After only a week in this city, it is a bit presumptuous to summarize it, but this is my web site, so I will presume anyway.

City of Angels  Bangkok is a bit of paradise. Its Thai name (Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit (กรุงเทพมหานคร อมรรัตนโกสินทร์ มหินทรายุธยามหาดิลก ภพนพรัตน์ ราชธานีบุรีรมย์ อุดมราชนิเวศน์ มหาสถาน อมรพิมาน อวตารสถิต สักกะทัตติยะ วิษณุกรรมประสิทธิ์)) designates it the City of Angels, among other things. I think you have to look a bit harder these days for its heavenly virtues, what with 20 million denizens in the metropolitan area, but it is still there.

Motorcycles  There are lots of motorcycles plying the streets of town. That eases congestion a bit. It is interesting to watch as they weave through all the cars at traffic signals so that the first several dozen vehicles at any intersection is a mass of cycles. In Spain, we were annoyed by the way folks adjusted the exhaust systems of their motorbikes so that they sounded like hoards of angry wasps. In Bangkok, the motorcycles are nice and quiet. Much more pleasant.

Clothing  Even in the hot, humid days of summer, Bangkokians wear long pants, even jeans, when wandering about the city. The shorts-wearers are tourists. If ever there was a place that deserved a more lenient dress code, this is it.

Bilinguality  Bangkok has language issues. Much signage is in both Thai and American English. But few of the Thais we met are comfortable with spoken English. On one hand they are proud of their heritage and language. On the other hand, they are inveterate shoppers and technology users, and brands and the Internet are primarily English-based. We met school children at tourist sites whose assignment was to interview Americans. We are easy enough to pick out of the crowd and they had a set list of questions. I sensed that most of our answers were not understood, but it was a start.

Traffic  There is lots of traffic.

Public Transport  The public transport is not as robust as this visitor would like. They have one underground metro line (MRT), two elevated “SkyTrain” (BTS) lines, one bus rapid transit (BRT) line, and ferries that ply the river. We used all of them but it can take a long time to get between points, and a lot of the city is only served by a regular (complicated and non-English) bus system. And the various systems do not have integrated ticketing or schedules. But at least they are air conditioned, which can be wonderful after a long walk from some city destination. Our flat is located at the Wat Pariwat BRT station, so at least it was convenient for us to enter the system.

Con Artists  Some of the cons in Bangkok are quite famous. One of these is that an individual outside the Grand Palace will tell visitors that the Palace is closed due to a visiting dignitary, and wouldn’t you like to take a tuk-tuk ride to see other sites while waiting for it to re-open. We encountered just such an artist, dressed as a policeman (quite possibly a real policeman). We decided that we would enjoy the con since there is little downside. We got a cheap (40 baht/ $1.50) tuk-tuk ride through the government part of the city (administrative departments, king’s palace, etc.), saw a less-visited, but still interesting, temple, and then sat in air conditioned comfort for 10-15 minutes while a salesman tried to tell us we needed to buy more stuff to stick in our luggage. Not very convincing, and not very painful.

Shopping  Bangkok is big on shopping. It has several of the largest malls in Asia. The weekend market at Chatuchak has thousands (!) of little shops that add to the commercial mix. While we were not in a buying mood due to our limited budget and luggage space, we did do several of these just to experience the “culture.”

Carelessness  It seems to be a cultural quirk that people don’t care overmuch about getting the details right. English signage is wonderfully fractured, even though the city has many thousands of proficient English speakers. There are typos everywhere and no one seems to do the transliteration from Thai to English in any sort of consistent way. A visitor cannot tell if that is due to thoughtful differences of opinion or just sloppiness.

King  The king is obviously respected. Many shops proudly display a photo of him. There are many billboards honoring him. He is the ninth in his kingly line (Rama IX) and by far the longest reigning at 65 years. He is a presence in the city.

Heat  The Thais point out that it is hot in the city, so I guess it is OK for visitors to note this as well. Daytime temperatures peak at around 90F with some humidity thrown in. It can be uncomfortable, but not unbearable. We look at Delhi’s upcoming 110F daytime highs with trepidation.

