New Bicycle

So I wasn't diggin my gym since I'm lazy and it was overcrowded even at 11PM.

My theory is to ride a bicycle around and learn how to do wheelies on it.

It's all theory of course but it's in detail right here.

http://tricktrack.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=1218&p=158550#p158550

was this

is now this

Never Fly China Eastern Airlines

I had to take this airline from Shanghai to BKK and it was the worst flight ever. I swear this plane was built decades ago but hadn't been revamped since the 80s. It had one central TV on the front bulkhead and it only showed Chinese infomercials. The meal consisted of prepacked snacks which doesn't sound bad until you realize onion flavored cookies, yes onion, and pickled turnips don't make for good snacking.

The worst bit was all the Chinese people on the place were rude and loud. It was 10PM and usually people are quiet and sleeping on a night flight in the US. Since many of these people had never flown before they were all talkative and rowdy. Yelling to friends several rows away and getting up constantly.

Now I know where Monty Python comes from because I swear it was like a flying circus. If I was supposed to die on a plane, that was it.

Note: Even on an international transfer; in Shanghai you have to deboard, get your luggage, go through customs, and recheck all your luggage on the next flight. Pay the extra and skip China as a layover.

10 Nov. Marshall comes to BKK

My old roommate from RI came to visit for 5 days. So we did some tourist stuff. First night I took him to Soi Cowboy where all the nudie bars are, he was impressed by the hot chicks. The next day I just showed him some malls as he was hung over.

Then we went to the Jim Thompson House. This guy introduced the West to the Thai silk industry in the mid 1900s. He vanished in the woods one day; I assume he was eaten by a jaguar. We also caught Wat Pho, where the reclining Budda does that.

Later we went to the old capital Ayutthaya and saw some temples with my buddy Bob. Lots of large cock, as in chikens, statues in this town.

Then we hit up some Muay Thai boxing. We paid $60 for ringside seats and saw 6 fights. These guys were from 12 to 20+ years old and 90-139 pounds but they all fought hardcore. They fight 5 rounds, 3 minutes each round. The second fight we saw lasted 15 seconds as a guy got knocked out from a kick to the temple.

We later took a river boat ride around BKK and saw Wat Arun and the Grand Palace in BKK. I also showed him Nana, where all the ladyboys hang out. Although married with a kid, Marshall now knows he's gay because the ladyboys are seriously good looking. Check the Picasa for all the pics. http://picasaweb.google.com/ttakata73

Chiang Mai trip & new bike

So I've been looking for a good deal on this bike all year. Missed an opportunity a few months back, but last Monday I saw a 2009 Kawasaki D-Tracker 250 for 100,000BHT (~3000USD) with only 1300 KMs on the odo. These things are 150K new, so saving 33%; I had to snatch it up. It was located in North Thailand, Chiang Mai, 740KMs (500 miles) away. My friend Jay wanted a road trip on his 2 week old Ninja 250 so he came along. We went to the train station in BKK, and he loaded up his bike on the train for $20. We split a first class cabin, a ticket is $35 each for the one way trip. The train left at 6:30PM and got in around 8AM. It would be a lot faster but it must have stopped at 15 other train stations along the way. It's comedy the various noises a shitty old train makes as it moves along. It was impossible to sleep more than an hour before some crazy noises or bumps would wake me up. I actually laughed trying to sleep because it felt like they purposefully put noise making machines under the train. It was hard to get clear pics while the train was moving. Got a decent breakfast on the train for $6 too. Jay told me they literally had guys lift his Ninja off the train. Chiang Mai is the 2nd largest city in Thailand and why they don't have a ramp at the train station is a mystery. Oh yeah, these people are a bunch of idiots.

So the guy selling the bike was Andrew from the UK and he was kind enough to pick me up. He'd been living here for 10 years and the bike is too tall for him. After taking it for a spin and looking it over, I paid the man and we went to get the paperwork done. I decided to keep the Chaing Mai license plate so I can pretend to be a lost tourist in BKK when I get pulled over. Smooth transaction at the DMV, 30 minutes and $20 to do the transfer.

