Chinese Water Torture

I just signed up for some intensive Chinese lessons for the next month or so. This great lil lady came to my flat and we went over my old text books (Yes, I do carry old Chinese texts books with me wherever I go, shut up). It was pretty horrifying. I'm way rusty after half a year in Oz practicing my English and drinking too much.

Now I'm back in China, it's time to get back on that wagon. I've signed up for 4 x 2 hour lessons a week. Only 8 hours and back in Kunming I was doing 16. But they weren't one on one lessons and that makes a difference. There's no others to take up the slack and nowhere to hide, although I don't rule out diving under the table and peeking out when things get rough. Stormy times ahead people.

My other language learning strategy involves..um... drinking too much, funnily enough. I heart Mao's Live House, that shitty punk dive I found a week or so back. It's craptastic, the guys are hot, the girls look like they'd slit your throat for a dollar. My kinda people. There's gigs there coming up. I'm going, I'm going alone and I'm going to talk to everyone who'll listen to me. Hey, it's language practice...

Also! I'm translating a website for a tattoo buddy of mine over here. Excellent way to bone up on the tattoo vocab hey?

Ah guys, my shit is in flux, but fuck it. I'm sick of the worrying.

It's time to tear this city apart.

24 kuai is 4 Australian dollars, 3 US.

Today was my first ever experience with having "hired help". My flatmate's got it organised that every Monday they turn up for an hour and make the magic happen. 3 Chinese women rocked up with punctuality and cleaning products that would impress a German. Are Germans clean? I don't know, but I'm pretty sure they're on time. Regardless, the proletarian in me twitched a little.

I'm going to do the math/s just to clear something up.

3 ladies@ 24kuai/hour = 8 kuai each = $1.33AUD per person for an hours work.

Ker-azey.

Favourite things

One of my favourite things to do here in China is get on my bike, stick my head phones in and ride like a crazy lady around the streets. In China, everyone on the road is really slow. I mean everybody. When I ride I overtake cars. It's not that I'm some bionic uberwoman, there's just a pace that traffic moves to here that's rhythmic, like a low sub-sonic soundwave.The cars keep it, the bicycles and the busses. And everyones happy. Slow, late and happy.

There are some behaviours that are inbuilt or at least learned from a young age. Take littering. I just can not for the life of me discard so much as a gum wrapper on Beijing's filthy streets without feeling like I'm going to hell. Riding is another thing. If I am on a vehicle, it must mean I am in a rush to get somewhere that mere walking alone would not suffice and therefore must ride like I'm being chased by Satan himself. Slow is not an option. But you know what? It works!

There's a chaos theory thing that happens. Beijing is a city of millions and the streets are stuporfyingly crowded. People make their own rules and definitely don't stick to the conventional stuff like right of way and orderly queuing. I grind streets to a halt by giving right of way to grannies and the frail and infirm. The rules always seems to change, but there's a pattern. It remnds be of when Jeff Goldblum demonstrated Chaos Theory on Laura Dern's hand in Jurassic Park. Wasn't that a creepy moment? Anyway, somehow in China it all works.

I try to ride at least twice as fast as the Chinese national average, or triple it. There's a pattern when exaggerated it fits and all of a sudden, you're flying. Sifted between the merging cars and outpacing the busses, leaving the other cyclists for dead. It's all or nothing though. Riding just a bit faster than everyone is not an option. That shit'll get you killed.. You have to crank that soundwave up an entire octave or perish.

I have a theory...

Have you ever seen them in the same room together?

Chinese Characters are cool - pictographs

Some Chinese characters make perfect sense, some make no sense to me whatsoever. Lets look at a couple that are so clear you want to go up to them and hug then until they're just a pile of black sticks in your arms.