Pink  Much to Eryn’s delight, Thailand is a pink country. Most taxis are pink. Many of the king’s official portraits have him dressed in pink shirt or jacket.

We arrived at the Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport around one o’clock this morning. We were a couple of hours late due to airport construction and the associated air traffic congestion. After boarding in Tokyo, we sat on the ramp for an hour, then idled another hour over Thailand in a holding pattern. In the airport, everything worked just as planned. Immigration and customs were non-issues and we just sailed through. In the terminal we quickly found the DTAC mobile phone shop and obtained a couple of SIMs for our phones. Then we wandered down to where the hotel touts were holding court and the representative for our lodging was there and had our name on the list. We were in our rooms by 2am and blessedly horizontal shortly thereafter.

The pool at the curiously named BS Residence was very nice. It is one of the largest pools we have encountered at a hotel, and Ethan and Eryn had it to themselves.

At noon we took a taxi to our flat in Bangkok itself. We are at Rama III overlooking the Chao Phraya River. It took an hour for the drive, passing through two toll stations (25 and 45 baht). The taxi fare was 215 baht (about US$7). Upon arriving we walked around the corner to the 7-Eleven store and picked up some bottled water. Eighteen baht (about US$0.60) for a 2-liter bottle.

We could grow to like these Thai prices.

Thais generally tend toward the left side of the road when driving. However, there is some flexibility in driving rules in order to fit more vehicles on the roads. It occurred to us that we will not be in a right-driving country until we arrive in Argentina next January. It also occurred to us that having a taxi driver take us through town can be a real aid to intra-family civility. Our next chance to drive ourselves is in Australia in August, but that should be relatively benign given the wide-open spaces of the outback.

The time changes are interesting, if that is the right word. From Seattle to Tokyo is a 10-hour flight. We left at 1pm on Wednesday and landed at 3pm on Thursday. We arrived 26 hours after departing Seattle, what with time zones, date lines, and general relativity.

We had been warned about hot temperatures in Thailand, but so far things are not too bad. Today is generally in the 80s Fahrenheit, with 50% humidity. Warmer than we are used to in Oregon but far from unbearable.

We completed packing the house and getting out the door Monday, just two hours later than planned. Not bad.

Now we are between flights, sitting in Seattle’s airport, waiting for our fight to Narita.

So far, the travel dramas have been minor ones. At United Air Lines check-in, they couldn’t issue boarding passes until they had “proof” that we were going to leave Thailand someday. Since we are on a one-way ticket, it took a few minutes to figure that one out. Then their boarding pass printer decided that it had a 10-coupon limit. Let’s see: four passengers times three segments = 12 coupons. Oops. Susan could only get as far as Seattle while they rest of us go on to Bangkok. United is still struggling through the transition of their computer systems to Continental’s, so the legacy United agents at the counter were challenged by this. Another bunch of minutes and several agents later, all is swell and we can all go. Then at boarding this morning, we were informed that the adults cannot sit in their assigned exit row seats because we are unsafe, what with children elsewhere on the plane. So more boarding passes are produced, and we are on our way.

Life is getting simpler all the time. Now that we have our luggage in hand, we no longer have to decide what to pack or worrying about stuff fitting. It just works now. We’ll see how long this nirvana lasts.

We leave home in a couple of days for our trip. The cars have been sold. Our friends who will be staying in our home are slowly moving their stuff into the garage and closets. The house is 90% packed.

Departure is getting close.

As we have talked about our trip with friends and colleagues, we have been asked several common questions. Herewith are some thoughts on these queries.