So now that we both had bikes, we rolled into town to find a hotel. We got rooms for $35 a night right in downtown. We got some great German food for dinner and then hit the bars. The town was dead, all the past redshirt activity really killed tourism here. Seriously I saw maybe only 200 tourists the 3 days I was there.

The next day, I wanted to check out the Kawasaki dealer. Turns out its a franchise so they sold a lot of aftermarket parts in addition to the bikes. My friend got a carbon Yoshimura pipe and some frame sliders put on and I got an aluminum TwoBros muffler. Twice the cost as usual but I wanted the extra power for the long ride home.

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So after the bikes were modded, we rode up the local mountain road to Wat (temple) Doi Suthep. The ride up was very smooth and twisty, much like Boulder Canyon Road or Glendora Mountain Road. My GoPro's memory card ran out so I don't have any video of fast riding. Here's a vid of us leaving the temple, but its lame and the sound cuts out for some unknown reason.

This new muffler is the loudest and most obnoxious thing I've ever heard, around 110db where the stock pipe was 86db. I have since ordered a silencer insert. I started to ride with my foot down like the MX guys do, different than the sportbike thing, but just as fun. The wat is on top of a mountain so it had some stairs, but once up top, there were great views of the city.

I was surprised to see a handicap ramp but notice how steep it is and they put two bends in it. Oh well at least they're trying.

After 2 nights in town we started the ride back home. I didn't know what it would be like in between the 2 cities so I brought extra innertubes, tools, gastank, and survival gear. So the bike had some 75 pounds of extra junk on board but I just stiffened up the suspension and it wasn't really noticable. I managed to max out the bike at 142KMH (88mph), it was very stable where my scooter only likes to go 110KMH. The ride out of town was like riding in Western PA, smooth concrete highways and 2 hilly sections, but nothing difficult. At night and the first rain we were taking it easy and I saw a 3 foot long monitor lizard run in front of me. I made a gesture and rode on, but Jay split it in two. It was too late and wet to avoid so he just rode over it. Unfortunately he didn't tell me till later, I would have loved pics of that. After being on the road for 7 hours I called it a night and got a motel. Jay kept going and rode all the way back in a total of 12 hours. The next afternoon I rolled into BKK and managed to see this cool mountain range on the way. My new muffler is so crazy it melted my turn signal, sidebags, and fender. No matter since I'm going to mod the hell out of this bike anyway.

The night I got back I went to a party and they had these FHM magazine girls but I was so tired I left at 10PM and passed out.

Planted nano freshwater fishtank

I'm not allowed to have any fish or pets in my apartment but I caved in and got a 5 gallon (~1 cubic foot) fishtank anyways since its small enough to hide. Too small for saltwater; so I decided to go with a planted freshwater and stuff it full of shrimp and small fish. The tank is cheaper here, ~$70 with the hood, light, and filter but everything else like the dirt, plants, fish, food, etc is about the same as in the US. I probably dropped $200 in all but it was well worth it. Hopefully by the end of the year all the plants will be grown in and it will look like a jungle.

You may ask what that lead weight is doing? Its keeping that moss ball tied to the deadwood. I'm hoping the moss will spread and cover the twig and end up looking like an underwater tree. I had to use toothpicks to keep some plants from floating away as they have no roots yet. I just zone out and watch the tiny shrimp and fish do what they do.

Redshirt aftermath

Well I got out to the Siam area of BKK where a lot of the junk happened. They burned down what was a nice big mall, Central World. Glad I wasn't around when this shit happened. The city acts normally again but I see less tourists now which is a good thing. I'm sure the corrupt government will continue as usual now.

Stupid RC project.

So some clown posted an RC build contest and I had nothin better to do.

Check out the link if you're bored.

http://www.scale4x4rc.org/forums/showthread.php?t=47810

Honda Riding School

So my friend wants to buy a Kawi Ninja 650R but he's never ridden a bigger bike. His gay 110cc scooter has 5 HP and weighs 150 pounds, but now he wants to jump to a 75HP, 450lb bike. Having almost lost it on several occasions on my big bikes and knowing how crazy it is riding in BKK, I recommended he go and ride a big bike so he can get an idea how fast and heavy they are.

