25/10/2023 - Settling back in (or not)

I'm not really used to suffering from jetlag, well not when travelling on a west-to-east leg at least. On this occasion however, it feels like I may be on the receiving end of a potentially brutal two-footed challenge. 

The flight had been long and tiring, and I had expected it to be as such when I booked them judging that the extra few hours flight time was worth it to try and claw back some of the extra costs I had been subjected to. Fortunately those hours passed by mostly event-free. and thanks to the added comfort afforded by exceptionally good performing noise-cancelling headphones, those 18 hours from Bristol to Bangkok only felt like about 20, thanks in part to a heart that felt about ready to pull a John Hurt in Alien on me (I may have become hyper-aware). The plane touched down in Bangkok at 12:15 p.m. Immigration was as simple and as straightforward as it could be and a short time later (when I had collected my overweighted bag from the carousel and picked up a local sim card accordingly), I was on the train from the airport towards the city centre. Here I  switched onto to the BTS (sky train) line, which then in turn enabled me to get within just a couple of minute's walk from my first hotel, which I arrived at dripping with sweat.

After sorting everything out at the hotel, I had a shower and headed back out into the heavy, overly humid evening air. Silom, a place that I first visited 10 years ago and had subsequently felt quite comfortable in, had changed. Some buildings had been knocked down or altered, with shops and landmarks that I once knew and recognised no longer existed in their once familiar forms. For the first time in a long time in that particular part of the city, I found myself becoming lost, with those absent navigation points leading on more than one occasion to me fully losing my sense of direction. One of the few things that I had left that had been resolutely reliable in the past (except in New Zealand, but there is probably a scientific reason for that somehow)

After getting some street food sorted (so good even when lost), I found my way back to the hotel, stopping only at a 7-11 store for some supplies for the fridge, enough to carry me over the next few days. Back in my room, I set about trying to write, either to make a start on an entry for the blog or reply to some messages that I had received over the past hours. Unable to keep my eyes open doing either, I gave in and embraced the cool night that was at the courtesy of the room's air conditioning unit. 

It may not have been silent, but in truth, it was close enough for it not to matter.