A lot of people think all Chinese characters are pictographic, ie little meaningful drawings. A lot of people are stupid too. Most Chinese characters you could place along a continuum of idographic to pictographic. Maybe it would look like this:


<-------------------------------------------->

ideographic pictographic

I would put our character chuan 串 way up the right end of that scale. Cos 串 looks like something strung together and that's just what it means. Whereas something like Cuo4 错 which means "mistake" doesn't look like much of anything. Cuo4 is made up of two parts radicals if you will, an ideographic component and a phonetic, so I think I'll put that one on the left of that continuum there.

There's obviously not going to be a way to draw a picture everything in the universe right? So Chinese makes it all up by using a combination of pictographic, ideographic bits and phonetic bits. Bits of pictures, bits of meaning and bits of sound = Chinese!

Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of the pictographic. Some of my best friends are pictographic. I think they have a role to play in society.
Check these guys out!

马 = horse (ok so this one is a bit of a stretch at first)

大 = big (imagine this is a guy standing with his arms out saying "It was this BIG!"

鸟 = bird (umm, this kinda looks like the horse character, but this is meant to be a bird)

鸭 = duck (Duck has the bird radical and another phonetic bit on the left)

鸡 = chicken (Chicken also has the birdy radical but with a different phonetic bit for pronunciation)

山 = mountain (kinda looks like a mountain don't it?

岛 = island (This is the birdy radical sitting on a submerged mountain......that is: an ISLAND!

So there we have some Chinese character pictographs. For the love of God, don't go thinking that's the be all and end all of Chinese characters. Jeez.

Should I write something about Chinese character tattoos at some point? Maybe, just maybe, I will.

Trashed in the Northern Capital - A How to Guide

I've finally got up the gumption to go out here get loaded. It was Friday night, a friend from the city I was living in last year was in town. It was time to drink some alcohol.

We started out at Nan Luo Gu Xiang. I still haven't translated what that means but it'll be something like Authentic Chinese Alley Encourages Foreigners in the Drinking Place. I'll put up some pictures of NLGX...later. It's a great example of tearing down the old and awesome and replacing it with a new lamer version of old and awesome. It's a favourite Chinese governmental passtime. Anyone who has been to the Badaling area of The Great Wall will know what I mean. I found the gang drinking on the rooftop "terrace" of the Boheme Coffee Republic. It's just the roof of the bar, but they've stuck some chairs and couches up there. You have to kinda scramble to get up there and the roof is slanted, but it matters less the more you drink.

I met Keng Keng up there. It was great to see her. She's hands down my favourite person in China. Her fam are moving to Melbourne in a matter of days as well. She told me she's pretty nervous about going cos she's not got any friends there and her English is pretty average. But she's a fucking superstar so I'm sure she will be fine. Her English has got way better in the last 6 months as well. She used to hate speaking English which is awesome. It's a fucked language. I understand completely why she's nervous about going though. Moving to a country where you speak the language craptastically and have no friends is no easy shit.
I hope that she doesn't meet with that Australian ignorance of FOB awesomeness any time soon.




So we alighted the terrace and went and got some 串 (= chuan = meaty deliciousness on a stick = see this post).
It's still stinking hot here so eating outside seemed like a good option. NLGX is pretty narrow and as well and pedestrians, there's bikes, 3-wheel bicycle tuk-tuks, motorbikes and cars trying to get through. As we were sitting eating our meal last night, a fucking Hummer tried to get past and we all had to scoot out chair to the side to let it through. Fucking Hummers.

KengKeng has great taste in music and after we could gorge on chuan no more we headed up to Mao's Live House, the local punk dive. I'd never been but I will go again. Shocking sound, crap lighting, under airconditioned, sticky floor and general air of shittiness. We got there in time to see the last two bands only . It was 40 kuai to get in which feels kind of as outrageous as asking 40 Oz dollars to get into shitty bands at The Annandale. Keng Keng, always the wordsmith said "It is a fucking ripoff" and I walked inside smiling. The first band was crap but I enjoyed it because I was enjoying the ambiance. Kunming neverhad any clubs as cool as this. The last band, PK-14 were awesome. Kinda like a Chinese Interpol maybe? Good stuff.

