Top Ten (because ten is a good marketing number.)

Danielle and I leave the Kingdom in seven days. More like six since we leave so early in the morning. As we have spent the last four months in Thailand, we have come to feel as if this is a home for us. We will miss many things, however, we are also looking forward to not having to deal with a few things as well.

So I present to you my top ten things that I will miss, and won't miss about Thailand.

I will miss:
1. Training and living at the same place. It rocks to able able to wake up and just go train whenever you feel like it. This is what I came here for and probably what I will miss the most.
2. Food. Thais cook great food both Thai and Western. It seems that they take a bit more pride in this than the average American eatery.
3. Cheap prices. I'm going to have sticker shock when I get back home. I'm used to $9 buying a great meal for two here.
4. Not having a job. It's great I love vacations.
5. Pervasive public transportation. You don't need to own anything to get anywhere in this city. Even buses will take you from city to city in Thailand and there's bound to be taxis of some sort there. Most of the time you can just walk to the nearest street and hail a cab like it's nothing.
6. Being very obviously different. For the first time in my life I am surrounded by people who can take one look at me and know that I'm not from around here. It's been a great learning experience and a wonderful change in perspective.
7. The abundance of healthy looking people. Sure there's a sickly one and a fat one here and there, but it's here and there. For the most part the Thai people seem to eat well and stay fit somehow. The most unhealthy looking people I've seen have all been old fat white men. Overall it's so much easier on my eyes here.
8. Great people and friendly locals. I'm supposed to be in one of the worst areas to find Thai hospitality and it's still wonderful.
9. Connecting with fighters from around the world. Every place has their own little ways of doing things. The boys from Crete like to follow through everything, and the Aussie has a different teep kick. The amount of new subtle techniques one can learn here is amazing.
10. Last but not least, all the great friends I've made here. I will especially miss ChaiPoom, the various trainers, and the brothers Boyd and Bird.

I will not be missing:
1. The pollution. I spent most of my time around Bangkok and I'll be glad not to breathe air like this for a while.
2. The communication gap. Although everyone pretty much understands each other now, new Thai people thrown into the mix make for those awfully awkward moments of "what tone was that?".
3. Farang tax. Even with the Thai people charging me extra as I am foreign, stuff is dirt cheap. But that's not the point, I know I'm being ripped off because of my skin color. Screw that I'd rather pay the expensive American price and not give you any of my money. Hence my lack of buying too much stuff here.
4. The Music. Everything here is pop music. Western pop is imported, along with J-Pop and K-Pop. All the hip-hop and metal are the popular variants. I hate pop music back home and I hate it here. Unfortunately here there seems to be no real underground scene. Just bands claiming to be different and sounding just like Bodyslam and other Thai Pop acts. It will be nice to go back home and get a real Death Metal show under my belt again.
5. Weird fish in the food. I hate ordering incorrectly as some of the seafood here is quite strange. No more, thanks.
6. Getting sick. I'm not used to the variants found here and my body is already taxed from training. Needless to say I will not miss the occasional undercooked food either.
7. Poor water piping. I can't count how many times our shower has randomly shot rust for a few seconds and then gone back to normal.
8. Lack of dryers. My clothes feel only half clean when air dried.
9. The weight machines being broken. I can't gain weight if I can't lift, and these machines snap their rusty cables after about 50 kilo. Thus I'm looking forward to finally putting some meat back on my bones after all this endurance training and sickness taking my weight down quite a ways.
10. Mosquitoes. I hate these things now. I rarely got bit compared to Danielle but they still made things hell for the both of us. Mosquito genocide sounds like a great idea, screw the fragile ecosystem.

Danielle is also doing this on her blog. Some things may overlap as we are writing at the same time and not cribbing off of each other.