Tuesday, January 25, 2022
7:00 a.m. Room 1102, Phannu House
Mae Sot, Thailand
I’m happy to report that everything seems to be working out. I went to the immigration office first thing on Monday morning with all my paperwork carefully prepared and filled out in advance. And my application was accepted, and I was out the door in less than fifteen minutes. As a friend of mine told me, had I gone to the immigration office in Bangkok, I would have been there for the entire day, and I probably would have been rejected at the end. I now have to return to the immigration office in two weeks (on February 8th) to get the official stamp in my passport. But that is more or less a formality.
There is no word yet on whether there will be another 60-day extension of stay available after this one. Even the officials at the immigration office weren’t able to tell me. They said they might know by February 8th, and they will be able to inform me when I return. My hope, of course, is that I won’t need one. I’m still hoping to be able to enter Malaysia soon, where my poor bicycle and other meager possessions are still trapped. There is some good news on that front. All my stuff is stored rather haphazardly at a low-budget hostel in Kuala Lumpur. And the owner of that hostel had returned to Russia, and there was some concern that she would sell the hostel and all my stuff would get lost in the shuffle. But she made plans to return, and after jumping through all the hoops, she was able to get back into Malaysia a few days ago. She’s currently doing home quarantine at the hostel, where she also lives, and she assures me that my bicycle and my bags are safe and sound. Of course, she can’t speak to their condition. My poor bicycle is probably a rusted mess. I should have taken more forceful steps to have it taken care of, but it was a tricky situation.
While I was on the four-day return ride to Mae Sot, I had lots of time to ponder what I might do next. That is a favorite pastime as you are riding along for hours on your scooter or bicycle. And one of the options that got my stomach tingling with excitement and pleasure was the idea of getting back into Malaysia very soon, fixing up my bicycle and getting it roadworthy, and then flying back to Canada just in time for summer. I could land in Vancouver and then ride my bike back to Sarnia. To be honest, I don’t have any particular reason to go to Sarnia other than to touch base with a few people and then get a pair of pants out of a box. But I do occasionally think it would be nice to be on Canadian soil. As I wrote about before, it gets mentally and emotionally tiring to be constantly on the hunt for the next 30-day or 60-day visa that allows me to be where I am. It would be nice to be in Canada where no visa is required for me to exist. I don’t need permission from anyone to be there. That would be nice for a change. And the idea of cycling around Canada excites me just to have all that open space. And to be around 100% English-speaking people all the time would be cool.
That idea of being around English-speakers actually relates to the trip I just finished. Tourism is not really happening in Thailand yet. But the town of Pai is such a popular place for foreigners to visit that pretty much every tourist in the country appeared to be there. And I had the chance for a few casual encounters with fellow foreigners, and I enjoyed that. I say often that I’m a fairly established loner. I’m comfortable with no one’s company but my own for long periods of time, but apparently, deep down, I have been yearning for some conversation. It’s not like I was out there partying it up with a dozen new friends and laughing it up twenty-four hours a day on this trip, but I met quite a few people and even spent some time with a few, and that was really nice. It’s been a long time.
And related to that, the idea of being in Canada, where I can talk to anyone at any time, is appealing at the moment. Just now, I had an interesting encounter with my neighbor here at the Phannu House. My room sits between two other rooms, and the parking area is right outside my door and window. So, I’ve been hearing a lot of movement and coming and going and doors opening and closing. One neighbor in particular seemed to need to come and go a lot. He has a car, and even though I’ve been in this room for just one night, I think I heard him leave his room and get in his car and then return about ten times. I heard him just a few minutes ago, and I came up with an excuse to step outside my room so that I could “accidentally” run into him and have a chance to say hello. To my delight, he turned out to be from Myanmar. That’s good for me, because I find people from Myanmar to be friendly and open.
