Leaving the BKK
My time in Asia is coming to a close so it is time to give a recap of the last few weeks up to today...
It has been absolute madness finishing up the last few weeks in BKK. Had to interview, hire, then train our new staff as best I could in a very short amount of time, deal with all kinds of crazy legal issues because we got screwed by our formal "lawyer" who turned out not to be a lawyer at all, accounting B.S. with back-taxes like wild because of false legal/ accounting advice, find and move into a new office, and basically hand over all of the work, structure and systems I have created over the last 2 years... oh, and pack up our entire house.
So on the night before J-Dub and I departed for Cambodia, I was at the new office with my successor/staff going over last-minute details until midnight, raced home to start packing, packed until 4am, up again at 8am and left in a van around 11am. It's a really weird feeling to know that Bangkok is not my home anymore, that all of my life now exists in two duffle bags and a small box. That's it. As we left Bangkok for the first time in about three weeks I had the time to just sit and think, and it was a really strange sensation to recognize I'm gone from here - don't know when I'll be back... and that I have no idea where I'll be next.
Our drive to the border went fine. Then we had the process of packing ALL of the boxes (an absolutely huge quantity of stuff) onto a wooden cart and having two Cambodian boys push the cart through the border for us, stopping to wait while we checked out of Thailand and again while we got our visas to go into Cambodia. They were really nice kids, though we were quite wary at first. Part way through - between Thailand and Cambodia - some Cambodian Immigration officers stopped us and wanted us to pay them for the goods going through to Cambodia. J-Dub and I pointed out that they were IMMIGRATION (which deals with people), not CUSTOMS (which deals with goods). The guy finally said "up to you" and we said "in that case, bye, have a nice day" because we knew they had no authority to stop us. When we did reach the Customs, then we hit bigger trouble. They demanded a receipt for the towels (about 100 branded towels for our B&B) and that we pay them the fine. We said, ok, if you give us a receipt then we will pay the fine, so our business can see the receipt from the Customs Agents... of course they weren't going to give us any receipt because their demands were - well - not entirely "legal." Finally we negotiated from $100 US Dollars down to a $12.50 bribe. Still annoying, but what could we do?
See, I think that the city of Poipet (the Cambodian city just past the Thai/Cambodian border) gives Cambodia such a bad name, particularly among the Thais. The police are so corrupt and the poorest of the poor come to this area to beg from the toursits passing through and the Thais who go there to gamble and generally look down upon Cambodians (which in turn give Cambodians a bad view of what the average Thai is like). Everywhere else, the people are so nice, so gentle and so sweet. Poor and poorly educated, but generally really good people. Poipet is to Cambodia what a sphyncter is to a Supermodel - a shitty part of an otherwise beautiful thing.
Anyway, once across the border we got in two taxis with our staff, Narla, and began the incredibly bumpy ride to Siem Reap. It had rained really hard earlier in the day - so hard that the taxis had to drive up onto the bus station passenger waiting area so the passengers didn't have to wade through knee-deep chocolate-brown water to get into their Camry. Needless to say, the road was absolute shit for a while. What took about 3 hours just a month ago, now took about 5 hours, and was a miserable ride. In the end, we made it safely though.
Just two quick days here in Siem Reap that have flown by too quickly. I leave with The Jaw tomorrow afternoon for Luang Prabang to begin the guide training and meeting with our partner companies. From there, on to Vientiane, Hanoi, Hue, Hoian, Saigon, back to Bangkok, Chiang Mai, then down to Phuket for J-Dub's Marathon, then to Krabi for a few days, back in Bangkok for three days, then... back to the US. After that, I don't have a plan in the world... except maybe a long nap.
~Bear
It has been absolute madness finishing up the last few weeks in BKK. Had to interview, hire, then train our new staff as best I could in a very short amount of time, deal with all kinds of crazy legal issues because we got screwed by our formal "lawyer" who turned out not to be a lawyer at all, accounting B.S. with back-taxes like wild because of false legal/ accounting advice, find and move into a new office, and basically hand over all of the work, structure and systems I have created over the last 2 years... oh, and pack up our entire house.
So on the night before J-Dub and I departed for Cambodia, I was at the new office with my successor/staff going over last-minute details until midnight, raced home to start packing, packed until 4am, up again at 8am and left in a van around 11am. It's a really weird feeling to know that Bangkok is not my home anymore, that all of my life now exists in two duffle bags and a small box. That's it. As we left Bangkok for the first time in about three weeks I had the time to just sit and think, and it was a really strange sensation to recognize I'm gone from here - don't know when I'll be back... and that I have no idea where I'll be next.
Our drive to the border went fine. Then we had the process of packing ALL of the boxes (an absolutely huge quantity of stuff) onto a wooden cart and having two Cambodian boys push the cart through the border for us, stopping to wait while we checked out of Thailand and again while we got our visas to go into Cambodia. They were really nice kids, though we were quite wary at first. Part way through - between Thailand and Cambodia - some Cambodian Immigration officers stopped us and wanted us to pay them for the goods going through to Cambodia. J-Dub and I pointed out that they were IMMIGRATION (which deals with people), not CUSTOMS (which deals with goods). The guy finally said "up to you" and we said "in that case, bye, have a nice day" because we knew they had no authority to stop us. When we did reach the Customs, then we hit bigger trouble. They demanded a receipt for the towels (about 100 branded towels for our B&B) and that we pay them the fine. We said, ok, if you give us a receipt then we will pay the fine, so our business can see the receipt from the Customs Agents... of course they weren't going to give us any receipt because their demands were - well - not entirely "legal." Finally we negotiated from $100 US Dollars down to a $12.50 bribe. Still annoying, but what could we do?
See, I think that the city of Poipet (the Cambodian city just past the Thai/Cambodian border) gives Cambodia such a bad name, particularly among the Thais. The police are so corrupt and the poorest of the poor come to this area to beg from the toursits passing through and the Thais who go there to gamble and generally look down upon Cambodians (which in turn give Cambodians a bad view of what the average Thai is like). Everywhere else, the people are so nice, so gentle and so sweet. Poor and poorly educated, but generally really good people. Poipet is to Cambodia what a sphyncter is to a Supermodel - a shitty part of an otherwise beautiful thing.
Anyway, once across the border we got in two taxis with our staff, Narla, and began the incredibly bumpy ride to Siem Reap. It had rained really hard earlier in the day - so hard that the taxis had to drive up onto the bus station passenger waiting area so the passengers didn't have to wade through knee-deep chocolate-brown water to get into their Camry. Needless to say, the road was absolute shit for a while. What took about 3 hours just a month ago, now took about 5 hours, and was a miserable ride. In the end, we made it safely though.
Just two quick days here in Siem Reap that have flown by too quickly. I leave with The Jaw tomorrow afternoon for Luang Prabang to begin the guide training and meeting with our partner companies. From there, on to Vientiane, Hanoi, Hue, Hoian, Saigon, back to Bangkok, Chiang Mai, then down to Phuket for J-Dub's Marathon, then to Krabi for a few days, back in Bangkok for three days, then... back to the US. After that, I don't have a plan in the world... except maybe a long nap.
~Bear
posted by Cali Thais at
2:28 AM
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