So Honda has a driving school in the city, and its only $6 to ride small 150cc bikes all day long. They charge $100 if you want to ride the big 600/1000cc bikes. I was cheap and just rode the little bikes. I rode a Honda CBR150, a cool little sportbike. Then a Sonic 125, a manual scooter, then I took my own scooter out on the track which was way boring as there's no shifting. Then they let me ride an old police bike, a VFR750. It was a locomotive, 550 pounds and lots of torque. Here's a video of me on the CBR150 doing the slow course. The camera has a 180' wide angle lens so it looks like I should go faster, but it was pretty narrow in places.

The day was mostly about slow riding and agility which was so boring I ended up experimenting by riding with one hand, riding on the back seat, and riding standing up. At the end of the day we did 10 minutes of high speed which was fun. Kinda boring for me, but for $6 it was a great way to spend the day. My friend has a long way to go, but he's going to buy that Ninja big bike tomorrow.

Redshirt protests, awesome!

Many have asked if I'm OK here since all the protests are happening. So far yes, but it's beyond my control and I'm not going to live my life in fear and hide out for months while these guys figure shit out. I support them protesting the illegal government and if I was a Thai I'd join them. They've shut down half the city by blocking roads and camping out. I ride through their gatherings all the time: not by choice, I just don't know where they roll and I run into them. Here's a vid of a bunch of them riding by my neighborhood, they just kept coming and coming so I got bored and went to see Clash of the Titans.

This vid is my first ride through their main gathering point back on April 4th. It was early and no one died yet so things were mellow, but notice how many blocks they took over. I turned the camera off because it got boring.

This video is from April 12th, I was on my way home and got detoured as the mobs were growing, this is the time people started dying.

Lastly is a video my friend made of the more recent gatherings in the main tourist shopping area called Siam. I rode through 5 blocks of this area on April 17th but it was raining so I knew they weren't going to be violent. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMWoJjbtERQ

Since I look Asian they don't stop me driving through their barricades. Guess I'll probably end up being a casualty of a bomb or something. Some Japanese photographer was killed and a bomb went off 2 miles from my place. Whatever, beats being in the Middle East and it's not a shark attack. I bet more people are killed in LA every week than they do in a year here so its no big deal. I remember some dude got shot one block away from me in South LA. I'd be more concerned living in Detroit, Atlantic City, or New Orleans than in BKK.

I'm hoping that all this protesting will reduce tourism forever. Thai people are getting greedy and lazier because jackass Westerners and tourists are paying too much giving them easy money. I don't see where the Thais get off charging 40% import duties and $5 for a crap beer at a club when the infrastructure of the city is so pitiful. There's definite discrimination here, they automatically double or triple rent and product prices just because you look Western. The cops charge me $6 a moving violation, the Thais pay a dollar. You think American politics are corrupt? Well at least some money makes it back to making America look nice: paving the roads, clean water, and educating its people. All the money the Thais take is never put back into making the country, its people, or businesses better. It all ends up in some politician's bank account while the country continues to look like a shithole. My friends tell me there was a time when you took a girl home and she would cook you breakfast and wash your dishes in the morning. Not anymore. I've paid $10 to have my tiny apartment cleaned and my microwave is still filthy. I can clean my place better than these so called professionals. In a global sense this place is like New Orleans, if it vanished it wouldn't matter. The people and business done here is not advancing society, in fact Thailand is just polluting the Earth and doing nothing to better it. Don't get me wrong its still dirt cheap and awesome to live here, I just want to keep the idiots in check by bringing them down. Yay, Revolution!!

Songkran Water Festival

April 12-15th is the old school Thai New Year's celebration. Really its just a good way to fight the humid peak of Summer so the whole country shuts down and parties by hosing people down. Everywhere you go there are people throwing water at you, but during the day its kinda refreshing. I got some lame squirt guns to fight back; next year I'm going to have to import some Super Soakers. I was riding my scooter and kids threw buckets of water at me. Good thing my visor was down as some got me flat in the face at speed. I couldn't get pics of the wetness riding, so these pics are from Soi Cowboy, the main gogo bar street.

