Because You Are Thai

“Thida, you should come with us to see how it is in Japan.” Said one of my customers.  He went to Japan quite often. 

There were two other ham shop owners agreed to go together. Applying for the Visa was difficult.  We had to line up at 7 am. –[ worst than going to India] to get the numbering and got the number from those who came earlier than us, to take the number for sale.

This was my second trip abroad, and yes, I only followed the leader.

Water and Salt

The men enjoy the flight’s wine and I enjoy the music.  I did not remember the arrival time to Narita airport, only remember that the train was so nice, and it took 2 hours to Tokyo, and we reached the hotel very late at night.

It was Prince or Princes hotel, not sure, that was too close to the train station to get any transportation, and too far for walking with a big baggage. 

I was surprised when opening the door of the room!  I had never seen anything so compact like that.  The room was about 1.5 x 2.5 meters, including the bathroom. 

I did enjoy seeing the way they utilized all the space, very impressive.  My leader might have enjoyed it less, for he was about double the size of me and much higher.

Put my baggage over head then went to join the team to fill the empty stomach.  No other food available except those at the vendors in front of the train station.

I ordered noodle.  The man asked me whether I wanted Shashu – a piece of pork, or seaweed or.. etc.. and how many pieces of them.. This was strange to me.. We had everything already put in the noodle bowl in Thailand, not so many choices like this.

One of my pride was that I could eat almost everything.  Japanese food was also what I was used to.  But the pride was rocked with the first bite!!.  The soup was pure hot water, salt, and pepper.. The cost was about 250 Baht, while the tasty noodle I had in Bkk would be only 15 Baht at that time.

I looked at my friends’ faces.  All faces showed the same impression.. :-)

Amazing Hams

We went to Harumi ham fair on the next day.  We queued up for the taxi, and suddenly the rain fell in the sunshine, and from being sweating we were shivering.

From the taxi we ran up and down the sky trains.. very confusing.

The ham fair was amazing.  We went around up to each one’s interest.  What I like the most was the electronic studying kits that the old smiling hams set for the young children.  I looked for a long time at a Yagi antenna made from bbq sticks wrapped with foil.  The sticks were standing alone on a piece of foam, no electrical contact.  Each element had a small bulb that was lighten up each time we pressed the PTT.  The bulb at the driven element was the brightest and the far most director was the fainted.  It made me understand right away about the – inductivity -  This was very cleverly done.

I went up stairs to see the clubs’ exhibition and found many interesting clubs, for example, the disable ham club.  They made many nice equipments for the disable to enjoy ham radio, such as the cw readable receiver for the deft and the brail transmitter for the blind.  I was really impressed.

I also looked around the flea market but I was not a technical ham, I could only look, while the engineer friend had bought a few spectrum analyzers.  I wished I knew about it at that time.  It would be very good to do some test for the magazine.  He had used them for his shop for over 10 years, very worthwhile.

The Ham Shops

We Visited  many radio shops.  The equipments were fantastic also the displays.  Every shop owner invited for coffee or tea.  And that night, it was difficult to sleep.  I carried back a lot of catalogs and posters, to give to my ham shop customers for their decoration.  It was VERY heavy so we bought a small cart and pull them.  But to get into the airplane I need to carry.  A friend had helped me carry half of them.

Free Beer

By the way, the rest of the food was VERY good.  The price was not that high comparing to the quality.  Since the menu was in Japanese, hanging over the counter, and non of us could read.  Sometime I walked around, looked at each dish and asked the one who were eating to order for me.. They liked it and laughed.  It was like a contest, the one who was selected would proudly order for me   it was fun for them and for us also.

We had Ramen once.  There were blended dried chilly but it was not any hot taste.  Our Ramen was very red and the Japanese looked at it with fear.

We had food in a restaurant once.  The food was nice, and suddenly we got 2 bottles of beer served.  We told them that we did not order.  The owner of the restaurant said it was complimentary because we were Thai.  He used to have Thai staffs and they were very nice that he was so impressed in Thai people.. He told us and said it again in Japanese for all customers to understand.  They gave him and us a big hand.

Night Life in Tokyo

Each evening after dinner we traveled around.

One night we were at Shinjuku.  A few youngsters were singing and dancing.  My shoes ware not proper for that heavy walking and my feet hurt.  We could not find any open shop to buy shoes.  I walked around Shinjuku in socks only.. Finally we found a pair of sandals.

The other night, I saw many shops full of pinball games, and full of young fathers and mothers with their kindergarten uniform children. I wonder how the children grew up to be like.  There were a lot of shops like this.  All were large and there were about hundred people played.

There were many other games shops that you dropped your money in and saw whether you would be lucky to get more money out.  There was horse racing game that if you put a coil into a number and it was the winner number, you would get a lot of coils.  There was a box that had a lot of coils.  You could see that, only another coil in, all plie of coils would fall down to you.  But when you put the coil in, your coil would be inserted under  the pile and it looked like the pile would fall with the next coil. 

There were many other different gambling games like that.  I observed them one by one and wonder why so many people still wanted to take the risk. 

The Sex Show

One of the nights we were in a ‘red road’. There were many restaurants and the guys selling x VDO and show tickets.  All the friends were hesitated because they had a woman in their team.  I told them I did not mind, for I had never seen also.

We went into an air conditioning room.  There were about 50 audients.  My friends stayed in the most front seats.  There were ladies took off their cloth and danced in sexy movements.
The last show, the lady gave wet tissue to anyone who wanted, including my friends.  She told them to clean their hands then she opened her legs for them to touch.
All my friends who had just known what was going to happen, cried out laud and jumped over to the back seats.. all other audients were laughing..

Amazing Hong Kong

We stopped in Hong Kong, visiting radio shops.  The team ordered the radio there and brought them into Thailand illegally.. To my surprise, it was so easily.  A friend bought a VDO camera, color viewfinder.  It was very new.  He bargained for half the price for 2 of them, his an mine.  The owner of the shop was very angry so we left the shop and he called us back, did a little bargaining and the cameras were sold.  They offered us zoom lenses.  After the bargaining they were also sold and the owner was complaining and complaining.. very long face.. I would like to tell him that, if the selling caused him so much painful , we were willing to buy from another shop..

Flying Dishes

The food was nice.  The owner was the cook himself.  He threw the dishes from the head of the table to the tail of the table as if he was angry.  However, the food was good.. hi hi

Toysarus

I was told taht tt was the biggest toys shop, so I had tried hard to see whether I could get some toys for my 2 little darlings at home.  The place was very large, very difficult to look for a proper toy.. and the place was full of screaming and crying and shouting. The parents and the children did not agree in the same toy.. I told myself, I would never bring my kids to a place like this.

A few years later, there was a place called Toys’ World in Thailand.  My children was about 4 and 6 years old.  I told them I would like them to go and see the toys in the shop, and what I had seen and was afraid of.  If they did agree that we would discuss before buying anything, to see whether it was educational and not expensive, we could go.  They promised. 

We went to the place and they kept their promises very well.  There were children that were screaming to their parents and my kids looked at them like something strange.  We never had anything like that in our family.
Finally, my two little angels got 2 small toys..educational and not expensive.
Their father could not stand it, and bought them additional big and expensive toys.. :-)

That was the second time abroad, and the only time to Japan.  I planed to go to the ham fair again this year, with the engineer friend who was there together.  From starting the radio business at that time, he is now the biggest radio importer.  He would bring his son and I was to bring my son along.  This time, getting the Visa was very easy. He had visited Japan, but I had back and ankles problem, and missed the trip.  What a pity..