He goes by the name Mr. Moe with his Western friends, who, like me, would have trouble pronouncing his full name. And Mr. Moe was an affable guy. I was pleased to learn that. And he works for a local NGO that assists migrant workers from Myanmar. I was a bit sad to learn that this was his last day at the Phannu. He had rented a house with some friends, and he is moving out tomorrow. I was looking forward to having him as a neighbor. However, I got his contact information and the name of his organization. I could track him down if I wanted to. And, to be honest, it’s not all bad news that he is moving out. He clearly gets up very early every morning, and he is not exactly shy about opening and closing his door. And since he comes and goes so many times a day, he makes a lot of noise with the room door slamming and the car door slamming and the car starting up. Plus, he is a smoker, and he sits outside his room at a table several times a day smoking. That smoke seeps into my room, and my eyes start to burn instantly.
I haven’t seen my neighbor on the other side. I’m not entirely sure, to be honest, that someone is in that room. But this morning, there was a lot of noise coming from that direction. Someone somewhere was taking a shower, and the water pipes made a pretty loud screaming noise. And this went on for a long time. I’m not super sensitive to noise like that during the day. I just take it as part of the environment. But it was pretty loud and annoying, and I started to wonder if Mr. Moe’s room would be better. When he moves out, maybe I can change rooms. He shares a wall with just my room. There is no room on the other side.
The other big change that might happen soon is turning back into Walking Doug. I’ve been renting this scooter. I didn’t buy it. And it looks like I will be based in Mae Sot again for at least the next month. I’m not planning any regional trips, so I don’t really need the scooter. But at least I gave that scooter a very satisfying last trip. The entire forty-seven-day trip through the north was wonderful, and the final four days were extremely satisfying. The rental period expires today, and rather than renewing it for another month, I think I’m going to return it. It will probably be a bit of a shock to find myself without transportation, but I could use the exercise. I used to walk quite long distances routinely, and it shouldn’t be that hard to pick up the habit again. And even if I want to go to Tak City or down south to Umphang, perhaps I can try to take local transportation. That would be a new adventure. And it would put me more directly in touch with Thailand and its people. Having a scooter is great, but it does isolate you. It might be interesting to be crammed into the back of some crazy pickup truck with fifteen other people, just like in the old days.
It will all almost certainly come to nothing, but as I was scootering along and considering future options, I was also dreaming about going to Pakistan. I was thinking that if Malaysia doesn’t open to tourists, rather than extending my stay in Thailand, I could go to a new country. That would be very exciting. And I’ve always wanted to go to Pakistan. I could go to Pakistan for a couple of months and then perhaps go to Malaysia. I don’t actually have the money for a trip like that, but it might be worth the risk. The experience of going to Pakistan could be something very special.
And then, how these things always seem to happen, I went to a local Burmese tea shop for breakfast after my trip to immimgration, and when I entered the tea shop, a man said hello and asked me to join him at his table. I did so, and it turned out that he was from Pakistan. Our conversation wasn’t exactly coherent, but we talked about a bunch of things, and I managed to insert a few questions related to someone like me going to Pakistan. He completely dismissed the idea that covid would be a factor at all. He said that covid had ended in Pakistan and that the whole country was open and back to normal. But he also said that flights to Pakistan were currently very expensive. And that might be a barrier. Plus, even if I did manage to get into Pakistan, it would be only for a limited time, and then when my visa expired, I’d have to go somewhere else, and entering any nearby countries could be a challenge.
Oddly enough, when I was in Pai and interacting with all these foreigners, I heard a lot of stories of fairly normal travel. It was a strange feeling. I was having a beer at a streetside bar one night, and a couple from the Netherlands joined me. And we had a completely ordinary conversation about their trip. They told me that they had been in India, and then they traveled to Nepal, and then they flew to Thailand, and after Thailand they were going somewhere else. Covid and restrictions never came up in their stories. I guess the people that are going around the world are simply picking and choosing whatever countries happen to be open right now, and the key appears to be that they have quite a bit of money. So they can just change their plans at any time, pay for any flights, and go wherever they like depending on the ever-changing conditions. They’re not worried about suddenly facing a two-week hotel quarantine that costs $3,000, because they would just pay for it and keep going.