People were getting wasted and wet, but they pretty much stop the wetness at night since people get cold. For some reason they like to smear baby powder on you too. The black guy is my buddy Karl from LA. He's trying but having a hard time getting a girlfriend, they all say "no, you have too big banana". Black man can't get a break anywhere.

Tamiya Model Show

I like my scale models so I learned of this small model show at a shopping mall in East BKK. It was a tiny show, but probably the biggest in Thailand as no one has time or money for goofy hobbies here. I was really impressed by how many great, museum quality, models there were.

Sadly its hard to get a sense of scale and detail in these pics but a good example is this 1:700 boat here. My dick is bigger than this model and I have a small dick, but this model has so many small details. I could never model the tiny wires all over this ship, I don't even know what the wires are made of as they are thinner than any wire or fishing line I've ever seen. I wanted to buy it.

The planes, motorcycles, and boats were the best but some of the cars were cool too. Almost all of the 80 iphone pics I took are models that will fit in the palm of your hand. I wish I brought a real camera as these pictures don't do the models justice. Many looked like the real thing; that's impressive.

Don Wai Floating market

Well, me and 3 scooter dudes rolled out to this place for lunch. It's about an hour West of where I live. Nothing too special, a temple (check out the giant chicken statues) and a floating market. I dig the car engined boats and the large plant islands floating down the river. Good food.

2010 Bangkok Motor Show

Last week was the big motor show for Thailand, cars and bikes. The bike section was very small, just a few manufacturers and fewer parts shops, probably 10 booths in all. Considering 75% of rides here are bikes it seemed odd they don't have much at the show.  It was just half a hall so it's like 20% the size of the Long Beach cycle show. No new bikes I was interested in either...weak.

The car sections were bigger but maybe a third the size of the LA show. One nice thing is they have lots of models dancing and doing acts to show off the new rides. I'm surprised America doesn't hype their shit up like this. They seem to love their CNG powered cars here which is cool but no hybrids yet. I learned a Mini costs more than a 3 series BMW because it is re-assembled differently. There were a few concept cars and bikes, but the highlight was the MB SLS gullwing. I'm sure that will sell for a million+ here. Well there's lots of hot models on the Picasa.

dumbest mistake I've made in a year

Last year I dropped my motorcycle headlight which cost me $475 to replace so now I've done this.

I was riding the scooter Saturday out to Bang Na and rode through several parades of the red shirts that are protesting the illegal government that is in place here, kinda like how George Bush fucked Al Gore in the ass.

Getting tired of constantly taking my iphone out of my pocket to take pics and video of these parades I then placed it into a deep 6" scooter pocket for easy access. I figured if I had a box of change in there for months and a lock in an even shallower pocket and they never moved; my phone should be safe.

I walked the Central Plaza Mall in Bang Na, enjoyed a cat show for 15 minutes, and had a crappy steak at Santa Fe.

Their $15 dollar imported New Zealand T-bone was so small and lame I went to McDonalds after and enjoyed a double cheeseburger more. Now it was dark.

So I'm hauling ass home and the road has few lights; it was dark. I hit this little whoop-dee-doo construction strip at 60-70 kph. It was the perfect speed and perfect angle that my iphone flew out of the bike but I was too slow to try and catch it. I pulled over to the side and found it in the middle of the road. A car ran over it and it looks like this. $730 wasted.

What shall we learn?

Never put shit in a scooter pocket.

Electronics Show

There's a convention center called Queen Sirikit and they had an electronics show. I really don't care for this sort of junk since I've been to CES 3 times, but my friend wanted to go and I had nothing better to do.

We strolled through for 3 hours and I must have seen over a hundred hot girls. Sadly the iphone didn't allow me to take many photos. Nothing interesting or new by way of electronics as one expects from a poor country like Thailand. There were a lot of show girls with big ugly poofy dresses, almost as bad as those pregnancy dresses girls wear in the US.

BKK Naval Ship/Mangrove forest

So my German buddy Helmut, plotted out a scooter ride to see a small military museam. We rode 30KMs South and rolled into this place with an old British scout ship. There were also some artillery bunkers and a mangrove forest on site. Not many people here at all and they let anyone walk around wherever they wanted.