• “How do you pack for a year?” The short answer is, “lightly”. In our case, we have decided that we do not want the drama of lugging huge amounts of baggage around. We are doing carry-on only: one small piece of baggage and a “personal item” as they say at the airlines. Two of the pieces of luggage have wheels so that we can consolidate the four bags onto wheels for treks through airports and on sidewalks. All four pieces have backpacking straps for when rolling is inconvenient. Inside these bags are nestled about a week’s worth of clothing. We have endeavored to get quick-dry items, both because the dry quickly (we hope) and because they are generally nylon and therefore lighter and thinner. We all have ultralight down jackets for colder climates, but they will not escape the luggage for at least six months as we are starting out in hot places. Then there are the bulky medicine supplies, mostly doxycycline for malaria, but also several types of antibiotics and altitude pills for our time in the Andes. As a dyed-in-the-wool gadget guy, we are also carting along a lightweight computer, Kindles for all, GPS, a couple of cameras, and the associated cords, batteries, and memory cards. And the quart ziplock containing our liquids and gels. (How our lives and vocabularies have changed since September 11, 2001.) If we need anything that was not packed in the bags, then that is why they invented credit cards.
• “I am so jealous. How did you manage to do it?”I am afraid that I am not very gentle in my reply to this question. First, I question the premise – I suspect folks are not really jealous. Curious, perhaps. Certainly envious of avoiding work for a while. But I think that most people would far rather spend their time and treasure on other things than a year-long trip. Travel is very uncomfortable. Human nature seeks a sense of belonging to a place. All cultures have homes. And humans like to accumulate stuff. Long-term travel rubs human nature the wrong way in at least these two areas. So I think that my interlocutors are really quite satisfied to spend their resources on homes and cars and friends and family. All good things, just different than travel. The second part of this question (“how did you manage it?”) is a bit easier to answer. It is just about priorities. It takes a good-sized stash of cash to do such a trip. This is neither easy nor trivial. We have been setting aside since our kids were toddlers, 10+ years ago. While we have lived well, we drove old cars that we bought used. We have not landscaped our house. Both parents have worked, even when it might have been more fulfilling to have one be stay-at-home. I believe most of my associates could do such a trip if they made it a priority. There is nothing heroic in our ability to do this.And there is nothing wrong with those who choose different priorities. That is what makes this a most interesting world in which to live. Everyone has different goals in life, creating all the different people and societies that can make travel fun and interesting.
• “How do you plan such a trip?” Pretty much the same way you climb a mountain: one step at a time. Against the best advice of people who know better than us, we have planned our trip in some detail. We have all the transit legs planned and tickets purchased, as much as possible. While major airlines let you ticket 330 days in advance, some smaller airlines only ticket 6 months out. Indian trains allow booking 120 days before travel, and buses in South America generally do two months of advance sales. So when we depart next week, we will have all the transits planned up to arrival in Morocco next March, with the exception of some bus and plane segments in South America. The other area where we have planned in excruciating detail is our lodging. Some have suggested that it is great to travel without much in the way of plans. This gives you flexibility to go and see and do things that you learn about during the trip. We decided to take a different approach. We are staying in each place for more time (generally 1-3 weeks) to enable spontaneous exploration, but every night is booked through April. And the remaining nights will get booked over the next couple of months. We have convinced ourselves that all this planning is good because it lets us experience where we are instead of spending the whole year in a struggle to find accommodation and transport. We will see how it goes. The area we have not planned is the activities we will enjoy. That is where we have enabled ourselves to see what happens in each place and go with the flow.
• “How much does it cost?” While lots of people want to ask us this question, few are actually brave enough to do so. In the spirit of beating around the bush, I will leave this unanswered for now. We have a budget that approximates the price of three middling new cars, but it will be more interesting to see how we live with it. We are starting out in Asia which seems relatively inexpensive. Later we spend the Christmas holidays in Cape Town, at the other end of the expense spectrum. In general, the monthly budget is about one third lodging, one third food, and one third ground transportation and activities.
• “When are you coming home?” This one has a non-satisfying answer of “sometime next June.” You can only get airline tickets 330 days before the flight. That means that we cannot buy our homebound flights until about August of this year. We are leaving home with no specific, concrete plans to return. Sounds ominous when you say it that way, no?

Yesterday (Friday) was Susan’s last day at her school. She is a high school teacher. On Monday, we leave home. Lots to do and only two days to complete it.

Back to packing we go.