I’ve heard many stories in my life about extreme hospitality in Pakistan, and if the man I met at the tea shop was a typical Pakistani, the stories are true. When I sat down at his table, he immediately got another plate, and he started spooning food from all his dishes and putting them on this plate and then when it was full, he handed it to me. I ordered a bunch of items myself, and when this man got up to leave, he paid for his breakfast and for what I had ordered. He basically gave me half of his breakfast and then paid for the breakfast I ordered for myself.
Looking back, it’s actually a fairly amusing and somewhat typical story from my life. For one thing, this man’s hospitality actually made my life worse rather than better. The main dish he had ordered for himself was a large bowl of cow’s hooves. (Or possibly sheep or goat?) I’ve seen this dish my entire life, of course, but I’ve never ordered it or tried it. I have no interest in gnawing on a cow’s giant hoof. In fact, when I went to the tea shop, I was looking forward to a very quiet and pleasant meal of chick peas and potato curry and roti while basking in the happy glow of getting my sixty-day extension of stay. I was very happy, and I wanted to revel in it. I had a bunch of electronics with me, and I was going to break them out and edit some videos for YouTube and generally live my life.
But then I found myself sitting at a table with this boisterous man from Pakistan, who peppered me with the usual questions about the process of getting a tourist visa or work visa for Canada. People I meet from countries like Pakistan generally think I can help them get to Canada, and it is always an awkward situation. I don’t know a thing about how someone from Pakistan could go to Canada. My sense is that it would be very difficult and expensive. And my sense is that the only thing you can do is go to the Canadian embassy and ask them what the requirements are. And I’m sure there is a vast network of Pakistanis and specialized agencies that he can turn to for advice and help. I’m the last person on the planet who would know anything about it. But I always sense that these people don’t believe me, and they conclude that I just don’t want to help them. This man was hinting at my writing reference letters and letters of invitation and sponsoring him in some way. And I had to explain that I’m barely a Canadian myself anymore. I don’t live there, and I can’t do any of those things, I told him. But he never seemed to grasp that fact.
And in the middle of all this, he was treating me to a big plate of animal hooves. And to be polite, and because he never stopped talking about how delicious they were, I had to eat them. And the only way to eat them is to pick them up with your hands. There’s no possible way of using chopsticks or a fork or anything else. And it turns out these hooves are ninety percent gelatinous goo, and eating them involves sucking off all this goo, and your hands and mouth and face and everything within a ten-foot radius gets messy and sticky. And while this is going on, I’m trying to get settled into my spot at this table. I had one of my cameras and a microphone out at the time, and I was trying to put them away. And I was trying to order the dishes I wanted for breakfast. And when my roti and chickpeas and potato curry arrived, it was difficult to eat them because my hands were such a sticky mess. I was profoundly uncomfortable and distracted and stressed out. And this is almost always what happens when I run into a hospitality situation. I become a hospitality prisoner, and my life actually gets worse rather than better.
And a really funny thing happened when my food arrived. Since he had treated me to some of his breakfast, I felt that I should reciprocate. So when I ordered, I ordered more dishes than I wanted, and I encouraged him to help himself to those dishes. I figured we were now sharing our food. And he rejected it all out of hand. He said that he didn’t like any of that food. He doesn’t like potatoes, he said. He also told me doesn’t like chickpeas. And he prefers nan bread. He doesn’t like roti.
And I was thinking, “Hey, wait a minute! I didn’t know it was possible to turn down offered food!”
The last thing on the planet I wanted to do was dump my face into a plate of sticky cow’s hooves. But I did it because I didn’t think I had any choice. I felt it would have been rude to reject his hospitality. But then when I try to offer hospitality in return, he just casually rejects it, and in so doing, implies that it wasn’t very good food that I was offering anyway.
