Joey and I took a sleeper bus to Chiang Mai to Bangkok. For the first hour of the busride the guy behind us complained non stop that the seats did not fully recline and that it wasn't technically a sleeper bus. The entire time I was thinking this was one of the nicest sleeper buses we've been on and that this guy obviously has only traveled in the comforts of Thailand. Good luck in Laos or Myanmar, buddy.
We arrived in Bangkok around 6 am. Khao San road's party scene was still in full swing. Lady boys, prostitutes and very drunken English guys littered the streets. I think we even saw super man. Staying up all hours of the night drinking on a busy road in Bangkok just doesn't appeal to me. We were glad to find out guest house quite quickly and get into the room where could put our heavy packs down.
The plan was to stay in Bangkok for only 3 days. Enough time to get our Myanmar visa and celebrate my birthday. Joey and I had a couple lazy days of shopping in the MBK and seeing a couple sites around our guesthouse. Our first plan was to go to the Myanmar embassy to apply for our visa. It was relatively easy to get to, and the process was quite quick. The only confusing part was that there were three different times posted to pick up our visas in 2 days. One sign said they closed at 3pm, another said visa pickup was from 3-4:30 and another said it was 3-4pm.
The day we needed to pick up our visa we took the ferry down the river to a stop that connects with the sky train. Before that, we had thought it was a good idea to have a nice lunch at the vegetarian place by our guest house. Ideally we should have left our guesthouse around 2pm. We didn't end up leaving til shortly after 3. Time was running out. We anxiously sat on the ferry and when we got to our stop we bolted off the boat and ran to the sky train.
After getting of the sky train it was time to run as fast as we could through hundreds of school children just getting out of school. We dodged parents, small children, old people with walkers and food vendors. Time was cutting closer and closer. When we turned the corner to the Myanmar embassy, we saw the last worker pulling away on his scooter at 4:29. The door was padlocked and we were screwed.
We sat in disbelief and exchanged some words of frustration with our choice of having lunch. It was one of those shoulda, woulda, coulda situations. Joey and I were truly unimpressed with eachother. We started thinking of ways we could make the situation better. Our flight left the next day and we couldn't get into Myanmar without a Visa. Better yet, it was Friday and the embassy wouldn't be open until Monday. UGH!
Joey and I called Air Asia which is the company we booked our flight to Yangon with. We lied saying that the Myanmar embassy didn't have our visas ready in time, and wouldn't have them available until Monday. Air Asia required proof, and because it was less than 48 hours before our flight there was little they could do for us. Even though I threatened to never fly with them again. Silly me thinking that would work.
We were defeated. Sad, mad, frustrated, annoyed and infuriated with the situation we decided it was time for some beers. At this point we knew we couldn't do much to change the situation and that we were out $250 because of not being able to postpone the flight unless we wanted to take a 4am bus to the airport the next day to argue with the desk.
3 hours later we were feeling better and more confident about the situation and we went to an Air Asia store around 11pm. Joey explained the situation and the guy told us he needed proof our visa wasn't ready. We just said they didn't give us any documentation and what else was there that we could do? The guy felt bad for us and called his supervisor. His supervisor didn't pick up the phone and the guy at the office decided to post pone our flight for us anyways. Obviously it was for an additional fee, but atleast it wasn't the full amount of $250.
We had to stay in Bangkok for another 4 days, but we were okay with that because there is a lot to see and do there. In some ways, despite being an expensive mistake, it was a blessing in disguise. That's all you can hope for when traveling. You just hope that everything works out in some kind of way. Roll with the punches and just deal with what happens. Sometimes there is so little you can control and just knowing that helps us deal with a lot of situations. We're still new to traveling so we make lots of mistakes. So far we've had $800USD and a camera stolen from us. We're still here, happy, alive and having the times of our lives. What more can you ask for.
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