Progress
When I first had the bright idea to prefix my entry titles with “Travelogue” while we’re overseas, I didn’t really stop to consider the result: that every post I make for the whole rest of this trip would start with that word. That’s an awful lot of posts. As you can see, I gave up.
It’s Saturday afternoon, and I’m just finishing my work. For the uninitiated, many Thai people work six days a week, Monday through Saturday, including my wife’s family. Since everyone else is working, I figure I might as well, too. Sometimes I use this as an excuse to put in a few extra hours and make some more money. Other times — like this week — I use it as an excuse to piss away half of Friday playing games during business hours, and then finishing the other half of my day’s work on Saturday. 
The little gaming setup I put together for myself here is paying for itself over and over again. It’s great to have a little slice of home here in Thailand to help recharge my batteries. I still thought I’d miss driving, but so far I don’t. Perhaps because I’ve been playing a lot of driving games!
In relatively short order, we’ve fallen into our usual routine here. Each morning, Apple’s brother and his wife and daughter leave the new house at 7:30 so they can travel back to the family business, known to me as the “print shop.” (Which is exactly what it is: a printing business, old-fashioned mechanical presses and all.) I stay at the new place with my computer stuff and do my own work for the day. Around 11:00, a tuk tuk arrives with my lunch, a specially-prepared “miniature version” of the family meal at the print shop (we’re reimbursing Apple’s family for the cost). Usually Apple goes over to hang out with her family by mid-afternoon, and returns in the evening with dinner.
On Saturdays, it’s a bit different. We’ll get up early and go to the print shop with my brother-in-law at 7:30. Getting up early this one day is not usually a big problem, but it was particularly difficult this morning for some reason. Perhaps in part because we got up early yesterday as well, because we had an appointment at the hospital for the next milestone in our fertility treatments. And I must have slept weird, because my neck is all sore. Anyway, I’m ready to go back to bed, the earlier the better. Tomorrow’s Sunday, so we don’t have to get up too early, but the housekeeper is coming to clean the new house so we’ll have to get out of the way at some point.
Through all of this, we’ve been making progress in our fertility procedures. Despite being the last woman to enter this month’s treatment regimen (her doctor only accepts a small number of IVF patients every month or two), Apple was the first to produce a set of healthy eggs for retrieval. After the eggs and a sperm sample were collected, they were brought together in a lab — and now, five of those eggs have been fertilized and are showing good progress. Soon, we’ll be ready to transfer some of those eggs back, and then all we can do is wait and see what happens. I know my fingers are crossed!
A Thai Thanksgiving
First off, to my American-based audience, which I suspect is the entirety of it: Happy Thanksgiving!
Obviously, there’s no Thanksgiving holiday in Thailand — that’s a uniquely American (and, OK, Canadian) tradition. Nevertheless, being an American in Thailand, and one who often cited Thanksgiving as one of his favorite occasions thanks to my love of turkey and mashed potatoes, the holiday is certainly on my mind. It was oddly surreal, an hour or so ago, as I watched the local CBS morning news broadcast on my Slingbox while I wrapped up the day’s work. There was all manner of talk about traveling weather, airport delays, how to avoid eating yourself into a coma, and so on. Even special turkey graphics on the five-day forecast.
Naturally, since there’s no Thanksgiving here, I figured I might as well work; it’s not like I have much else to do. Actually, I had originally planned to spend part of the day playing games on my new Xbox 360. That was always one of my private little Thanksgiving traditions, one that even my parents may not be aware of. I’d secretly relish getting up a little early in the morning on my day off from school, and indulge in playing my favorite computer games — Comanche, Wolfenstein 3-D, Doom or The Legacy: Realm of Terror — while my grandmother bustled busily about in the kitchen, and the delicious smells of roasting turkey and stuffing began to fill our home.
There’s not much roasting turkey around these parts; even Apple remarked thoughtfully that there’s no such thing as turkey in Thailand, as far as she knows. But there are plenty of family gatherings, smells of food cooking, and celebrations of other occasions. And there are also games, courtesy of my Xbox. As it turned out, though, I was unable to replicate that part of my personal Thanksgiving tradition, because this day got off to a particularly poor start and I spent most of the morning and afternoon trying to catch up.
