Bye-bye, Bangkok

Wednesday, June 29
3:00 AM

Wake up with two hours of sleep and splash face with water. Sleepy bang, ask corner store clerk to ring a cab to the bus terminal. Two guards let me in, lights off all through the station. Buy the second ticket to the airport and read Sedaris until the overheads dim.

The rain is as bad as the typhoon the week earlier. Check in, boarding call, back to sleep. Wake up over Shanghai, back to the Chinese authorities. Passport, alien card, staple, stamp, transfer sticker.

Muggy out the airport, bullet to the tarmac. Six hours to the rooftop pool at the hotel, $18 a night. Find friends in the lobby, wet from fresh rain and heavy backpack sweat. Pull out a deck of cards and play Get Drunk.

Order buckets of booze and apple hookah, sit on plastic stools on the street. Talk about Skins and Misfits with Brits, argue with street scammers hawking dying roses and elephant sequined hats.

Head into a tattoo shop at 3:00 am to get feet and armpits inked. Back down to the street for more buckets. Stumble past lady boys, all rouge and slim waists. Turn down happy endings and pull a left onto our street.

Room 304 B, sleep.