I'm back!!!

So, now that my "vacation" with Johanne is over (snif, snif), I should be back to a regular schedule of blogging. I'll hopefully be caught up by the end of the week, if my access to OK Internet connections continues.

I can sum up our vacation in 1 word: Fantastic! But of course, it wouldn't be a very interesting blog if I left it at that, so yes, I will go into a bit more detail...

Johanne's & my reunion was held at close to 2AM on January 7th. It was so great to see her, after more than 2 1/2 months away! She looked great, especially considering she'd had such long flights. And it made me laugh to see her arrive with 2 Canadian backpackers in tow, having corraled them into a little group earlier on during one of their layovers. Leave it to Johanne! Still the social butterfly my sister!

The next day started bright and early. We had 4 days planned inBangkok, and a whole list of places to go/things to do. And admittidely, I was eager to impress Johanne with my new found travelling skills and my stamina. However, my pride would take a little beating that day, as things didn't really go as planned...

First of all, I wasn't in the best shape that day, having managed to catch a cold somewhere between Malaysia and Thailand. I'd just been joking with a fellow traveller the week before that ever since I hit Asia, everytime I hear someone caugh or sneeze, I automatically think: Oh!oh! Bird flu alert! Kind of ironic that I'm the one now getting the cold, sneezing, coughing, blowing my nose, all the symptoms you'd expect from a good old fashion winter cold in Quebec! And of course, having just travelled half-way across the world, Johanne was in perfect health, with no signs of jet lag at all! So much for showing off to my sister :-)

The next blow to my pride came later that same day just after we'd left the Royal Palace. Before getting into that, I need to give you a bit of background: One of the things the Lonely Planet guide books are good for are describing the potential scams you may run into while travelling. One thing they tell you clearly, frequently and in BOLD flashing letters, is never to believe anyone who tells you that the attraction or place you want to go to is closed. This is almost always a scam to get you someplace else of their choosing, where you'll be encouraged to spend your money and for which the driver will get a commission. So back to my story: There we are on the corner of a main road, just outside the gate of the Royal Palace. Our next destination was Wat Po (aka Temple of the Reclining Buddha) and were just checking the map to see which way to go, when a nice gentleman offers up his help. He says he work for tourist information and he keeps saying: "just information, free free, no money". So I end up showing him our map and asking for directions to Wat Po, which he quickly gives us. He goes on to say that we should switch the order of our sightseeing, since Wat Po is closed this afternoon until 3:30 (it was around 12:30) because of a special ceremony for the King's sister, who'd just passed away the week before. I had heard about the Princess, so it all seemed logical to me (duh!). He also told us that we could take a tuk-tuk (motorcycle rickshaw) to go see the Giant Buddha and maybe stop off at a tourist information office to help plan the rest of our trip. He is so helpful that he even points out which tuk-tuks we can trust, telling us to take only the one's with drivers wearing an official looking shirt, with a collar and badge. How nice of him! And before we knew it, he had stopped a "good" tuk-tuk and even negociated a good price for us. It would cost us only 20 baht (about 65 cents) for our own chartered tuk-tuk that would bring us to 3 different places and wait for us while we visited. Sounds too good to be true? Of course it is, but still, it didn't ring any alarm bells for me yet.

After our perfectly nice stop at the Giant Buddha, we then stopped at the tourist information office, which ended up being just another travel agency. We were being pressure-sold a package for the rest of our trip, everything from flights, hotels and taxi transfers to/from the airport. We declined and I left feeling stressed about booking our time down south. By the sound of it, we would be lucky to find a flight at all. Now at this point, I still had no clue that I had fallen prey to a textbook example of a tuk-tuk scam, but the lightbulb finally came on when the driver suddenly stopped by the side of the road shortly after we'd left the tourist information/travel agent, and proposed to bring us to another one. We said "no", he said "OK. I bring you to a tailor where you can look to get clothes. You only need to look, no need to buy". Since I'd already been there, done that, just the day before (scammed by yet another tuk-tuk), I was not interested. After a bit of "chatting" with the driver, we ended up getting off then and there, without paying. Since we had no clue where we were, we started looking for a taxi and were lucky enough to get one before it started to rain. All's well that ends well.

Overall, our luck wasn't great that week, with little misshaps like trying to go to the museum on the one day a week it was closed, or showing up at the Teak Palace only to be turned away by the guards at the entrance because the Prince & Princess of Monaco were there visiting. But the misshaps didn't amount to much, considering I was having a great time traveling with my big sister.

One of the better moments of the week was an "Amazing" one. When we finally ended up at Wat Po, the Temple of the Reclining Buddha, Johanne and I were both quick to realise that we'd seen this before on the "Amazing Race", as part of a "Fast forward" in season 1. Of course, Johanne even remembered who won the challenge (team Guido). She's a freak ;-) We did our own reproduction of the challenge (dropping coins into a bowl. not Olympic-event material).

All in all, our time in Bangkok was well filled with sightseeing and catching up. I'd say 4 days in Bangkok is enough for anyone who isn't completely enthralled with big cities. It's big, takes forever to get anywhere, but you can do so cheaply. It's also hot, humid & very smogy. It has nice attractions and the best cinema I've been to yet (Siam Paragon, a must-see!).