Always Moving

I’ve been in transit since giving my notice in Everett, Massachusetts to my landlord, telling him that I was really moving to Thailand. He asked me three times to make sure this is what I really wanted and that I was really going to move. “Yes” I told him. From there, I moved in with a good friend who was kind enough to let me stay with her for two weeks. That was a lovely experience. After that, I moved home for one week and strangely enough it was a very long week and not in a bad way. I had built up Thailand in my mind for the past several weeks and was ready to be there already. In the week building to that move I felt as though my life was moving in slow motion. I was consolidating my life into seven storage boxes and trying to pack my clothes into two suitcases plus one mini carryon. I was also paying off bills and cleaning up my credit history with the intent of staying abroad for an extended period of time.

By the time I got to Thailand and had moved into my studio, I was glad to be there but horrified that my room smelled very much like the streets I walked through while exploring my new surroundings. There’s nothing more pungent than raw sewage mixed with humidity, people, animals and a thriving, flourishing city. This I discovered was the approximate smell of my studio when I turned on the air conditioning. Oddly enough, my bathroom smelled better, which worked to my benefit, as that was the best place to get an Internet connection. I would prop my laptop up on the closed toilet seat and squat on the floor as I checked email and Facebook. Still, this was not a life to live. I therefore began apartment hunting.

After finding a condo in a nice part of Bangkok, I decided to stay with friends so I wouldn’t have to pay an extra week for a place that made me gag.

With the help of a friend, I moved my three bags and laundry basket to their place in Petchaburi, next to the MRT (subway) and Airport Link. For one week, I slept on their oh-so-comfortable IKEA pull out sofa and went to work with my friend. This gave me an opportunity to learn the routes better, although I had to admit that I wasn’t as aware because I knew he knew where we were going. It’s like being the passenger in a car and not really paying attention because you know that the person who’s driving has it covered. It wasn’t until I moved into my new place that I really started learning my way around and screwing up in the process.

When the time came to move one final time, I packed my bags the night before so that when we left work and got back to the condo, we could load up a taxi and head on out. What I hadn’t anticipated was the overwhelmingly awful traffic that exists on Sukhumvit and Asoke. There’s no better way to describe it than an almalgamation of cars, trucks, buses, taxi’s, and motorbikes, all vying for a way down the street. Everyone is trying to get ahead but no one is moving. If we could have managed it, I would have suggested we take the subway, but it was just too cumbersome.

Therefore, once we loaded up the taxi and climbed in, we were underway. It wasn’t until we had pulled out of the condo’s roundabout that I noticed the meter was off. I mentioned it to my friend and the taxi driver began shouting and told us to get out of the taxi. He was hoping to make a profit on my move and had refused to turn on the meter. In turn, we unloaded the taxi and he sped off. We decided that the best way to get a taxi in this horrendous traffic was to move to the other side of the street, so with arms weighed down with luggage, we rolled the bags and carried the basket, across the crowded street. We weaved in between cars and managed to miss the speeding motorbikes that were also fighting for space. Once on the same side of the road that we needed to be on, we waved down taxi after taxi but to no avail. Once we mentioned Sukhumvit, no one wanted to pick us up. Stressing out that I was already over an hour late, I called my agent to apologize and he asked me how far away we were. I told him about the traffic and that without it, we were fifteen minutes but with it, it could be as much as an hour. He told me not to worry about it and I relaxed. After the sixth taxi however, I could feel myself starting to become desperate. After forty minutes of hailing taxis, one finally picked us up. We loaded up the taxi, climbed in and then didn’t move for twenty minutes.

Two hours later, we arrived at my condo. For someone who doesn’t like to keep others waiting, I felt awful for keeping my agent waiting for more than two hours. Although tired, he understood how terrible the traffic is in my (new) area and whisked me through the many steps of my leasing contract. After it was all said and done, he gave me the give and wished me a good night. At last, the moving was over, at least for this year.