Arrival in the Land of Smiles

I think I'm in culture shock! When I left the Bangkok airport, I did not have to fight through crowds of taxi walas and rickshaw walas. I actually got helpful information from a cheerful man selling bus tickets, even though the bus I needed was not available through his company. Then I stood at a shuttle bus stop, with about 50 Thais, and nobody even talked to me! It was crazy, compared to being in Pakistan. I was in for another shock when I was in a taxi and the driver had the meter working before I asked him (or begged him) to use it. He even offered to use his own phone to get directions to my guest house. The highway from the airport felt like a superhighway, and I saw brightly lit skyscrapers as I drove towards where I was staying. Can you believe, there's an automatic washing machine that I can use for free!

You may not get excited about that, but I haven't used a washing machine to do my normal washing since June of 2007. I'll have to use it just for fun.