“You want to spend another 30 days in Southeast Asia?!”
“Yes, please.”
“Then you shall suffer!”
Leaving the big smoke smouldering behind on the horizon, you attempt
to seek some semblance of comfort within the cramped confines of the
minibus.
This isn’t easy for several reasons: the first being that
you are sharing the back row of seats with an assemblage of fellow
visa-runners who between them weigh more than the fucking van itself;
and secondly, of course, the guy behind the steering wheel appears to be
in a tremendous hurry – couple this with the shot rear suspension and
it’s a miracle you have yet to stipple the vehicle’s interior with a
recently digested Moo Sub Mama cup.
So, a mere 30 minutes into the journey and you have already sunken into a pit of woeful despair.
There’s
probably only one solution to your current plight; well actually
there’s two but one of them tends to see you banged up in the
Immigration Detention Centre for a fortnight before being escorted to
the airport and banished from the country for eternity, or two years, or
something like that.
No, the more – and I begrudgingly use the word –
sensible
option is to ask Khun Maniac-Driver-From-Hell to pull over at the next
available beer Chang retail outlet and purchase no less than seven large
bottles.
Advantage – you. Now you have the upperhand.
Although
you will morph into a most perturbing presence – and thrice-per-hour
comfort breaks will become a trend – Aranyaprathet, the last Thai town
before Cambodia, is met in fine fettle and you can now go about perusing
the many hundreds of quirky stalls at the border market.
Indeed
this is the trip highlight – unless of course you yield to the Cambodian
visa tout’s offer of a Vietnamese national with pretty eyes and, I
quote, “big milk”.
But for argument’s sake we’ll eschew this
option because it’s downright sordid, depraved and unwholesome
behaviour, said nobody, ever…
In amongst the market now and you
discover that while tourists go to Chatuchak in Bangkok, locals come
here, to Rong Klua. Indeed, walking around the entire market will see
you yomp passed an incredible five kilometres worth of, let’s face it,
tat – but very affordable and interesting tat nonetheless.
The
market is a nice prelude to the main event. Now surrounded by a mob of
Cambodian touts who, upon seeing you brandish a British passport, begin
to imitate Del Boy from
Only Fools and Horses, and much to your total awe and utter amusement, Vicky Pollard from
Little Britain,
you surmise through beer Chang-induced befuddlement that a little help
for a few hundred baht would actually be just the ticket.
And
before you ask, no, I do not require the services of a large-breasted,
Vietnamese lady or a whistle-stop tour of Cambodia in the back of your
1976 Toyota Celica.
With the tout having performed his magic, you
go through the motions and are presently stamped out of Thailand and
into Cambodia, where you spend your allotted three seconds buying cheap
cigarettes and whiskey, fanning yourself with the visa paperwork and,
dare I say it, holding your nose.
Poipet – the Cambodian border
town – has something of a fetid waft to it, not dissimilar to that of an
extremely ripe piece of Roquefort – but it definitely is not Roquefort,
if you know what I mean.
Back into Siam now, after having had
your visa extended and your passport subjected to varying degrees of
scrutiny, you pay the tout, trudge back to the minivan, forlorn at the
thought of another four hours of travelling but buoyed because it’s the
concluding leg of the trip, and take your seat, clutching the
freshly-purchased bottle of whiskey like a comfort blanket.
They say that only two things in life are certain: death and taxes.
They obviously forgot about the visa run.
I am sure, however, that there are those who combine it with a long-weekend in Miami, or a snorkelling fortnight in Fiji.
But for many it’s the minibus, and gulp upon gulp of Cambodian duty-free.
*hick*
Source:
Sukhumvit
*****
