Two years ago next month, my job — the Old Job, to be specific — sent me to Bangkok to do the press check for our membership directory. Not being a complete idiot, I took a couple of weeks of vacation while I was there.
The only downside of the trip was that I was by myself. I’ve traveled solo before and have no qualms about dining and sightseeing alone, but I didn’t realize how much I would miss having someone to talk to. I’ve always been on my own either in the US or other countries where English is the dominant language, so I could just talk to the locals when the need for conversation got to be too much. Not so on this trip. Granted, the Thais and Cambodians had way more English than I had Thai or Khmer, but it was still not enough for more than an exchange of pleasantries. And thus, I texted my sister. A lot. She’d been to both Thailand and Cambodia before, so she could ooh and aah along with me more easily than most. Unfortunately, my Treo freaked out upon my return from the trip and repairing it erased the memory, including our entire “conversation.”
This week, though, Eileen surprised me by emailing me a transcript of my texts. She’s getting a new phone and didn’t want my in-the-moment travelogue to be lost forever. It’s kind of interesting, I think — I hope not just to me, since I’m sharing it here. I’ve edited it only to correct typos and take out names, except where noted. I’ve left in the cryptic remarks that would probably make more sense if her side of the conversation were there. Oh, and the date and time stamps are off by 13 hours — the difference between Southeast Asia and US Central time.
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