Teaching English in Thailand: Day 19, Sailing Home

Day 19: Sunday 12^th July

I felt like I had rewinded 10 years when I woke up to the pleasant sight of my friend’s feet in my face. Still, sharing a bed was better than braving it all night on the hard floor. The weather was still a bit grim and check-out was at 12, so another lazy morning was in store for the three of us. Also, it wasn't  if we had somewhere exciting to rush off to!

We had breakfast in the hotel café again, but today Jess and I splashed out and had ‘bread and chocolate’ and Kirsty had ‘bread and honey’ rather than jam. How exciting! Again, we were presented with a slice of bread that resembled a brick, drenched in sugary chocolate and condensed milk (of course). Thai red tea is fast becoming a favourite of mine, so I had one of those again and tried not to think about how bad all of it was for me.

Thankfully, I didn’t go out without my bra and knickers today, much to everybody’s delight. Talking of delight, guess what taxi picked us up? Headache inducing, sickly smelling, Pitbull blaring party taxi! WoOoOOoOo!

Jessica enjoying the free WiFi!

We went to the Big C shopping centre in Loei, which actually turned out just to be a big supermarket with a few little shops outside it. We somehow managed to waste a fair few hours there, shoving in as much KFC as we could before heading back to a week of Thai food. I bought a Topshop nock-off T shirt for £1 and some real leather, white deck shoes for about £6. Happy Liv!

After we had bought some snacks and prepared for the journey ahead of us, we went to the bus station 2 hours early just to make sure we got a ticket, and frankly, because there was nothing else to do! Amazingly, a bus was about to depart in 15minutes when we arrived! We thought there was only one bus at about 18:30 but we got the 16:50 bus! That’s about the only good luck we’ve had the whole weekend.

Loving the bus!

The bus was much less crowded this time, unlike on the way there. We sat at the back of the bus too (like the cool 15 year olds that we are), which meant we were blind to the craziness happening at the front of the bus, regarding the driver’s annoying habits and cracks in the windscreen. There was a huge storm again, almost for the whole journey; I got less wet this time. My biggest worry was the sheer amount of times that we nearly aquaplaned off the edge of the mountains… You would have thought the driver would slow down in such crazy conditions and floods, but nope, he just kept on going, full pelt!

We had enough snacks to feed the whole bus, which of course, we did not do. However, I did offer the shy teenage boy next to me a double stuffed Oreo, which he declined! Who would do that!? Maybe he was scared of the strange farang who was trying to force feed him sugar. Just maybe.

Jess and Kirsty got off the bus an hour before me, as the bus stopped in their town, Chumpae. Lucky buggars! By now, it was about 8pm and it was pitch black! I had to deal with the bus taking a full transformation into a boat, and a lady offering me eggs on a stick. No thanks! I’ll stick to my Oreos and mystery fruit. Finally, we arrived in Khon Kaen bus station, and I’ve never been happier to see dry land! I was a little worried about the task I was about to face though, which was to get a taxi home on my own. As soon as I stepped off the bus (into a huge puddle) I was approached by about 5 Thai taxi drivers who I had to pick from. I put one of them onto the phone with Kanang who explained where she lives and then hopped into the taxi who’s driver looked the least like a murderer.

After a long ass journey, I was finally home. I face timed my Mama back in England and had an early-ish night after such a CrAzY weekend of not doing much! Im not looking forward to an early wake up tomorrow. Please pray for me.

Peace,

Olivia