It’s been an interesting couple of nights. I’ve been sleeping pretty well on this trip so far, thanks to the excellent accommodations here at the new house. Two nights ago, however, I had a particularly lousy sleep. I chalk it up to the wild and unsettling dreams, although from practically the instant I awoke in a cold sweat, I couldn’t remember anything about them. After that disjointed slumber, I hoped that the next (Wednesday night) would be an improvement, but it was even worse.
Last night, around 4:00 or 5:00 a.m., I awoke to the fundamentally disturbing sound of a near-indescribable humming, whining…thing. It’s hard to describe exactly what it sounded like, so about the best I can do is to say that it reminded me of a tornado siren running on two almost-depleted AA batteries. It mostly held its pitch, but occasionally modulated a half-note up or down like some kind of diseased…thing. Really, it was quite unsettling at four o’clock in the morning.
Travelogue: Settling In
As my workday comes to a close, and my efforts gladly wind down, I think that what I’m most looking forward to this evening is going to bed.
Rainclouds obscuring the mountain range
It started pouring rain last night and continued, off-and-on, into most of today. I had the house to myself, my office room enveloped by the view of the mountain vista outside, enshrouded in cotton-like filaments of rain-soaked fog and mist. The picturesque landscape actually reminded me of the sky texture from Doom episode one, which I guess is appropriate, because that texture was taken from a photo of a Chinese mountain range.
Last night I was up quite late, feeling suddenly wired (probably a jet lag reaction) and deciding that I may as well direct my pent-up energy toward getting some work done. And oh, was there plenty of work to be done.
I knew in advance that yesterday, my first full workday in Thailand, was going to be a doozy. As it turned out — and this always happens to me when I book a vacation or other travel date — my company planned to release a monumental new product on that very day. Every time a new product lands, it’s my job to update the downloadable files for our free trials and licensed copies, add the product to our website, write and deploy the press release, do all the ancillary marketing, and lots more.
This time, though, the development team decided not only to release the new product as planned, but they also launched major revisions to two of our other products, so the work was multiplied even more so than usual. Add to this the fact that I also needed to write the company’s monthly email newsletter, bearing announcements about the release, and get it sent out within 48 hours. Saying that I had my hands full yesterday would scarcely do justice to the reality of the situation.
I wasn’t helped by the Internet connection here at the house. It’s an ADSL system provided by TT&T MaxNet. It was up and running just fine when we got here, but as I started working, it became clear that we were going to need to upgrade from the “Indy” package to the “Premier” package. “Indy” is meant for casual users; tons of ports are blocked (no Slingbox, torrents, or even instant messaging with my work contacts) and connections between here and the western hemisphere are de-prioritized.
Apple and her brother A called in to get the package upgraded. Then MaxNet did something dumb: They disconnected our existing line, even though it was going to be a full day before they could get the new line up and running. So my connection went down in the heat of this crazy workday battle and stayed down for about five hours. After a flurry of calls and complaints we finally got MaxNet to turn the “Indy” connection back on until they could get the “Premier” one ready.
I didn’t have connectivity again until evening, so I went back to work. Eventually I stayed up late enough to run into the U.S.-based crowd as they came to work for the day, and we started exchanging emails, and the next thing I knew, it was three in the morning. But I finally wrapped up everything that I needed to, and got to put a whopping 15 hours on my time sheet for the day.
Travelogue: So Far, So Good
Greetings from Southeast Asia! It’s our second and last day in Bangkok, Thailand, before we head to our final destination in the nation’s south. So far, our travels from the U.S. have gone swimmingly — no significant delays, a handful of pleasant flights and experiences, and no problems of which to speak. In fact, I think this may have been one of the most pleasant journeys to Thailand that I’ve yet taken.
We departed from Florida on schedule this past Friday morning, after my parents graciously shuttled us to the airport in Apple’s Mazda (and then put the car away with its tank full of fuel stabilizer). Our first flight took us by way of Atlanta — doesn’t every Delta flight? — where we had a light breakfast and then proceeded on to Seoul, South Korea. We seem to try a new airline each time we travel, and this particular 15-hour flight was our first on Korean Airlines.
Atlanta’s international terminal, known fondly as “Concourse E,” is much more nicely-appointed and much less harried than its domestic terminals. We hit a streak of good luck almost right away, when the gate agent told us that “it was pretty quiet today” and offered to relocate us to a seat at the front of the plane, without us even asking. We ended up with two bulkhead seats in row 28, the very first row of the economy cabin. Although the armrests don’t raise and the seats are a little narrower, I’ve come to like these bulkhead seats because of the abundance of legroom. Perhaps most importantly, my knees aren’t constantly embedded in the back of the seat in front of me, and this helped a great deal.