After that it pretty much went pear shaped. We jumped in a cab and made it up to Sanlitun, the notorious foreigners bar district. We started at Kai Bar, the seediest of the seedy, but the drinks are spectacularly cheap and everywhere else, it's pretty much Western prices or worse. By this stage I'd had quite a bit to drink and was looking to get mouthy. There were a lot of retarded foreigners around to make fun of luckily. I found 2 guys who were English teaching 3 hours out of Beijing and settled in to trying to pick a fight. I dunno, I'm an idiot, ok? When I got sick of that, I stumbled around Kai Bar trying to find Keng Keng, Elise and Matt but couldn't find anyone. I'd also run out of money completely and didn't have my phone with me. With no other options, I started the long walk home. It took me about an hour and a half to get home and I called Matt straight away. I had 10 missed calls on my phone. Matt, Elise and Keng Keng had been searching Santilun for that time trying to find me. Kai Bar is the sort of place that degenerates quickly and the surly Russian prostitutes and other mafia types come out of the woodwork. Matt had been beside himself with worry as I'd disappeared into thin air. He rushed home after I called and cried when he told me about searching the streets for me. He was worried something seriously bad had happened to me. I felt as shitty as the floor of the Mao Live House. I realised I was in way over my depth. Beijing can be a big mean city and the foreigners scene nasty and predatory.

Lessons learned:

#1 Don't ever leave the house without your phone.

#2 Always bring too much money and have an emergency 50 kuai on my person at all times.

#3 Getting drunk and picking fights, though fun is not appropriate in big scary cities.

universe 1 : andrea 0

Ever had one of those 24 hours where it seems the universe has got it in for you?

I was doing some general internet things yesterday, settled in for an afternoon of getting crap I have to do done. Shifted in my seat and spilled coffee all over my Blogotron 3000. Actually it was just over the keys left of T,G and B, nevertheless I still freaked and made squealy noises. Didn't seem to do any damage and those keys sure look a lot cleaner than the rest of my computer. But fuck.

Hmmm...what if I did lose my Blogotron? I'd have no camera, no laptop, very little music, nothing to watch DVD's on. It would suck but I can see benefits.

Yesterday after I rode away from this cafe I decided it was exploring o'clock and so I let the roads be my guide. Actually, I was kinda following a hot laowai for part of it, but after I lost him, the roads were my guide. I should have stuck to stalking because it all ended in tears. Maybe my Beijing Betty was angry cos I bought her the cheap shitty tyres. Maybe she was pissed I left her out the front of a cafe too long, maybe she finds anthropomorphism irritating, but hell hath no fury like a woman scorned....and basically, long story short, I tried to jump up a gutter onto the footpath to avoid a street sweeper and didn't make it. I stacked my bike right into the gutter and fell pretty ungraciously infront of a group of toothless ol' guys playing mahjong. I picked myself up like it was nothing, like hey, i do that all the time, that's just how I roll. But I came up in bruises almost straight away and I think I've bruised my kneebone quasi-seriously.
I got home and drank some tasty alcohol and took an afternoon snooze on the couch. That was pretty awesome actually. I don't know what I'm complaining about.

You win some, you lose some.

photos of impressive bruising up soon.

Chinese Characters are cool - Chuan4 串

I love the Chinese language. I love it like a disciplinarian Father who frustrates you when you're starting out but as time passes you begin to understand their logic.

Chinese confuses me, but it loves me and knows I'll understand one day.

Whenever I think of it, I'll post Chinese characters here. Ones that I love like a cute little brother, ones that are profound like a quiet Uncle, ones that, like an older sister, make no sense. Ones that are inexplicably cool, like me.

Today we look at Chuan.

Chuan has a falling tone. Imagine saying Chuan as you're sneezing and that's what it should sound like. You can't say all words with a 4th tone like you're sneezing, but Chuan kind of sounds like a sneeze anyway. Well, my sneezes do. Shut up. To indicate the falling tone, aka the 4th tone, we write it like this Chuan4 or chuàn. To listen to Chuan4 spoken click here. Then click where it says chuàn under the heading Mandarin.

