Backtracking- McNair

This blog was typed on July 7th in Siem Reap, Cambodia.  Typos = YES!

"Only a few days after tapping out an iNote about the death of michael Jackson and I'm doing it again. However this note is about the death of Steve mcnair and is being composed on the skyrtrain in bkk- not at an airport. 
 
Mcnair's death didn't initially carry quite as much weight as mj's. Perhaps it was because the celebrities have been dropping like flies lately. It could have been that i had many other things on my mind at the time. Maybe I was just in an emotionally numb frame of mind when I found out (i'm not always the most emotional person you know). 
 
But when I was reading an update on titansonline today and saw the pictures of mcnair's days as a Titan my brain flashed back to hours spent camping out in stiffling heat for titans tickets. I remembered driving home from the games listening to titansradio eagerly awaiting their "insight" like a kid at Christmas. There are a few mcnair memories stuck in there as well. I remember going to a birthday party ernestine threw for him after one of the games, standing in the freezing cold with a sign that read "no practice, no problem" after he routinely won games without practicing and incuring a growing number of injuries, I also remember the moonshine man that would meet him in the ramada parking lot near the stadium and give him bags of clear mason jars.

 
Camping out for Titans tickets: Year 2
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Allumsia

In Thai, "allumsia" mean grouchy or moody.  I hate to sound like a girl, but I've definitely been moody as of late.  In fact, I don't even feel like typing out this blog; I'd rather sulk.  Only 9 more days in Bangkok and my emotions are toying with me like Geoffrey the giraffe. On the positive side of things, I've been having a great time catching up with old friends and trying to see everyone before I go.  Unfortunately, the result of having such a great time with friends is the immediate realization that it is one of the last "great times", and well, it's just depressing.  Bittersweet is definitely the word to describe my feelings, however I don't like it.  Bittersweet chocolate is amazing and ALWAYS brightens my day.  Bittersweet feelings are really just sad.

My fear is that my sadness will carry-over into my vacation and spoil the incredible time I should be having.  It's already overshadowed the excitement I would have had after purchasing a new netbook.  Hopefully, I'll pull myself out of this funk, and be un-allumsia again, but I have an awful feeling that my mind is going to be in an emotional purgatory for quite some time.

Backtracking:  Familiar Faces 

This blog was typed out on my Ipod July 26th.  I know there are typos- thanks.

"Just finished dinner at kao sarn road. It was the typical Japanese fair that I've come to anticipate each time I go to the crowded backpack hub. This time I wasn't with my usual Thai entourage: I met my guide from Nepal and his australian girlfriend. I hadn't talked to my guide since leaving Nepal but on the trek we exchanged emails because he said he had plans to visit bkk at some point. 
 
It's quite odd for me to see people i know from distant places here in Bangkok: Its like sticking a batman action figure in a doll house. 
 
This "displacement" was also a theme of my thoughts last week when chris smith was here. Our entire history as friends has been spent in Murfreesboro... Having him hanging out in Cambodia with me and one of my Thai friends was a blast, but so completely different than other trips I usually take. It was just as visually weird to see my parents walking out of a BTS station when they were here last year. 
 
His visit also brought to light something that had previously gone unnoticed: my friends here know nothing about my life before Thailand. I've mentioned friends and family from back home, but I'm not a big story teller and I tend to keep most important things to myself. For the most part i only relate to others based on the past 2 or 3 years here. I've missed inside jokes, sarcasm and basically the ability to be myself without having to worry about being rude or misunderstood... It's just as freeing as the opposite has been for the last 3 years."

Backtracking:  Trouble at Immigration

This blog was typed out on my Ipod July 4th.

"I'm standing in line at the Thai immigration counter semi-patiently 
waiting to leave this country.  My friends have already made it, but 
I've had to call my embassy and reconstruct my passport... We'll see 
if it works."
 

A little backstory.  Chris Smith had come to visit and we planned a trip to Cambodia.  My friend Honey joined us and because of my special work visa, I went through a seperate immigration line than they did.  They exited Thailand and were waiting for me in "No man's land" - the area inbetween the Thai and Cambodian borders.  I got to the counter and the grisly woman at thai immigration refused to stamp my re-entry permit on the last valid page because she claimed there wouldn't be a valid page for the Cambodian visa.  This was true, however Nepal and India had both placed their stamps on pages they shouldn't have, and well, Cambodia isn't exactly the most scrupulous country in the world.  Why the Thai officer was even concerning herself with this is beyond me.  The permanent scowl on her face let me know it wasn't to be nice. 

If you remember a few months ago I mentioned removing pages that had been added in my passport because they didn't match the original ones.  I have always kept the additional pages with me in case I needed to reattatch them at some point.  They are stuck into an existing passport with what is basically double-sided sticky tape. Standing at the immigration counter probably wasn't the best time to produce pages that had been ripped out of my passport, but I really had no option.  Explaining that the pages fell out didn't get me anywhere as she insisted I go back to the U.S. embassy in Bangkok (which was completely out of the question).  Had my friends not already crossed the border, this would have been quite an amusing situation.  She left no other option than to go back to BKK, so I went to find a phone and call the embassy. A group of touts selling Cambodian visas offered to "help" me out by putting the visa on one of the questionable pages for an extra $30.  They also suggested ripping out an old Cambodian visa and putting a new one in its place.  These were both viable options, but I wanted to call the embassy in hopes they would tell me to just stick the pages back in. 

Seeing as it was July 4th, the embassy was closed and the staff was probably pigging out on hotdogs and hamburgers at their annual celebration in BKK.  I kept pressing the emegency numbers and eventually got a Thai worker who screened my call and misinterpreted my problem to an American women who had obviously just been woken up from a nap.  I apologized for disturbing her holiday and explained my situation, substituting "I removed the added pages because they didn't match the rest of my passport" with "the extra pages weren't attached properly and they fell out".  She was very understanding and in a very professional tone said "stick those suckers back in there and see what happens." . . . and I'm proud to be an American...

I reattatched the mismatched pages with the blessing of the American government and walked back to the border.  The old angry lady kept switching booths to relieve other immigration officers for their lunch breaks.  She was in front of my line for 20 minutes and as I got closer to her I began to panic.  With 3 people in front of me, a friendly old man took her place and I breathed a collective sigh of relief.  He glanced at my passport and waved me on where I soon met up with Chris and Honey... Welcome to Cambodia for the 7th time.

The original passport design with a different state's seal on each page.
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The new design, with pictures on each page and "inspirational" American quotes.
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The original pages on the left, and the added pages on the right. 
You can see the clear plastic tape used to insert the new section on the left page.
Seeing as it wasn't very sticky, and the obvious design discrepancy, one could
easily understand why this might just happen to "fall out" until it was really needed.
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