Touch down into Bangkok airport around 4:30 am local time, 12 hours ahead of Toronto/Ottawa. Two days, three planes and 24 hours of plane time alone, here I am on the other side of the world to start another adventure.

I am blogging again and this period is called the “Bangkok Diaries.”

Often when I go through a period of my life or travel, there is a word that pops up constantly to describe it and won’t leave me alone. Picasso had different colours for periods of his artwork like his blue period. For me, it’s words or captions that tug at me until I write them down and use them.  The creative process at work I guess.

In any case, I didn’t know what time it was when I arrived because I didn’t catch the announcement in the plane which was first in Thai and then in an English with a heavy accent. And I had a fuzzy brain after two days of traveling.

As I was getting off the plane, I could feel and smell the warmth of the air. It felt warm and tropical and I love that. When you come from an area that is cold, everything seems locked up, zipped up for the winter, and there are not as many natural smells from nature that you get when it’s warmer.

I didn’t think it was so late because it was busy at the airport, it was full of people, there were information agents at counters, and many stores were open. I didn’t clue in that it was that time until the information agent told me it’s 430 am. What? I guess Bangkok is truly the city that never sleeps.

The 14-hour flight was delayed by a few hours leaving JFK because of snow in Korea.  The airline attendant at the counter exclaimed “three inches of snow in Seoul!” I had to smirk because three inches of snow is nothing to a person from Canada. I guess it’s all relative and they are probably not equipped to deal with it.

In any case, this meant that they had to change my connecting flight in Seoul to Bangkok to another airline and a later one, and even when we landed in Seoul and we arrived past the boarding time for the next and I was wondering if I was going to make it.

As I was getting off the plane, I saw a young airlines attendant anxiously waving a sign saying “Bangkok.” There were other people of different nationalities, languages and ages that were gathered around her. We were escorted across the vast Seoul Incheon airport, from this gate to the next, by this petite airline woman who was practically running in her heels, telling us to keep up, and saying constantly “hurry up please”.

I was annoyed at her when she would say this. First of all, it wasn’t our fault that the flight was late and we were late for the connection, there were places where it was not in our control to hurry up like the airport scanning area, and the airport looked interesting to explore – the food and stores – if we had more time than connectors in the night.

I joked to the others running after this woman that she was our fitness coach from the airlines. No one smiled or laughed. I’m not sure if this was because of the language barrier or they were as tired and fuzzy as I was. I am assuming both.

I didn’t even have a chance to grab some water, go to the washroom or grab a bite, which I was really looking forward to after a long 14-hour haul. Instead, it was right onto another plane, so I was a bit shell shocked when I entered the other plane.

It was a small full plane and there were all these Asians looking at us slightly annoyed as if it was our fault that we were late. I know I am Asian-looking but living all my life as a “visible minority”, it’s strange to be plopped into a “majority” all of a sudden. It must feel strange being white and a minority as well. I feel strongly that it’s important for everyone to experience that feeling of being a minority and different in a population at least once in their lifetimes.

“The thing that impacts the most is hiring…people who have never lived or studied abroad have a limited worldview that makes them feel so uncomfortable to change and entitled to their status.” Chris Sacca, CEO, Twitter

I got or should I say crawled into my seat by the window. I had to ask the young guy next to me that was quite big and tall to move. He wasn’t amused and kind of moved for me while in his seat. He didn’t speak any English and probably thought he had the extra seat for himself because you need it on this flight as there is very little room between the rows.

I thought the flight was only one hour but when they said six hours I gasped and said “oh no”. I thought, what am I going to do crammed in here for so long and not being able to get out easily. I hate that as I am a bit claustrophobic at the best of times and thus always request the aisle seat in planes.

I looked for the first opportunity to drink some wine so that I would pass out, and that helped. I watched some movies, one in Japanese, I tried to sleep, and I would quickly get out whenever the guy next to me went out. They turned off the lights for most of the flight so I didn’t want to bother my neighbour who put his jacket over his head and seemed asleep for most of the time.

It cost about 500 baht to take a taxi from the airport. 100 baht is about $14 Canadian at the time of writing this.  You get a chit from the machine with a number and you go to the taxi with the number. Explaining where I had to go even though I had the address in English and Thai proved to be a bit challenging, so it’s good that I knew some landmarks I could tell him.

At 5:30 am I got dropped off near the address and hoped I could find my way by asking guards along the way. The area was well lit and I felt safe walking around vs. my earlier thoughts that I would be going down dark alleys, lost and vulnerable, with predators all along. It’s funny what your mind conjures up before you go somewhere or do something of the risks and dangers, but when you’re in it, when you get there, it isn’t usually what you imagined. It shows you that worry is unproductive and unnecessary for the most part.

I found the apartment building, the keys waiting for me at the lobby, and took the elevator up to the apartment. The bright sticky note on the door of the apartment made my heart melt and I felt so relieved and happy, it said “Welcome Caroline.”

I had been texting back and forth with my friend Mike when I got in to Bangkok but when I realized it was 4:30 am I was aghast, stopped texting, and told him to go back to sleep, not to worry, I would get there. He was glad that I had arrived safely and was on my way. That’s what good friends do and I am so grateful.

Like most adventures and life, it is not smooth, we are fuzzy, we wander, we get lost, we have people directing us to follow them and “hurry up!” so we can make our connections, we get boxed in and drink wine, we get out, we ask for help from strangers and friends, we get back on track, and we find “home” on the other side of the world.