To make things more confusing, Beijingers have an accented speech where they make a heavily retroflexed RRRR sound on the end of many words, particularly those ending in N. Chuan becomes Chuar. This accent is called Er accent or Erhua. Basically Beijingers sound like pirates cos everything ends in Arrrrrr. So! Say Chuan, and say it like you're a sneezing Chinese pirate and you got it! God Bless you.

Chuan4 looks like this: 串

Best part of all is that Chuan4 means to string together. It's also the name given to fried meat on a stick, kebab style. Ain't that cute?

Beijingers are nuts for chuan4. On every street there are hole-in-the-wall restaurants with people inside ripping chuan4 off the stick with their teeth. And by a cute quirk, you can make this character pretty easily out of a string of lights, which is exactly what these restaurants do and string them up infront of their shop.


Photos up later tonight.

I 串 Chuarrrrrrrr.

Road Warrior

The new woman in my life has made me realise I am a menace on the roads and a danger to society and peach vendors alike.

She is an old, cheap ride but I love her all the same. She is Beijing Betty.

I was starting to realise the reality of needing a bike in Beijing. This place is just too massive not to. You need a bike to even get close to public transport, then begins another kind of nightmare altogether. I guess I could brave the busses but honestly, you're sardined in on those and they smell like cabbage soup when crowded.

So now I have Betty. She's probably about my age or a little older, but the harsh Beijing climate has not been kind to her. But she's been around, seen a few things I'm sure. She was a spring chicken when Mao died, was old enough to remember Tiananmen Square but not really old enough to understand it. She's seen this city change. The old alleys (called hutong) be torn down in favour of multi-storey apartment complexes. She remembers when old folk remembered the days when the Empress ruled. They're long gone now, replaced with old folk who remember when the Japanese occupied these parts and the dawn of Communism.

Things have improved here. The city is newer, opening up. Things are booming but my Betty gets older. She's seen this city unfold to the outside world. She remembers when she saw her first foreigner, now they're everywhere. When she was little, foreigners were confined to one area of the city and weren't allowed on the subway. They weren't allowed to use Chinese Renminbi (lit: the People's Currency)but had to pay for things with special Foreigners Currency. She remembers riding past a group of them long ago. They were tall, faded looking and had the overfed look of a Capitalist Roader. I'm sure she's horrified she now belongs to one.


__________________________________________________________________

*Capitalist Roader was the term given during the Mao era to those wanting to open China up to the West and hence, down the Capitalist Road.

walking the street

Got locked out yesterday so I took a long walk.

I found a shop called Happiness Yoyo. It sold undies.

I came across 3 kids playing in the street covered in filth. When they saw me, it went down like this.

Dirty Little Girl: HELLO!
Me: Hello!
DLG and all her friends: HELLO! HELLO! HELLO!
Me: Hello.
DLG: BANANA!


The waiter in this cafe waving around a miniature electrified tennis racket killing flys.

ZAP!

Love andrea

Registration of a Nation

I went and did my bureaucratic duty the other day and registered with the cops (their called the Public Security Bureau here). There's a funny quirk in China where if you're foreign (called laowai here), probably if you're Chinese too, the government must know where you spend the night at all times. If you're travelling, the hostel/hotel does this for you when you check in, they report to the cops that you, Mr Passport Number Blahblah stayed at X hotel for X nights. When you're a resident here, you have to take your passport down to the police station with your address, your landlords phone number and ID card number and get it all put on file. You are meant to do this within 24 hours of your arrival. Even if you spend one night away from home, for example at a friends place cos you're drunk and can't seem to get your keys in the lock in your door, you're meant to tell the cops about it.

