Well It was a crazy, surreal kind of day. I woke up in China for one night, and ended in Thailand, both entirely new countries to me. I had a flight from Brisbane to Guangzhou, Guangdong province, China, and stayed overnight in one of the China Southern Airlines partner hotels, which was actually really nice and I slept quite soundly for a bed that wasn’t my own and after a 9 hour flight. I woke with plenty of time to spare, with enough time to eat the complimentary breakfast, have a small workout at the hotel gym, and go for a quick walk before catching the fancy electric shuttle van. Seriously maybe the most futuristic car I’ve ever been in. Guangzhou is a MASSIVE city from the air with characteristic Chinese design of tons of carbon copy apartment buildings, plus some massive and impressive buildings. The smog was the thickest I have ever seen though. I didn’t see Tokyo during the day from the air but I imagine there would be some contest.
Anyway, I caught my 3 hour flight to Thailand just fine, and two amazing things happened on the flight. I first spent an hour in a deep listening meditation to Devin Townsend’s ambient album “Snuggles” and just let myself open fully to whatever arose, which activated some deep intuition in me, as afterward I noticed I was seeing mechanistic patterns and understanding things in a long-forgotten style of cognition. It’s hard to describe and I don’t think I’d do it justice so I’m going to skip it. Afterward, I got talking to the elder Thai man beside me I heard praying quietly, and he opened up about Islam and his history with it and was sharing Islamic stories and wisdom with me. All the while I was cross-relating what he was sharing from my own studies of wisdom and asking questions with the best tact I could – I have a couple reservations about Islam that I picked up from Sam Harris. I don’t want to go into that either right now! I’ll wait until a different opportunity comes to ask the serious questions, preferably to someone who speaks English I can at least 90% understand.
So I landed in BKK, Bangkok international airport on time. I had already had pretty novel experiences, but it was only just getting started. I spent a while in the airport getting things sorted, as well as admiring the self-driving airport cleaners. I took longer than I thought and got to my hostel after having a nice chat with another young Canadian Toronto native on the train who helped me with directions because I didn’t have a SIM card yet. I had arranged to buy one later at a mall with my friend I was meeting (late) at the hostel. The hostel was fantastic with a glass-bottomed lounge space on the 6th floor, and I barely had time to marvel at the new-to-me smells and sights of the markets where it was located before I got checked in, met Aviel, and we got going JUST as a torrential rain began.
But we got going indeed since we planned to have our own epic One Night In Bangkok before the monastery stay! Dodging through the markets where the awnings were casting rain off like waterfalls, we both quickly relented to the inevitable soaking of our shoes. We linked up to a lady friend from Laos he had made previous who now lives in Bangkok. Sai Pan (sp?) was her name and her father was a monk. The rain stopped soon, and she took us shopping for linen clothes for the monastery at a crazy fashion mall, and then we went to the top of a mall for some excellent, relatively expensive Thai food (more brand new flavours to me).
The contrast between the clamor of the streets and the quiet of the taxies we caught was stark. The day had already woven an immense experiential tapestry with so many textures but it just kept going! We bought a SIM card for me and met up with Aviel’s other friend (also a lady), and just with time to spare we caught Venom: The Last Dance at the Siam Paragon mall. Seeing the Thai King Rama X’s pre-movie tribute was interesting and sparked later conversation about the king’s relationship with the Thai People.
We decided to forgo dancing at a club since it was a semi-early morning the next day (plus soaked feet!) and instead went to the Chinatown night markets. The street food was delicious and we headed back to the hostel. The gals didn’t want to head home immediately so the four of us chatted on the roof before we parted ways and hit the hay.
I was quite impressed with my energy throughout the day and just the sheer variety of experience the day brought. I am certainly glad for my friend who took lead and planned out the day so well. The next morning we were up and at ’em and I was so thankful for another good night’s sleep that I could’ve cried 🙂 Please, if you made it this far, do me a favour and make a great day with a good friend of yours in the near future! Thanks for reading.