Toe Woes

After flying from Delhi via Singapore, we arrived in Bangkok airport at midnight. We skilfully dodged the taxi and hotel touts in the airport and managed to find the local bus to the city. We arrived at the famous backpacker street, Koh Sahn, at three in the morning, not long after the nightclubs and bars all close and push the partygoers out the door. So, our first impression of Bangkok was hundreds of swaying, boozy eighteen-year-olds. It felt just like Melbourne at 3 on a Saturday morning!

We found ourselves a guesthouse where the staff were still awake and got comfortable. At this point we realised that Marty's toe, which had become cut and infected during the trek in Nepal, was infected again. Time once more to see the doctor.

We went to a hospital which was eerily quiet and, being an Adventist hospital, contained curious paintings of medical scenes in which Jesus was literally showing the doctors the way. The doctor said that the toenail had become ingrown and would require surgery, and that she could do it right then if we wanted. Not wanting to delay the inevitable, Marty decided to go under the knife then. A couple of hours later, he was being wheeled out of the hospital, minus part of a big toenail and a few hundred dollars but with a couple of new stitches.

For five days Marty was unable to walk much and stayed almost entirely in the guesthouse. Luckily there was an acoustic guitar there which came in handy for the dull days. Once the toe had healed somewhat we decided to move out to Cambodia to begin our South East Asia travels in earnest.