Merry Christmas SM's and all you other readers! I'm in Bangkok right now enjoying a Christmas break away from Chiang Mai. I came down with Sam (Samantha), my New Zealand friend.
Our train was scheduled to leave at 4pm. We were ready to go by 3:30. Unfortunatly, no one was there to take us to the train station! PiDuang, who was supposed to take us, finally called at 3:45 and said to find a neighbor to take us. So Sam went down the street to find a neighbor. She found one, but if you show that your in a hurry, or flustered, they won't help you, so she couldn't hurry the lady. So by the time our message got communicated it was 3:55.
Right then, PiDuang came screaching up in her truck and told us to hop in. So we told the neighbor "never mind" and "thank you" and threw our stuff in the truck, jumped in, and hung on for one wild ride! We drove faster than I thought was possible on those crazy back roads. We arrived at the station in time... in time to see our train pulling out. Thai culture may be laid back, but trains and buses leave right on the dot. So Sam ran to a guard and explained our plight. The guard led her to the ticket guy who was nice enought to change our tickets to the 4:45 train with no extra cost except the difference of the tickets in moving up a class, from 2nd class no AC, to 2nd class with AC. We were really thankful for that!
We had a blast on the train! We made crazy voice recordings on my little digital voice recorder, we made up songs, and we listened to my ipod. We also did practical things like writing late Christmas/New Year cards.
After eating our supper that we had brought with us, we chit chatted until about 10:30, then turned into our sleeper berths. We both had top bunks across from each other. They were barely long enough for us to stretch out in, so any of you who are longer than 5'8" would have problems! The berths were comfy, and the rocking of the train was really soothing. It reminded me of taking trips in my grandparents camper as a kid. The down side was that we froze. We only had a thin blanket, and even sleeping in long pants and a sweat shirt, I still got cold!!! I just about went and crawled in with Sam! But we survived the night, and arrived at our station at 5:30 am
Our station was right next to the airport, so since it was still a bit early to show up at Sam's dad's house, we went to the observation deck and Sam slept while I journaled. Finally at about 7:30, we caught a taxi to the house.
Were well recieved by the maid and Annie, Sam's three year old half sister. We spent the rest of the day catching up on sleep and taking it easy.
It was a great trip down from Chiang Mai. I just hope the return trip by myself goes as good! - Mishala
