With that said, allow me to share with you a bit of a running diary of my first night in LOS. Sorry if it's a bit long, I'd expect the ongoing updates to be a little shorter but figured that you may get a wry smile of my first impressions and experiences. Plus it saves me keeping a diary!
God I hate air travel...
After a short flight to Melbourne and a little milling about at the international check in, I boarded the flight to Bangkok. First thing I did that morning was to log into the airlines web site to see how the seat allocation was looking, I was relieved to see that it appeared I had a whole middle row of seats to myself. I'm a big guy and the novelty of air travel was lost long ago and even the thought of what awaited me at my destination wasn't enough to enthuse me for the next nine and a half hours of squirming and the constant battle of trying, unsuccessfully, to get comfortable for anything longer than 10 minutes at a time.
Jetstar may need to change their name to upsell. It's remarkable to see the added enthusiasm of the cabin crew when there's money to be made from all the in flight extras as opposed to them being standard inclusions. I wonder if they are working individually on commission? Then again, it was a budget flight and that's how they do it I suppose. Armed with a foot long Subway BLT, two bottles of water, my trusty Creative Zen media player, a packet of starburst fruit chews and a Dean Koontz novel, I settled in.
Ten hours later....
Got to hand it to Thai Immigration, it was perhaps the easiest and quickest I have seen in any country that I have visited. After grabbing my suitcase I headed out to the appropriately named "Meeting Point" absolutely certain that my driver to the hotel would not be waiting for me. But no, there was my name up in lights, well moreso so scrawled in texta on a piece of cardboard, but none the less, I was pleasantly surprised that I was going to get to the hotel without incident.
Some 20 minutes or so later I arrived at the Aspen Suites and checked in. The suite is very impressive, fully self contained and very well kitted out. This is home base for the next week or so.
Sleep time or short time??
After a quick orientation of the room the question presented itself..."OK, do I go to bed or do I go out for a look around?" as I had started to pull up a little tired and worse for wear from the flight. A quick check of my emails made that decision for me as I had heard from fellow BM eslmiker who had arrived the day before and was going to be at Guess Bar around 10-10.30. It had just gone 10pm so after sternly reminding myself what the purpose of the trip was, I hopped in the shower, got changed, quickly double checked Google Earth to see where Guess Bar was (big mistake) and headed off to see whether I was in fact a man or a mouse as I still wasn't 100% sure I would be able to commit to walking into one of these places when it came to the crunch.
Lost in LOS....a rookie mistake, you hate to see it...
I strode out of the hotel and up the street where, coming the other way, was a guy holding hands with a very attractive local lass. I couldn't help but give him a knowing smile as we passed each other. "You sleazy bastard" I grinned at him. "Damn straight" his slight head nod in reply seemed to indicate.
After getting down to the end of Sukhumvit 2 I started to wonder if I shouldn't have looked a little more into just exactly where I was supposed to be going. The night was a sea of neon and I laughed to myself as I thought the area looked a little bit like out of a scene from "Blade Runner". I wasn't too concerned that I hadn't stumbled across Guess Bar yet, figuring it was probably just a little further away than I thought. The lure of a more concentrated crowd of people and a buzz of activity eventually got me to the Nana Complex so I knew I musn't be too far away.
I wandered up and down Sukhumvit 4, fending off crotch grabbers and offering polite "Hi, how's it going" or "No thanks, I'm looking for my friend" to the multitudes who grab and proposition you as you wander about. The other thing that struck me is, for the most part outside of the "Hello's" and "How are you's" I struggle to understand what people are saying to me. After 45 minutes or so the heat and tiredness is starting to get to me and I appear to be no closer to finding my destination. To compound the error, I wander over the road and head up Sukhumvit 3, getting sweatier and angrier with myself for not checking more thoroughly where I should be going.
