My Travel Adventures

Not long after my flight from Sukhothai landed in Bangkok, I called myself a Grab cab to the river and took a final tour of the city that had been my home for the past five months. I began on the pier across from Wat Arun and noticed that the winter sun was casting harsher shadows on its sides than I remembered. I then walked to the Grand Palace without paying for the tickets and walking inside: I merely strolled all the way to the gate and back again, weaving my way through the crowds of inappropriately clad tourists as they scrambled to buy trousers with elephant prints. I also remembered I had never taken a good picture of the City Pillar Shrine, so I tried my luck after eating some pad thai at a nearby restaurant.

After a few weeks working as a research assistant at Oxford, I had the good fortune of finding a job to bring me back to Asia. My position began online towards the beginning of the month, and my visa was approved shortly afterwards. I arrived in Bangkok on the 27 th of June. Careful as I am never to let myself form idealistic expectations of my travel destinations, I was surprised when – in the land of smiles – one of the guards at immigration hit me on the arm and pointed in front of me. He only spoke Thai, and the gesture meant to convey the simple and unnecessary instructions that I should move forward in the queue by about five centimetres. Thankfully, my carefulness not to form idealistic expectations of countries is matched by an equally strong resolution not to judge them by first impressions.