#3 With a Slightly Different Tone

Climbing out of the bus on Sunday morning, the British doctor gave me some muscle relaxers that put me out for the entire bus ride. I'm so glad to be back in Bangkok I could kiss the two toothed half Malaysian woman selling lottery tickets on the corner. She reminds me of the one footed pigeons in San Francisco. I take the British doctor to his hotel, oddly enough the bus leaves us all in a part of town I know. He's staying in the nicest hotel in this district, a swimming pool on the roof, masseuses who come to your room.

“Who knows if they're only masseuses?” He says to me.

After I drop him off I sit down on the steps of the sky train wondering where to go. Last night sleep fell upon me like an anvil in a vacuum, but just as my eyelids shut I had an oh shit moment. Lauren, the Saffer who's still stuck in Lao, she's the only one with the phone number of the guy who got us into the apartment building. It's not some obvious high rise on a major street. We're talking a budget apartment on the outskirts of some obscure neighborhood. Too tired to try and solve my problem at the time, I let it wait until now. The only problem with time is that it keeps going no matter what, the best moments shrink into the past too quickly and the biggest problems grow even bigger as they approach.

I call Jen, a nice girl from Minnesota I met last week. She's a counselor at an international school with whom I left quite an impression. Perhaps I can take a shower and use her internet to try and sort all this out. Our phones don't work in Lao without a Lao simcard, something none of us invested in. I do email Lauren but given her track record of responsibility I wouldn't be surprised to not hear from her until she returns to work.

Jen's happy to help me out, thank god, but it's a waste in the end. I look up three apartments called Palm Suites, the name of my apartment building, and after spending too much money on cabs I have found three apartments all called Palm Suites and all not the one I'm looking for. I know that it's across from the eleventh army regiment barracks, but none of the Thai's who speak English seem to know where that is, or even that there was an eleventh army regiment. It must have a different name in Thai.

Jen puts me up on her couch, she lives in an apartment that in San Francisco would probably cost about $4,000 a month to rent. At work the next day and everyone at work is laughing at me, the jokes never end. Whenever anyone is looking for something they ask me where it is, I've become the guy who can't find anything, but worst of all his apartment. I borrowed a work shirt from Ben and a few people have kindly offered me a place to stay until Lauren gets back. No one at work knew she wasn't coming in so I've now become the only person who can explain her predicament, it's an uncomfortable place to be as I'm not sure exactly what details of her failure to appear I should divulge. I know she'll be back tomorrow.

Tomorrow rolls around and I've washed my clothes in a sink, they smell like hand soap. Lauren still hasn't arrived at work, no one at work has heard from her. Work is easy and the jokes have spread, now everyone in the company knows that I've lost my apartment. It could be worse though. I've made good friends with a 6'3” British ginger named Simon, what is it with me and the gingers? While I was in Lao his Thai lady friend used his spare key to go into his apartment and while he was in the shower she tossed his $500 TV onto the floor and poured fruit juice all over his bed. There's a picture of her in the lobby of his apartment building now in case she returns. I feel terrible for him but at least I've lost some of the attention. He's taking it well but he's only had the TV a week, how well can someone take that?

Some other good stories that took my mind off losing my apartment.

Scott, one of our trainers, had a class of young kids. It was the beginning of class and he went and got them from their home room teacher. One of the kids was trailing the group a little bit and walking like there was a saddle between his legs, that sort of walk that denotes a concerted effort to hold in a perfectly normal bodily function. He asked Ploy (every Thai child is called Ploy when telling a story) if he needed to go to the bathroom, Ploy said no. They got to the top of the steps and right as they got in the doorway of the classroom Ploy, as Scott said, blasted himself. Shit running down the sides of his legs and the back of his shorts stained brown. Scott was at a bit of a loss but obviously calling the custodian wasn't sufficient. He took Ploy to the toilet while the Thai teacher occupied the rest of the class. In Thailand there is a hose attached to every toilet, it is meant to help you clean yourself after a bowel movement. The westerners politely refer to it as the bum gun. So Scott strips Ploy out of his clothes, throws away his shorts and his underpants and begins hosing him down with the bum gun. Scott has obsessive compulsive disorder so I have no doubt he did a sufficient job of cleaning Ploy, and though Ploy is now clean he is still without pants so Scott sends him off to the office. Ten minutes later Ploy comes striding confidently into class wearing a full Liverpool Football Club uniform, socks and all. How Ploy came up with the uniform is unknown, someone at the office must have given it to him, but the beauty of it is that the kid who shit his pants and was about to be made fun of the rest of the day had instantly become the coolest kid in the whole school. I love this story.

Another great one was when Phil was teaching a class he was going over different adjectives. Big, small, fat and thin, etc. The children gave a funny look when it came to fat, the flashcard is of a rather obese feline, the Thai teacher grabbed one of the students who was quite fat and pulled him up to the front of the class and pointed at him. All of the kids made that ah-ha! Sound and Phil didn't know if he should be horrified or laugh. The fat kid just stood up there and smiled and nodded, perfectly happy to be the center of attention. How's that for a bit of culture shock.

When I get home I have an email from Lauren. I'm so excited when I open it, and then the bottom drops out. If it were my laptop I would probably throw it out the window. Here's a copy of the email exchange, and keep in mind this transpired over the course of three days.

Adam:

Hey Lauren, it's Adam. I am in Bangkok and I can't find the apartment, boy do I feel stupid. Anyhow, if you could send me Mark's phone number perhaps I could get this sorted out. I hope you get this tonight!

Lauren:

hey hey!! did u manage to find it haha! sorry been missioning around here have not checked mail!!
how is trining trying to get back by tomorrow but havinbg such issues with my card!! please chat to knum for me today and just tell himn my situation I have been emailing him but he has not replied!

Adam:

Hey Lauren, nice to hear from you, but you still didn't sent me Mark's number, or the address for the place, do you not have either. Can you send me Carrie's number or Jauck if they're in town. I would really like to get to my apartment.

The next email she sent had the number in it, which meant that I arrived there only hours before she did and three days later than I should have been in my own bed. Of course, how much could the bed actually be considered my own, I'd not spent a single night in it. I rented the apartment, put my bags in it and then got on a bus and went to Lao, all in the space of an hour. I didn't even think that the Saffers and I would be separated, live and learn eh?

The silly thing is that after spending a couple of nights at the apartment I decided it was a bit too far off from the city and the sky train so I moved out and found a new place with a few boys I'd met earlier. A nice town house in the middle of the city, lots of space but still in the budget.

Of all the things to lose, my apartment? Really?

Goodbye, au revoir, think of me when you get home at night, and remark thoughtfully to yourself at how easily you found it.

While eating dinner in a hut on the edge of the river in Vang Vieng we thought we heard a water fall suddenly begin, turns out it was a heard of Buffalo crossing the river. Much bigger and scarier in person.

The view of Bangkok from my first hotel window.

A little bugger I pulled off our bed sheets in Vang Vieng. Don't worry Lia, I deposited him outside...alive.