Tuesday, March 8, 2022
10:27 a.m. Bungalow 14, Mr. Jan’s Guesthouse
Pai, Thailand
I wasn’t feeling particularly energetic this morning, and I’ve been having a lot of computer issues, so I did not jump onto this laptop as soon as I woke up. Instead, I went out for a nice breakfast. And now I’m back at the guesthouse.
The main computer problem is related to the one fly in the ointment for this bungalow: the WiFi doesn’t work. That’s a bit frustrating. I didn’t have good WiFi in Pang Mapha either. I tried to upload a video to YouTube, and despite leaving it to upload for several days, it never made any progress. And that same video won’t upload from here either. These days, with my lifestyle and interests, I don’t think there is anything more frustrating and stressful than an inability to connect to the Internet. I just can’t settle down and relax if I can’t get online and do the things I need or want to do. And, for reasons I don’t understand, my MacBook is the worst at connecting to WiFi. Quite often, my phones and my tablet will connect to the WiFi, even if the signal is weak. I won’t be able to upload or download anything on my phones, but I can get online and check the news and book hotel rooms and get on Facebook. But even then, my MacBook is useless. It won’t connect unless the WiFi signal is super strong. And even then, sometimes it won’t connect. And I don’t know why.
Breakfast was way overpriced for my needs, but it was good. I have such simple desires that really good food is often lost on me. I went to one of Pai’s most popular breakfast spots, and I ordered their full-on English breakfast with all the trimmings and a cappuccino. It’s one of those breakfasts that a normal person would rave about. They’d take pictures of it and post the pictures to Instagram and be very excited about how delicious it was. But my main takeaway was that after breakfast was over, I was still hungry. I could have eaten two or even three of those complete breakfasts. The fact that it was very good and quite fancy is irrelevant if as soon as I leave the restaurant I’m looking for my next meal. I might as well have spent half as much money and gotten a giant box of Corn Flakes, a liter of milk, some bananas, and a cup of instant coffee. THAT would have been much cheaper and far more satisfying as a breakfast for me.
I kind of want to move to a new hotel just to get a good Internet connection. But that’s such a hassle. I guess I’ll just stay here. When I absolutely need a strong WiFi connection, I’ll just go to a nice cafe and order a coffee and use their Internet for an hour or two.
My mood was surprisingly bad this morning. I’m not sure why. I think my dissatisfaction with the WiFi had something to do with it. And I didn’t sleep well for some reason. And I found myself kind of mentally muttering and feeling irritable as I went out for breakfast. I was in a fantastic mood when I arrived in Pai yesterday and found this bungalow. I was quite happy. But that happiness disappeared overnight. Now I’m not quite sure that I even want to be in Pai.
My irritability found an outlet in being very judgemental over breakfast. This restaurant was right on the Pai Walking Street, and I got to judge a lot of foreigners. A lot of people were walking back and forth along the street going about being a tourist in Thailand. And I judged everyone. I was very small minded in this. I guess I’m not used to the big, brash, overly individualistic style of Westerners. Foreign men were going by in nothing but a small pair of shorts. And they stride like John Wayne as they go shirtless down the street, as if they own the place. And that’s just not normal in Thailand. It’s still a relatively conservative place, and going about on a busy main street without a shirt seems rude to me. I continued being small minded in that I judged just about every Western woman for being so fat. And they were, to be honest. So many really, really fat women. And yet they insisted on wearing rather tight-fitting clothes. I found them to be so very off putting. And these foreigners were so loud and brash. I just sat there over breakfast sending out waves of dislike towards all of them.