Maybe we'll be able to zap people from one place to another by then.)
And now to backdate this post so it appears to show up on Thursday. Pay no attention to the woman behind the curtain, you guys. She's just on a weird time warp bender. It started with a funky Starbucks drink in Bangkok, was followed by another funky Starbucks drink in Tokyo, and then there was a normal Starbucks drink in DC. Is it socially acceptable to have coffee three times in one day? What if the clock says all three drinks were consumed at essentially the same time?
Wait.
Don't answer that.
Bangkok
Another successful work thing is in the books, which means I'm about six hours from jumping on a plane and heading home. I should probably think about packing. Maybe. Before I do, though, some random thoughts about Bangkok:
1. The lack of traffic lights is ... odd. The fact that instead of traffic lights, there seems to be a person directing traffic at nearly every intersection is also odd. But, it really does seem to be significantly more effective than a traffic light. There's a crapton of traffic but somehow people keep getting through and there really is no explanation other than the fact that the people blowing whistles nonstop is working. Except, THERE ARE PEOPLE BLOWING WHISTLES NONSTOP.
It's on my nerves.
2. Google may say that NYC has a bigger population than Bangkok, but I think it's a lie. I have never seen as many people crammed into as small a space as I did when we took the train to dinner the other night. I didn't have to hold anything as the train lurched from stop to stop because there was a mass of people holding each other perfectly upright. So many people.
3. It's likely only coming to mind because I was in the Middle East a few months ago, but it's startling how very little sexism there is in Thailand. In fact, some coworkers who are from this region were asking me why there are so few female managers at our USA office and ... WELP. I have all of the thoughts about that, but I'll save them. In general, though, I haven't caught a single whiff of anything other than respect while here.
4. For group photos, everyone automatically says, "Women to the front" and it ends up looking weird in the photos, but it's not at all weird in person. It's a respect thing or something and makes it real easy to get the shorter people towards the front with the taller in the back, except for that thing where I'm a giant compared to most everyone here. Heh.
5. OMG the traffic cops with their whistles.
6. The streets are filled with vendors selling everything from meat on a stick to Cialis to cheap clothes and it's pretty awesome. Except the meat on a stick. They can keep that.
7. So. Much. Coffee. There's more Starbucks here than in Pittsburgh and in between each of the Starbucks are 17 other coffee shops.
8. There's a lot of prostitutes standing along the street near the mall and train station across from my hotel. A LOT. And they all look like they are in complete command of everything in their life.
9. There's also a lot of small children living on the street. I'm going to be thinking about the little boy close in age to Mila who sleeps under the stairs across the street from my hotel for a long time.
10. We did a "team building" event at my work thing that involved getting measured for a custom suit. Really. I wound up with a jacket, skirt, and pants and I paid a whopping $35 for it all. Somehow the magicians called tailors here are able to measure you, let you pick a fabric, and then make a completely custom suit in 24 hours. And it's cheap.
11. Everything is cheap. I walked through H&M earlier and didn't find a single thing that cost more than $10 US.
12. Tariffs are dumb. Don't ask me to elaborate unless you have a WHOLE lot of time on your hands.
13. Most of the taxis are motorcycles. It makes sense because they can cut through traffic much more quickly, but it's still disconcerting.
14. There are SO many health clubs and spas around. SO MANY. They're just as common as Starbucks.
15. Everyone is very polite and kind and they all speak English. It makes life significantly easier.
16. I really should schedule an extra day on these sorts of trips so I can get out and see more, but ... maybe when the girls are older.