In fact, the first third of the 15-hour flight disappeared almost without trace as I essentially slept through the whole thing in one- or two-hour segments. This is unprecedented for me. The food was quite good, and between my iPhone and an actual printed book in my pocket, I was kept occupied the entire time. I tell you, the eReader application I wrote about earlier is a godsend. And I’m glad I bought a couple more eBooks before we left, because if I hadn’t, I’d be just about out of reading material by now!
Although we were almost an hour late in taking off from Atlanta, we still had plenty of time in Seoul with which to grab a bite to eat and explore around a little. Admittedly, this was probably the low point of the trip, as we were both feeling tired and a bit grouchy and sore from being seated so long. Also, Incheon International Airport isn’t as impressive as we’d hoped. I think Apple was hoping to buy some Korean cosmetics there, but there weren’t any to be found. There was also an extreme dearth of food to eat, as the food court was undergoing renovation and was completely closed. We eventually found a little restaurant and had a meal, but it wasn’t anything special.
Our final flight — a nearly 6-hour jaunt — was also on Korean Airlines, and took us directly to Bangkok. Again, we asked if there were any better seats available and were “upgraded” to an exit row, where we had just two seats next to each other and a huge amount of legroom. I thought this was an excellent location, the only problem being that we were right next to the galley and thus often had to endure a crowd of flight attendants as they scurried about.
I dozed off again for a couple hours, but the last three hours of the flight dragged on and on for both Apple and I. At that point, we could think of little else besides getting to our hotel room, stretching out and sleeping for twelve hours. Finally the plane landed in Bangkok, we picked up our luggage (all of which made it there intact), and met Apple’s brother M, who was there to escort us to our hotel by taxi.
Gearing Up
Our travel date nears, and so, as you might expect, preparations for said trip have just about reached fever pitch around here. Not that I’m spending 24/7 packing — I usually plan things far too elaborately to get caught in a flurry of last-minute prep work. Rather, a little bit of planning has been going into every day, woven inexorably into the fabric of the day’s events. A phone call here, a purchase there, a list made today and a schedule made tomorrow.
So far, everything is on track.
I’ve had a lot of things I’ve wanted to post about, but every time I’ve thought about sitting down to craft an entry about one of them, I decided that I would much rather leave the room instead. Absurdly, some days, temperature is one of the biggest deciding factors. After spending 8 or 10 hours working in this room, the combined heat of body temperature, dual-core computer, three widescreen monitors and related equipment is enough to send me scurrying for the relative cool of the opposite end of the house. (It’s no accident that said opposite end is home to my 57″ TV and bevy of game consoles.)
Speaking of games, we are almost upon the video game publisher’s favorite time of year: the Christmas season. After an almost completely dry year, in which I purchased only one video game (Grand Theft Auto IV, back in June), the fourth quarter has started to become home to a whole gaggle of extremely hot releases. To name but a few from my wish list:
Mirror's Edge: Faith overlooks the flow of the city
- Mirror’s Edge
- Gears of War 2
- Fallout 3
- Silent Hill: Homecoming
- Left 4 Dead
- Tomb Raider: Underworld
- Rock Band 2
- Midnight Club: Los Angeles
- Need For Speed Undercover
- Resistance 2 (PS3)
- CUBE! (Kidding.)
Mirror’s Edge is perhaps my personal favorite of the bunch. It’s an action game played from the first-person perspective, but takes the genre to a completely different place. Rather than playing the role of a muscle-bound guy with an over-the-top arsenal battling aliens or zombies, your character is Faith — a spry young woman whose proportions are actually realistic — ahem — and whose job it is to deliver covert information by hand. She’s called a “Runner.”
In the futuristic city setting of Mirror’s Edge, “Big Brother” government has come to fruition. All communications channels are monitored by the State. Faith and the other Runners exist as a human conduit of information, transporting hardcopied packets of data from one interested party to another via rooftops, tunnels and other roads less traveled. The game combines parkour, the French-originated extreme sport of free running, with urban exploration and political intrigue. And it does it all with a refreshingly bright and colorful style that takes the place of a typical game’s dark and gritty presentation.
Having played the “teaser” demo of Mirror’s Edge just this week, I can confidently say that this game has catapulted to the top of my “must-have” list for the year.
Oh, but I’m not done yet…not hardly. Klicken Sie hier:
