Tuesday, October 8, 2019

A day that was spent well.

The day had begun on a depressing note that was an extension of an unpleasant episode that took place last night. The guy at the reception had misbehaved with my friend, Vijayakumar, who had asked for additional tea sachets and had added that the hotel should be lavish in the provisioning of such basic things to the guests.

The guy - sadly, an Indian married to a Thai woman - heard it as 'rubbish' and had taken off on that, bad mouthing all Indians saying that they needed everything free! Completely unaware of the episode, I'd called up the reception for the same stuff only to be told that I'd be supplied with it in the morning. And when I'd called him up this morning at 0600 hrs, he said that the house keeping staff would report only at 0800 hrs and I'd to wait until then. Mind you, this is happening in the hospitality sector!

Anyways, on our way to the day's event at around a half past 8, his boss, Crees, was apprised of the matter and the matter was resolved amicably after an apology was tendered by the errant staff.

The day's event was our visit to the Cocoa Island. It involved changing two speedboats midstream which was difficult for Lekha and a few others in the group but Lekha, being a fighter, gave it all her heart and all her soul and did brilliantly well to tide over the difficulties. Parasailing, snorkeling and handling water scooters were the activities and we were on a spectator mode. A nice lunch was served on completion and after an hour's break in our hotel, we were taken on a city tour by Mr. Chang who became our guide and photographer. The visit to the Gem Museum, followed by the trip to the hill temple, gave us nice sights of the city of Pattaya.

We, then, had returned to our room to give Lekha's feet a much needed rest and had ordered dinner to our room. Our friends had gone for the evening outing and once they were back, insisted upon us to join them which we utilised for a freewheeling conversation.


Tailpiece.

Two queries were uppermost in my mind after having spent so many days in Thailand viz.:-

 (a) Why does the Hotel Grand Bella, that
       thrives on Indian tourists, misbehave
       with them? It needs to stop this
       practice forthwith.

 (b) Why does flesh trade thrive in this
       proud and well behaved country? The
       sight of very young girls soliciting for
       customers, in the vicinity of Walking
       street, was a depressing sight.

I'm of the opinion that a country whose citizens are very well behaved - seldom use their vehicular horns even in the thickest of traffic - deserves a better deal.

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