This is a throwback to pre reform-era policy. There was a system called hukou whereby everyone had to be registered and an address accounted for. People could not move freely around the country as they pleased. If you had country hukou, you weren't allowed to move to the city without applying for city hukou. And vice versa, but who the fuck would want to move from a Chinese city into the country. It was easier to go from city to country than the other way around. As things opened up, country folk were allowed into the cities more and more as labour was required. They had to be able to prove they could support themselves though and had to bring their own rice ration with them in sacks. Wacky.

Anyway.

Couple of years ago some people from UTS forgot to register full-stop and they were dragged out of Chinese class by the cops one day a month after arriving, marched down to the police station and interrogated by a very yelly police official. They ended up having to spend a night in jail and having to write a self-confession. Self-confessions are another Commie throw-back. In a nut shell, you write that you're guilty of whatever you're accused of, that you're super sorry and that you've realised the error of your ways through the power of Marxism and you get off much much lighter.

I thought this time I should get right on being a good expatriate in China and marched myself down to the local Public Security Bureau, I guess it was 96 hours or more after I arrived, but damn y'know? I had shit to do.

I actually got into lots of trouble last year for not registering with the cops. I wanted to go travelling and registering with the cops involves them taking your passport for over 2 weeks at a time. I thought fuck it, I'll just do it when I get back, no biggie.

It was a biggie.

I got threatened with deportation, a fine of about $100AUD for every day I hadn't registered, which was lot and had to write up a self-confession of my own. I wish I still had it. I wrote that I was super-duper sorry and that I really love China and that it was all a big mistake and I'd never intentionally flaunt Chinese law. I thought about flicking some fake tear drops on the page just to kick things along a bit. No need, in the end they let me stay without a fine!
I was pretty lucky.

This time it all went without a hitch and becuase I was registering myself and not the school registering me, my passport was back in my hands in 15 minutes flat. I did feel like a bit of a doofus though cos I forgot my address. Do I lived in Entrance 12 Block 4 or Entrance 4 Block 13? The police lady tsked at me and called up my landlord and sorted it all out. Bless her.

A few days later, there was a knock on my door, a really loud official sounding knock. There was a lady in plain clothes holding a stack of papers and a young dude looking sheepish. She said something a gazillion miles an hour in a thick Beijing accent at me that went over my head so fast it hit the wall behind me with an audible thud. I said ".......um.......Wha?" And she said the same thing, louder, no slowing of pace, no clarity of diction. Obviously the reason I couldn't understand was because I was hard of hearing, not because I'm a fucking laowai and Chinese is a crazy hard language to learn at the best of times and when someone rocks up your doorstep out of the blue in a floral dress, it's obviously the filth checking up on you.

Turns out I just forgot that after you register, the cops come around and check that you didn't give a phony address and that your not housing 17 extra laowai in your apartment. She was actually pretty nice, but nosy as usual. I had a friend get visited by a policeman like this. He asked her very specifically if she had stayed in that house every night she'd been in China. She said "Yeah". The guy goes "Are you sure??" She goes "Yeah." He said "What about Valentines Day?"

Chinese people often regard you with either suspicion or a nosy curiosity concerning where and how you live. It's not unusual to have a Chinese person make up some reason to knock on your door and have a good ol' stickybeak 'round your apartment. I had a guy make up some bogus claim about my apartment leaking onto his below. He came in and investigated every room including my bedroom. Just wanted to see if I slept hanging upside down I guess.

At the entrance of my building are the Gestapo Grannies. It's their job as comminuty monitors to watch who comes in and out. I'm trying to get them to like me. I always give them my best shit-eating grin and sunniest Ni Hao! when I come and go. I'm only met with an interogating glare so far but I hope to upgrade to a steely squint in the near future. One day they will crack.

It's funny, I don't really notice the interrogation, surveillance and monitoring. You just get on and do it. It doesn't really take much to satisfy it and once it's done it's done. Being watched and looked at all the time is part of daily life here laowai or not, whether it's the octogenarian community monitors or the Public Security Bureau. Either way, it's easier to deal with if you just put your headphones in.

