I was awake around 6am with some noise ongoing and I decided to get up at 6.30 for the 3 S's to be ready and then had breakfast which was not bad, egg with rice and noodles. Left the hotel around 7.30 and got to the border control to find 4 Israelis taking their time going through the process. Thankfully I was able to get ahead of them and on the other side found a pickup to take me for 20 baht but then had to wait for it to really overfill up. The bus drove into Mae Sot and I got off at the last stop near the market and then made my way to the bus terminal and realised my phone had automatically updated the time for 30 minutes ahead so I changed my watch. At the bus station there were buses to Bangkok but they didn't look like moving and there was no ticket offices or local buses it also . I walked around the station but it didn't look like it was going to work and people pointed me in the direction of another bus station which was quite far so I could either go back where I'd come and take the pickup again as it had gone past there only I'd stayed on when I should have got off or I could try something different and I thought there should be some local buses or pickups so I went to the main road instead. I saw something that looked like it might be a bus stop but the people there were just motorbike taxi drivers and I really didn't want to take a motorbike with my heavy suitcase so we had a short but pointless not properly understood conversation before I walked on. I carried on and it was pretty hot and the suitcase wasn't rolling too freely but there were no buses and no pickups and not too many taxi either and it was only 1.7km to the bus station by now so I was thinking of just walking when one of the wheels on my suitcase really stopped working and I tried to look at it but it was too hot and burnt my fingers. It looked like I had lost a pin holding the wheel properly together and when I searched I couldn't find it so instead I just waited for a taxi who took me to the bus station and I got a ticket part of the way to Bangkok (Nakhon Sawan) as the direct Bangkok bus went later at 6pm. I'd had the wheels on my suitcase break in South America but at least there it had been after 3 months, this was just 1, and I was hoping I could maybe get some kind of fix done when I got to Bangkok. I saw a group of 4 Germans turn up at the bus station including what looked like Laura from Hsipaw. They agreed a price to Tak and disappeared while I filled most of the hours wait reading. I had been sweating and had also noticed a billboard for King Bhumibol and even though most people were not wearing black here I was in red so decided to change and the first dark t-shirt I came to was the one Mr Linn's wife had given me so I put that on and sat waiting for the bus which was supposed to leave at 12.30 but at 12.05 the woman came and made me get onto a little minibus where we then had to put the suitcase on the roof as the bus was full. The minibus was not even as far as Tak when it stopped for what turned out to be a police check and documents were looked at (not mine) and a woman and her son were taken off the bus before we carried on. After that the minibus stopped occasionally to let people off but then soon filled the seatsed again at the next stop and were arrived around 4pm at our stop halfway to Bangkok. I got out and our driver showed me to a person who helped me get a ticket for the next minibus and it all went well I got the front seat and they found space for my suitcase. I went to the 7-11 to get some food and a Thai man talked to me when I came out. His Dad had worked in the embassy in London so he had lived there. After I sat down and continued reading until the bus was ready to go and a tall guy I had seen at Mae Sot turned up so I asked how he had got here and he had been on a later minibus but the driver had gone really fast. The guy who turned out to be Canadian / Quebecois from Montreal had been doing meditation in Myanmar and was planning to spend a month in Bangkok. He was normally a clinical psychologist and we talked for a while before it felt we were disturbing the others too much as they seemed to just want to sleep. The bus made ok time and arrived around 8.30 at Mo chit on the main road not the bus station. I was a bit flustered thinking about which route to take and forgot to tip the driver (which I wanted to do as they had given me the front seat and found space for my large case). The thai embassy guy asked where we were going, the Canadian said downtown and the he agreed the skytrain was best, I said Khoasan road and the guy said to wait for the number 3 with him as it goes there. We went and sat at a bus stop and I showed him my hostel and he said I need to get off a stop before Khao san and he will tell me when. So we waited a while and a number 3 bus came but he said not that one we want the red one and as its Sunday there is not so many. We kept waiting and I couldn't read the bus numbers but he could and we talked a bit but I think I said something wrong as he didn't want to say much. We sat there over an hour when the bus finally came and he stood at the edge of the pavement and waved at the bus but the driver or conductor waved forward to show where they stop and carried on. I lugged my suitcase along after the bus but it stopped too far away and not for very long so we both missed it. He didn't seem to upset and wanted me to wait for yhe next one but I decided to take the train instead and then after a taxi and when I got off I had to walk one street to the hostel and make my way past a group of breakdancers before arriving pretty late at the hostel. For some reason to do with the hostel being new they couldn't find my booking but it was all ok and I shared a room with an English girl who turned out to be about 50 but still a party person called Lizzie. She was from Bristol and was going to take her daughter around Thailand for a few weeks when she arrived in a few days. I decided to walk around the block and see Khaosan road and there were so many people out and about with their shops snd stalls offering alcohol, massages, laughing gas, insects to eat, ping pong show etc. A lot of the people looked like the kind of tourist you might find in Ayia Napa or Ibiza.
I didn't know anyone and didn't really feel like a party so went back to the hostel where I joined Lizzie who was having a beer. A Phillipino girl joined us and later a Polish guy who lives in London and had spent 8,000 on a meal for 2 in a fancy restaurant here. Lizzie went to bed around 2 or 3 and I ended up going to bed at 4am.
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