I thought that was pretty funny. I always seem to come out on the losing end in these little hospitality games. People are constantly trying to be nice to me, but they never actually do anything that makes me happier or my life better. The opposite, in fact.
After my breakfast of gelatinous goo, I came back to the Phannu guest house. I had come here directly when I returned to Mae Sot with the intention of taking one of their cheaper small rooms. I had considered going back to the Green Guest House, but I really wasn’t in the mood for the complicated world that the landlady there created in all her dealings with guests. I’d spent one night at the Phannu before I left for my trip to the north, and despite some rough edges, it seemed like a suitable place for me. There are a lot of things I like about it, including the fact that it’s possible to ride your scooter right up to the front door of your room. That’s very convenient. The room was a bit cluttered and old, but the basics worked. The water flowed and there was fast and reliable WiFi. That’s really all I needed.
However, when I arrived, all the single rooms were occupied, and my only option was to take a larger and more expensive room. I hesitated at first, because for that price, I thought I could stay at a newer and perhaps nicer place. But I asked to see one of these larger rooms, and it turned out to be very nice. It was much nicer than I expected, and I saw right away that it suited me better than the other newer hotels I was considering. So I took the room.
A big advantage to this place is that the woman that deals with guests speaks a bit of English and applies a surprising amount of common sense and professionalism and organization to her job. I’m used to things being somewhat chaotic and disorganized in Thailand and in Asia in general. And this type of older hotel is usually a prime example of that. But this woman was very straightforward in all the information she gave me. I didn’t even have to ask questions. She anticipated the things I needed to know and just told me. She told me, for example, that a smaller room might become available the next day. She didn’t know for sure at the time, because the other guests hadn’t told her whether they were checking out or extending their stay. And she told me that I could take the large room, and if a small room becomes available, she will come knock on my door and inform me, and I would be able to move, and she would refund the difference in price.
That kind of thing is unheard of in my experience in this part of the world, or perhaps any part of the world. And when I paid for two nights in the large room, she filled out a very detailed and professional receipt. She even signed it and dated it. This was important because I was going to need a receipt like that to present at immigration as part of my extension application. Long ago when I was staying at the Green Guest House, the landlady there refused to give me any kind of receipt. I ended up having to make multiple trips to the immigration office to sort this out, and she finally gave me some random piece of paper because I put her on the phone with the officials at the immigration office, who explained the situation to her. She was worried that by giving me a receipt, she would be accepting some kind of responsibility for me in terms of my visa status and immigration. They assured her that it was just a formality. They just needed a piece of paper from the place where I was staying, and this paper had to have the address of the hotel on it. And she didn’t even have that. She eventually had to write down the address by hand on some random piece of paper and jot down some notes about the type of room I had rented. She was very careful to keep it completely neutral and with no real connection to her at all. For me to use this at immigration, I had to then write down some dates on it and make it look more official. And from that day forward, I used White Out to alter this original and keep making copies so that I could keep giving immigration this piece of paper. But at the Phannu, I was given a glorious full receipt that was bursting with official information.
I spent the day in my very large and very comfortable room, and then, to my surprise, around three in the afternoon, the woman from the Phannu knocked on my door and said I could move to a small room if I wished. I almost changed my mind. I’d really become attached to my large room in a short amount of time. But I made the move. This small room is certainly not nearly as nice as the large one. It’s several steps down in every way. And the large room really wasn’t that much more expensive. But with my lifestyle, all that space would be wasted on me anyway. I generally create one spot in a room where I do all my living, and I stay right there. All the other space just goes unused anyway.
While all this was going on, I was also asking about what it would cost to rent this room by the week or by the month. And here, too, this woman at the Phannu was a gem. She was clear and straightforward with all the information I needed. I can’t begin to tell you how confusing and weird this same situation was at the Green Guest House. The landlady there made everything so complicated, and I had to sign a multi-page contract that was all in Thai. And I couldn’t make any sense out of anything she said. It was all chaos and confusion. But at the Phannu, it was a very simple transaction, and I got all the information I needed.