Hello Beijing!

What can I say...Beijing at this time of year is a huge hulking stink machine. It's enormous, it stinks, you can't see to the next block because of all the pollution and I haven't seen the sun since I've been here. Actually I lie, I saw it, but it was a glowering orange butthole that I could look directly at.

Beijing is interesting and has a buzz about it no question, but it's over 35 degrees here with no breeze, no storm in the afternoon and if you leave your door or window open for air, your house gets covered in Mongolia. (The topsoil from Mongolia blows over Beijing every Summer).

It's a sink or swim kinda place. As a foreigner (called laowai in Mandarin) it doesn't feel like I'm likely to sink, just swim and whinge about it.

Gimme another few weeks and I'll love it, I'm sure.

I've found a great little cafe just near the base of my compound here. Oh here's my compound on a nice day a few months ago.




I live in one of the apartments right up the top on the left. It's pretty sweet but ....y'know.....hot.

The cafe is great, dark and dank which is a nice break from the heat and the sky here (it's white). This cafe has couches so comfy and staff so relaxed you feel like you're doing things a disservice if you spend less than an hour or 3 here. About an hour ago one of the staff, this totally cute Chinese Elvis Costello, brought over a vase with plants in it to my table. I said thanks and he placed it so the fronds of the plants were cascading over the screen of my laptop.

I just got my tuna sandwich. It's quadruple-decker with the crusts cut off.

I've just been settling into daily life here really. Haven't done any of the touristy stuff. This is my 4th time here.

I got a haircut yesterday at Hair Rodeo. It just sounded too much like the Cuttin' Caral so I had to give it a whirl. My hairdresser even had his scissors and combs in a gun holster. If he had spurs it would have been so awesome. For $7.50AUD I came away with a great new look.

It's started to rain here in the afternoons which is a nice break if I wasn't so concerned about acid rain. I was on my way to this cafe because I left one of my computer cables here the other day when it started to sprinkle, then pour. Ordinarily I really like walking in the rain and the rain doesn't fizz when it hits you like I always imagined acid rain would. I'm sure it does something though, maybe it reveales new, younger-looking skin. Assholes back home paying hundreds of Australian dollars for skin peels and I'm getting it all for nuthin.

China 1 : Cosmetics Industry 0

Here is some cheery Beijing.



I've seen some amazing Chinglish of course that is well worth photographing, but I'm still sans technology after having my bag stolen. I promise, it's worth it.

My prediction is that this blog will end up with a lot of Chinglish and pictures of horrible Chinese toilets on it. Wait. Chinglish, toilets, cute girls, ugly guys, boob jokes, ball jokes, Chinglish. That should about cover it.

Always funny.

Hello Thailand!

Hey all!
Arcing up the blog again to write up my overseas adventures. Hope you enjoy it! Comments, feedback, glowing praise always welcome.

Thailand

Thailand was the best of times and the blurst of times to be frank.

I'll start with the best!

My first mission after touching down was to find some Pad Thai. The JetStar inflight brochure had made Bangkok sound like it was a Pad Thai on Command kinda place so I could almost taste the noodley goodness as I left the baggage claim.
I went for a wander near my hostel, but this food mission proved more difficult than first anticipated. Fair enough it was absolutely chucking down with rain and it was 11pm, but still. I got excited when I found this place!



I got really excited cos there's a Thai joint near my house in Sydney called Bank Thai and I thought Awesome, hope it's as yummy as that place. Turns out though that this place is actually just a bank and that not everything in Thailand with "Thai" written on it is a Thai restaurant. Very disappointing, Thailand. I ended up getting fried rice.

I did find Pad Thai eventually.






I should mention here that Thailand is a Buddhist nation. There are lots and lots of yellow-robed monks that roam the streets. But you know, that said, they sure do have a lot of protests and coups for a peace-loving nation. I even saw a protest by Buddhists who were shitty that Buddhism was not made the national religion in the latest consitutional rehash. Would have been great if it came to blows. So I'm going to include here some pictures of temples and deities and crap so I don't go to hell.

