Thai Thai for Now!: August 2012

The Nan crew has just returned from our first cross-border adventure. Last weekend we had two days off for Buddhist Lent, so we booked a cheap flight to Penang, Malaysia, a big island off the west coast of the country. The plan was to take a night bus to Bangkok after school on Wednesday, get to Penang and stay in Georgetown (the city) on Thursday and Friday, then take a bus to Kuala Lumpur, the capital, on Saturday for our flight back to Bangkok on Sunday. But naturally, plans change. On the previous Friday, Prakop, our boss, came into the office and said, “Hannah, I have good or bad news for you. You seem to have the wrong visa. Can you go to Vientienne tomorrow?” At first, I thought she was joking, but no, she was really suggesting that I go to Laos after judging the English competition on Saturday morning. Although Nan is next to Laos, it’s pretty tricky to actually get there and would probably have taken the better part of 2 days, not to mention that the Embassy is closed on weekends. But then I remembered that I already had a trip booked to leave Thailand! So new plan: I would leave Nan a day earlier than everyone else and hit up the Thai Embassy in Penang.

So the adventure began with a night bus, an 8 hour stay in Bangkok, and a flight to Penang. I made it to a guesthouse that was quite nice, though on my way, a bird shat on the top of my backpack—missing my head by centimeters. That’s supposed to be lucky, right? Hopefully, it was giving me the luck I needed to get my visa in time for my return flight to Bangkok…

Thursday morning, I woke up early, ate some noodles on the street, and took a bus up to the area of the Embassy. On the walk there, I met a Thai woman who conveniently knew where it was a pointed me in the right direction. I rounded the last corner of the walk, only to find a locked gate and a piece of paper posted over the sign: “Embassy closed Thursday, August 2 for Thai holiday. Open Friday, August 3.” This was not good news, as I new that my visa would require a full business day processing time. So I tried to talk to the guards, but they showed me no mercy, telling me to leave and come back tomorrow. Woof.

Conveniently, it was only 9:45 am, so I headed back to the center of Georgetown for some sightseeing. It’s quite a unique city. Malaysia was colonized by the Dutch, Portuguese, and finally by the British, and getting its independence in 1957. Georgetown was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the early 2000s, so it has been fairly well preserved. The architecture is a fascinating juxtaposition of large, stately, colonial buildings, smaller colonial storefronts and homes, Chinese temples, Buddist temples, Hindi temples, mosques, and even some ocean jetty neighborhoods. The colonial storefronts seem to be crumbling under the bustling life of the city, but they are so lively and bright at the same time. So, I met up with a few PiAers from Chiang Mai that were also in Penang and spent all of Thursday walking around Georgetown, poking my head into storefronts, tasting so many interesting foods, and taking way to many pictures.

Here's Jacqueline and Laurel, some Chiang Mai fellows, at the Blue Mansion--the former home of a Chinese entrepreneur:

Speaking of food, apparently, Penang is quite the food hub. Upon my arrival at the guesthouse, I was given a city map and a full color brochure of all the foods that Penang has to offer—so overwhelming for such a short trip. Clearly I had my dining work cut out for me. So the day began with Char Kway Teo (similar to Pad See-ew in Thailand), progressed to street tastes in Little India, mango sorbet, white coffee, and ending with dinner at a Nyonya restaurant (Malaysian-Chinese). It was a delicious trip.

By dinnertime, the three other Nan girls had arrived, and so the 4 of us, plus the 2 Chiang Mai girls, plus another teacher from Japan staying at our hostel enjoyed a lovely dinner. On the walk home, we stumbled upon a Hindi temple where there was a hoppin’ dancing scene—all the women were dressed in the most colorful saris, dancing in circles within circles and having so much fun. We stopped and gawked for maybe 30 seconds before being invited to join by one of the men near the door. Apparently, since it was nearing the end of the celebration, we could join in too! We stumbled into the circle and attempted to follow along. It was impossible not to grin the entire time—it was so fun! I was a little worried we had crashed a wedding though, but thankfully, it was a more casual brother-sister celebration of sorts. What an end to the day!

Also, check out Dana's blog for a video of the dancing! http://wanderlustawaits.wordpress.com/2012/08/09/raksha-bandhan/

Friday, took me to the Embassy once again. This time, I arrived early, armed with an excess of Malaysian ringgit, Thai baht, and American dollars, determined to get my visa in the one day that I had left in Penang, no matter what. My hope was soon crushed, however, when I realized that my situation was not unique. Judging by people’s conversations with the man at the window, many people had tried to go on Thursday when it was closed and had planes to catch as well. Oh boy. I continued to try to negotiate with the window man, but I felt pretty defeated. I tried money, compromises, logical arguments, but nothing seemed to make him budge. Then I saw the security guard from the day before. He started talking to me and tapping the empty chair next to him absentmindedly. So I took the hint (was it a hint?) and sat down next to him. I told him my situation, and he seemed to think I should just wait around and keep talking to the window guy when less people were there. So in the meantime, I talked to him about random things—his background, his job, his two daughters.

Around 11am I game the window man one more try. He was getting nicer, but no less stingy with his rule-following. I was stuck. Too overwhelmed to make any logical decision about what to do, I brought out my notebook and made a list. It soon became clear that it made the most sense to just change my plane ticket and stay in Penang through Monday so that I could pick up my finished visa. Next, I set off to find a phone. My security guard friend suggested that I use on of the taxi driver’s phones, so I went out to the street to find some more friends to help me. This is about the point in the day where I realized that people really are good and willing to help you out. One guy looked up the Air Asia phone number, while a different man let me use his phone. For better or for worse, the numbers were not going through. We tried at least 6 times to get through, but no luck. Time was a-tickin’, especially since the embassy closed at 12 while they processed all the paper work.

11:40 rolled around and I decided to just give in and give the window man my paper work, and figure out my plane ticket later. I went up to the window, where there was no longer a line to wait in, and handed him my forms. I said, “Here are my papers. I know you can’t do anything, so I will just--” and he said, “What do you mean I can’t do anything!” This was sure a surprise, and the rest is still a bit of a blur. Somehow, he took pity on me and decided that he would process my visa that day! What a relief. So long story short, the visa was acquired successfully. Whoa. Sorry for the extreme long-windedness.

Anyways, the rest of Penang was wonderful! We left on Saturday afternoon for a 5-hour bus ride to Kuala Lumpur, but that soon became a ten-hour journey. We rode the bus for about a half hour before we stopped for some technical difficulties. It was a charter bus, but the AC was non-functional. No good in the Malaysian heat. So everyone got off the bus, and an hour and a half later we hopped on a new bus. We stopped at a rest stop around 6:30, then for some reason we stopped again at 7:30. We looked around a bit bewildered, and the man next to us explained that it was time for the Muslim bus driver to break his fast. Sure enough, the rest station was packed with people, sitting at tables, full plates in front of them, but no one was eating. Then we realized they were waiting for sundown. Within 5 minutes, everyone had tucked in. In ten minutes, we were back on the bus on our way to KL.

We arrived around 9:30pm in KL and soon found our way to our hostel, the Reggae Mansion (not even joking, that was its name). It was indeed quite nice, perhaps even mansion status. We hit the town and went to Little India to check out the night bazaar, bought some dates, then meandered around KL for a bit. In the morning, we had a few hours to walk through the city before catching the bus to the airport. I took advantage of the free breakfast and made 2 PB and Js for the trip back home (about 18 hours in all), and Allison, Dana, and I walked around Merdeka Square and the Chinatown market. More interesting Mogul architecture and lots of super tall buildings. Malaysia is a sure-fire melting pot.

Alison and Dana in Merdeka Square