Freelancer's....I guess
While walking down S3, and then back up again, now freely admitting that I am hopelessly lost, I pass a group of girls, one of whom is an absolute knockout. Tall, statuesque, incredibly good looking. I start smiling about ten metres before I get to her, she's looking at me and smiling back. As I get close she says "Hi", I stop and have a brief chat with her. Her name was (I think) Jenna. I couldn't figure out whether she was a LB or GG and can't think of a way to put the question to her without feeling like an idiot. I tell her "I just need to go find a buddy, if I can't find him I'll be back here in 10 minutes". She says "OK baby" and leans forward and kisses me, I almost caved and took her there and then, but I had not forgotten the master plan and was determined to find Guess Bar before I went crazy.
As I headed off I immediately thought of all the warnings people have mentioned about dealing with freelancer's, especially newbies. While contemplating the pro's and cons of this I was mobbed by four ladies who proceeded to grope and lick me while firing questions at me left right and centre..."where you from", "where you stay", "I come back loom with you" where the ones I could decipher. I played my by now standard "Hello, no thanks, I'm going to meet a friend" card however this had little effect and for some 20 metres or so it would appear that a rugby scrum had formed as I dragged them down the street, gradually detaching them one by one. While this was amusing in some respects, the fact that all of them were much older, not attractive at all, and looked like they lived on the street made me have a minor panic as my hands flew to my pockets, thinking for sure that I had just been set up and was ripe to be pickpocketed. Thankfully everything was in order. I again reminded myself to be wary figuring that those were the type of freelancer's people would have trouble with while also idly wondering how they made a living being as unattractive and (mostly) toothless as they were.
Your Guess is as good as mine...
By this time I was back at the intersection and headed back over to Sukhumvit 4 figuring I would head back into the NEC, and have a bit more of a detailed look. I headed in, took the escalator on the right, headed up, and did a wander around the first level. I asked the first lady that grabbed me and tried to drag me into a bar "I'm trying to find Guess Bar, can you tell me where it is?". I could barely make out her reply apart from the word "Ladyboy". "Ladyboy?" I repeated, pretending that I was surprised to hear such a thing. She then took my hand and put it on her crotch and held it there. "You like Ladyboy?" she asked, "Ummm...yeah, maybe" I stammered in reply "but I have to meet my friend at Guess Bar before I can find out for sure, can you tell me where it is?" She pointed out towards the entrance of the NEC and then pointed to the left. "Thanks", I said and headed on around to the stairs on the other side, back down and out on to the street again. I wasn't confident of finding the place, having already wandered up and down both sides of the street earlier without success, but headed out again for one last try.
At last!!!!
Coming back up the street after again failing to find it and, after three or four failed attempts to extract directions from tuk-tuk drivers, I finally decided to throw in the towel, chalk it up to experience (or lack thereof) and head back to the hotel. Opposite the NEC there's a road that looked like it goes through to Sukhumvit 2 and i get get back to the hotel more quickly going that way. I head down there and casually look over to my left to see what's in the plaza, which is seemingly deserted.....and there it is, tucked away in the corner. "At last" I think......."but surely Mike's going to be gone by now as I've been wandering around the streets for over an hour".
I abruptly turn to the left and stride towards it, thoughts of fatigue fading with my every step, but wondering whether I should do a bit of reconnaissance first. It becomes apparent that this won't be possible as I realise as I get nearer there's really nowhere else to go without turning around and walking away. I also spy a group of about seven or eight girls out the front who all seem to be looking at me.
With essentially nowhere else to turn I march right up towards them all, smiling like a madman. In my best yawp i announce "Hello everyone, I made it" which draws slightly confused looks and smiles in return. A very attractive LB opens the door and I go in. The first thing I notice....this is my sort of place, I am not a big fan of disco's or large crowded places. This seems far more laid back and relaxed than I had expected it to be, which is a pleasant surprise. The second thing, my entrance doubles the amount of men in the place, but only if you include the fellow behind the bar...
(to be continued...eslmiker just phoned from the lobby, we're adjourning for lunch before he heads off for a few days)
Attached Files
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The sooner the teleporter is invented, the better.jpg 104.96KB
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Check In.jpg 136.09KB
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