European Customer Service!

There's nothing like overpaying for something, and getting treated like shit!

I'm a Cheap Bastard!

There's no denying it. Ever since I arrived in Europe, I can't help comparing prices here to prices in Asia. It's one of the reasons I hitchhiked from Turkey to the Netherlands, and it's the main reason I haven't been drinking so much.

When I was waiting for a ride at a highway rest stop in Germany, I paid three Euros for a liter of water. That's $4.50 for a fucking bottle of generic water. They didn't even bother with the pretense of claiming it was from some sparkling pure spring. Granted, that's an extreme example, but you get the idea. It cost $1 just to use the toilet.

I usually can't stand when people are whinging about money all the time. It's a horrible habit to have when traveling. When someone is complaining about costs and prices and how they save money by doing this, and by not doing that, their focus is not on the present moment of being somewhere new and different, and it annoys the shit out of anyone in earshot.

I never whined too much until I got to Europe. I had enough money to not have to count pennies as long as I was making at least a half-assed effort to travel on the cheap. A nice sit-down meal now and then? The occasional taxi ride? A private room here and there? No problem when meals are four dollars and shared rooms aren't much more.

Those days are long gone. I can't afford to pay $45 for a room every night. Hostels in Amsterdam – fucking bunk beds in mildewy hovels – are up to $50 a night on the weekends. I had to rearrange all of my plans, confusing the hell out of my mother and myself as I tried to find cheap places in different cities on short notice.

Yesterday in Bruges, I kept refusing my mother's suggestion that we buy a little something to share since I had a quarter loaf of bread, some cheese slices, and salami in a bag swinging off my shoulder. I was determined to make a sandwich with what I already bought to save me a few dollars.

I'm becoming a cheapskate downer and it's getting bad.

Down and Out in Bangkok

When I got to Nong Khai station just over the border in Thailand, I wasn't too worried that the ATM there didn't give me cash. "Don't expect that ATM to work," an American told me as he smoked a cigarette next to his duffel bag. "I use that bank in Bangkok all the time, I think it's just that ATM for some reason. Its happened to me before."

I did start to get worried when I arrived in Bangkok the next morning though. None of the ATMs at Hualamphong Station worked. None in the subway worked. It was 7AM and no banks were open, and when they did open, none could give me a cash advance. I was finally willing to ask the French guy with a wen that I rode on the train with for help, but he had long since departed the station.

I had $42 left over from Cambodia and I changed $41. The guy at the bank didn't like the wrinkles in one of my ones. Anal, whatever.

The lady at a hostel told me the bed was like $20, but I could pay later, so I took it, assuming I'd work out my money issues. When the banks opened, nowhere was able to give me a cash advance. I walked probably 8 miles around Bangkok because I didn't think I could afford to take a scooter or the subway if I really wasn't going to get any money. My card wouldn't work at Au Bon Pain in the mall, one of the only places I thought would accept it as payment, so I had to blow my precious cash for the food I ordered.

I started to consider my options: pay an outrageous fee to Western Union and have my parents send me cash, and then either continue trying to hitchhike to India from Phuket, or get the hell out of Thailand. I couldn't go back through China because this shit went down the very day my second entry expired. I could give up my goal on traveling overland and fly. I could go to Cambodia, and take out a shitload of US dollars and come back through Thailand changing those. Nothing sounded very appealing.

To make a long dull story a short dull story, my bank, which completely blocks all transactions in Thailand, finally unblocked my card on my second call to the customer service people, after chastising me about not telling them I was going to Thailand and not having a back-up plan. I was on the verge of eating out of a dumpster and sleeping on the streets. Bangkok is bad enough with money, without it's a nightmare. Once I got the word that my card would work the next morning, I used the last of my cash to feed my growling stomach and rest my shoddy knee which had flared up from all the walking in the sun all day.

That's my tale of hardship - a whopping day on the streets (except when I was relaxing in the hostel waiting for the banks in America to open). Oh, and the bed at the hostel turned out to be $10, she just quoted me two nights for some reason. I guess I should get some traveler's checks. Also, if anyone wants to send me a shitload of cash or a credit card, please feel free.