Here is an ugly temple on a crappy Bangkok day.






...and here is a wet, slippery, naked deity to remind you to be a good person.


Thai people are also really into loving their King and Queen. You can see why...




So the next day, My Travelling Companion and I went out and explored some "asian markets". Note the authentic squid and authentic Asians.




You know, I always realy like it when people who live in crazy weather conditions do it with finesse. The Thai have hot weather down. There's fresh cool fruit everywhere and if you want to buy a can of Coke, you get a plastic bag filled with ice, you dump the Coke over the ice and stick a straw in it. Genius!



This umbrella hat is a little suspect though.



So on the way to the big market. It's called Chattuchuk I'm pretty sure, we passed The King again.I wish my country would put it's political leaders on 40-storey buildings. There's just something about that that says "We Mean Business".



We found the market and holy shit, it's amazing. It's hard to describe it with words and pictures, but imagine walking into a suburb-sized maze of eBay, where everything is Buy It Now and everything is under 5 bucks.



The market was hot a steamy and temperatures soared.



Sometimes a girl's just gotta cool down with some frozen Coke on a stick. The arrow points to hottness. It rotated as she walked across frame.


Here are some brass knuckles, ninja stars and a couple of tazers, brought to you by the Land of Smiles.



This girl was drinking a Strawberry/Blueberry frappe, but really, who gives a shit.



Outside the market I found the cops. I asked them if I could take a picture of them and they got embarassed and said "No way, our bikes are so shit!" They were right, the guy closest had the front faring of his electric scooterhalf made out of cardboard and gaffed on.



I started to feel pretty at ease with the whole Thailand deal. The people were nice, the food amazing and it seemed clean and prety safe. It definitely satisfied my common desire to be taller than everybody else. I found this car. If you pretend it's actually a Monster Truck and I'm holding a 2 litre water bottle, you can pretend I'm actually 12 feet tall!




This is My Travelling Companion. I felt safe when he was there. Sex perverts usually prefer to act alone.




It's always struck me as strange the whole Asian Whitening Creme phenomenon and Thailand was no different.



I feel like if I put this stuff on, I could turn invisible! I also found whitening deodorant, Bye Bye Melanin skin creme and Nipple Pink Creme.




Tuk tuks are the only way to travel I'm now convinced. The wind in your hair, the bugs in your eyeballs. Don't be fooled by these snazzy little numbers, you still smell like you've had a 2-stroke enema when you hop out.

People, Thailand rules but is very strange. It's exotic and familiar at the same time. The men are way hotter than in China, the streets are clean and the days are long. After so much visual stimulation, it was time for a beer and a good sit down.








I suppose I should touch on the bad of Thailand, but it's not as funny and not as photogenic.

I did go down to Nana, the sex district. It was as expected, but still creeped me out. Middle aged men who left their muscle tone in the 70's being escorted by super-fly Thai babes. It's just not fair. There's a reason people don't want to sleep with the old or ugly and it sucks that cash can get you out of that survival-driven reality. The Thai women looked like gorgeous butterflys and the fat pasty geezers on their arms looked like larvae. I walked up Nana street a few times but it was like someone stole the funny and I got out of there.

Also when I was at the Chattuchukkawhatever Markets I was a retard and put my bag down for 2 seconds to look at cool stuff. Of course, it got stolen, so I was without my passport, mobile phone, wallet, atm cards, digital camera, lipgloss from that moment onwards. I was due to fly out about 5 hours after it got stolen. Log story short I was delayed only 2 days in paradise because some lovely Thai girl found my passport and some cards on the bus and called the hotel where I was staying.
I still don't have my cards, camera, wallet or a mobile phone. But at least I didn't have to replace my passport and Chinese visa. And how lovely of her to try to track me down hey?!

So as soon as I had my passport back, I got the first plane out of paradise and straight to Beijing!