Friday, May 1, 2009

Off to ... Oman?

REASONS TO LIKE BANGKOK

Yes, Bangkok, the frenetic capital of Thailand, has a lot to offer. Sensuous temples, narrow alleys full of ancient shops, rivers that link the city like highways, smiles galore, and more.

We like the city, however, for other reasons. More than once while in some Indonesian or Sri Lankan backwater we wished hard for instant beaming to Bangkok, where you can get stuff that works, tastes good, and is fun.

Pirated CDs for $3? Hourlong foot massages for $6? Artists setting up on streetcorners when the sun sets? Bookshops with real books? It makes Bangkok a fun place to kill a few days in between flights. So here are some of those delicacies in photo ...

(Reason to like Bangkok #1: pretty boys, ah, I mean, pretty girls -- well, let's not think about it too much ...)

Photobucket

ON TO OMAN?

Like I said earlier, we built in about two months into this trip to stay in Bangkok ... not to see the sights but pick up some cheap airplane tickets. What I originally had in mind was much different than how it's working out. What I thought was we would buy one mammoth round-Asia package which would leave from Bangkok and go to -- get ready -- Colombo, Yangon, Shanghai, Taipei, Thimpu, HongKong, Beijing and Ulan Bataar before heading back to Bangkok.

When I really started to look into this package, however, a number of problems arose. Myanmar had implemented new visa procedures that made travel look iffy. China had increased its visa application fee to such a high figure ($230) that it totally put us off the idea of going there. Bhutan only allows tourist flights to originate from Bangkok -- and the roundtrip fare is close to $1,0000. And any flight to Mongolia was going to be hundreds and hundreds of dollars -- as much as $600 return from Seoul!

(Reason to like Bangkok #2: made to order diplomas and licenses -- about $8)

Photobucket

What we wound up doing -- which was probably a much better plan, anyway -- was picking up a series of roundtrip fares from BKK. We went to Colombo on Cathay Pacific and Taipei on KLM; next we are heading to Dubai on Thai and Yangon on good ol' Air Asia.

The flight to Dubai is not to take in the sights of United Arab Emirates but is instead to head into neighboring Oman. I looked for about a week for discount fares to Muscat from Bangkok but nothing rang in as affordable. I then broadened the matrix to have us landing in Abu Dhabi and Dubai and then bussing over the border, but even that was costly. Finally we went into a travel agent's office -- yes, we did it the old fashioned way -- and the agent immediately found a discount fare on Thai.

(Reason to like Bangkok #3: pleasant streetside cafes)

Photobucket

Why Oman? It's a place I've wanted to go ever since seeing photos of Muscat in a magazine article years back. But besides that, after months in south Asia we are both interested in a change of scenery. The Middle East is a place neither of us has really never been. Also, excepting for a few spots like Japan, Korea and China, we've run out of places to visit in south and east Asia and central Asia at this point is neither affordable nor safe.

(Reason to like Bangkok #4: cool t-shirts)

Photobucket

So how much is this all costing? Well, even cheap flights between farflung countries are pretty expensive, especially when our budget for Asia was to be $30 per person per day. Our flight to Colombo was about $250 round trip. Taipei was a tad more and Dubai came in at about $390 per person. Air Asia's flight to Yangon is a slim $55 per person round trip.

(Reason to like Bangkok #5: cocktail buckets for $7)

Photobucket

Flying incurs other costs, however, that we had not originally fitted into the budget. Getting to airports is expensive, often you have to pay a tax to board your flight and if you are stuck somewhere on a layover then you are looking at a pricey meal.

(Reason to like Bangkok #6: streetcorner artists)

Photobucket

I did the budgeting for this trip before we left. I did a fair bit of research into countries we would or might be going to -- both from guidebooks, our ealier travels and from posting questions on messageboards.

(Reason to like Bangkok #7: 24-hour juice stands)

Photobucket

My "budget" took into account everything we would spend in the course of a day's travel -- hotel, bus, food, deodorant -- but did not take into account the roundtheworld airfare, which we bought in two packages and go into a separate expense account along with insurance and pretrip expenses, like shoes and socks.

(Reason to like Bangkok #8: hour long foot massages for $7)

Photobucket

The RTW did not get figured in because it was impossible to figure out how much each leg cost, and the cost of continent hopping would have grotesquely skewed the daily cost of living. The daily budget did, however, need to include the smaller flights we have picked up along the way -- places like Borneo, Lombok, Philippines, Taiwan, etc. -- because I saw those as nonnecessary flights and, what's more, intercontinental rather than intracontinental. To wit: while in Asia we could have gone to Taiwan on a plane, or we could have taken a bus to Vietnam. Since a bus ride would have been figured into the daily budget, the flight should be to. (Incidentally, I used the same tactic on our last trip, when we picked up flights from Dhaka to Kathmandu, Kathmandu to Bangkok and Lhasa to Kathmandu along the way.)

(Reason to like Bangkok #9: Asia's best bookstores)

Photobucket

We did very well on our budget before coming to Asia, and actually the budget here did not come off the rails until just before flying to Philippines. In South America our budget was $45 per person per day and at the end of 120 days there we had spent about $44.50. In Australia the budget was $40 per person per day and we killed that by spending just $35 per person per day.

(Reason to like Bangkok #10: Cds and DVDs for $3 -- downloaded to your mp3 for a dollar more)

Photobucket


In Asia our budget was $30 per person per day and so far we are clocking an average of $36 per person per day -- pennies, when you realize what we are doing, but significant in that we've failed to achieve a goal and do not have infinite amounts of money. In retrospect, I realize we are taking more flights than I had originally planned on taking. Also, though I adjusted our 2002-2003 Asia budget for inflation and a currently weaker dollar, I did not take into account the fact that we would just plain old want a higher standard of living this time around than last.

(Reason to like Bangkok #11: chicken satay with peanut chili sauce for 30 cents)

Photobucket

The budget for the remainder of the trip should not suffer as much as the Asia budget has as we will be in fixed countries for relatively small periods of time -- either one or two weeks -- and will not (hopefully) be picking up any more flights.

(Reason to like Bangkok #12: really cool stuff -- these are fold-up lanterns)

Photobucket

We were successful this week in getting visas for Myanmar (suckas!) and fly there (they don't allow entry overland) on May 14. For now we are going to take it easy for a while. We head to Vientiane, Laos on a night bus tonight. Vientiane was a real favorite of our last trip and we hope to indulge in some relaxation and French-inspired Lao cooking for a short spell before we get moving again.

1 comment:

the larsons said...

I like not knowing where the hell you'll be next. I expect you to end up in Clyde for, like, a stay of 20 hours before taking off for Easter Island.