The Smashing Meetup!

Oh darn!! How do I even begin writing an entry about the Bangkok meetup?! It's one of those things you have SO MUCH to talk about you don't quite know where to start.

So let's begin with the weather (I'm sorry, really, I am. I'm bad with introductions).

Okay, so the weather was NOT on our side. I arrived in Bangkok at 5pm. I got myself all settled in at some random guesthouse in the heart of KSR. By 7.15, i was all good and ready to go. Just as I was about to leave, it started pouring cats and dogs and elephants (yeah, that bad)! i did consider sitting in my room just waiting for 8pm and hoping for the rain to subside.. but I decided to brave the weather since the rain didn't look like it was gonna stop anytime soon.. and most of them were already there since.. i don't know 5pm!? haha!

Oh, being the real smartass that I am, I had forgotten bring an umbrella even though I knew Bangkok has been experiencing rainy weathers. Fortunately, i did manage to find some really uncool disposable poncho in my bag. I swallowed my pride, put on the poncho and left my guesthouse. I did receive some stares from the locals along KSR (because no one else was wearing an ugly disposable poncho). It didn't help that I had to stop a few times and trouble New over the phone because I could not find the bar.. only because it was pouring, really! i'm usually decent with directions hahahah! Anyways i did finally find the place but not before I had to wade through 10m of flooded area just to get to the entrance of the bar.. the water was up to my knees, jeez!

So while the weather was against us... everything else wasn't!! I entered the restaurant (Hippie De Bar). I just had to tell the waiter "i'm looking for my friends" and he pointed to the staircase. Walked up the stairs, turned left and as I was about to search high and low for familiar faces, i suddenly see a camera flash right in front of me. IT WAS JC!!! He probably managed to take a shot of my clueless face. I received a very waarrrmm welcome by every single person there it was so heartwarming! So JC, Josh, Tuktaa, Dodge, New and Victor were there when I arrived. Apparently some of them had already been there for hours. Andre arrived not long after i did and we concluded that we had quite a bit to catch up on because the rest had drunk quite a bit (especially Dodge!!!). Soon enough, everyone started streaming in by bits and pieces.. some came in carrying their shoes in their hands, probably because they had to walk through the same flood as i did.

Once we had full attendance of about 16 TBs in total, we were just living the place up, eating, chatting, laughing.. oh the place was so full of laughter, it was amazing! The party had not started yet, by the way.. this was just dinner! We were really noisy, trigger happy (there were a million cameras). . and we were certainly very happy! Everyone got along instantaneously and it did not look like most of us were meeting each other for the first time, not at all :)

I still remember Aioh telling Steph and I about her full moon party at Koh Phangan in July. Well it went something like this.

me: so how was the party??
Aioh: it was good!!! it was at the beach. There was Sex on the Beach (at this point we thought she meant the shots), i mean SEX on the beach!! oh yeah, uh huh!

hahahahahahah!!! i love Aioh, she cracks me up! :)

After dinner, we headed to the Gazebo for some partying. I shall not bother blogging about our time in Gazebo because the photos would probably do a better job. Let's just say everyone was crazy and having so much fun.. inevitably, some got droonnk over Tequila shots (i will not mention names!) ;) Alcohol was so cheap (I heart Bangkok!!)!! After Gazebo, some of us retired due to early flights/buses, some went home because they were too drunk :P while the rest of us headed out to grab some food at a 24hr pizza joint in KSR. This time round, we were more sane, clearly due to exhaustion. The night ended with Jear, Jason and I walking along KSR towards our hostels/guesthouses at about a quarter to six in the morning. I was my first time seeing KSR at that time of the day.. so calm, peaceful and quiet :) I've always loved the street in its bustling moments, so it really surprises me how much I could appreciate the calmness of it as well!

So i have about 200ish photos in my camera, most of which weren't taken by me because Jear had kindly taken over my camera in Gazebo and collected more incriminating evidences of craziness for the night (thanks Jear!). I believe Aioh has around the same number of photos and Steph's mega kickass camera has.. i don't know 400+++ photos (most of which she doesn't remember taken) ?!?! And then there was New's camera.. and Rini's, Erna's and Andre's?! In any case, every photo of mine is going up on TB.. No censorship because doing a quality check would be a little hard!

Okay, I may be bad with introductions but I'm pretty decent with conclusions. So I'm gonna end this entry right here and the rest of the story will continue from the photos- mine and others. The Bangkok meetup was a blast and I'm really sorry those who really wanted to be there had to miss it. I'm so glad I flew to BKK for the meetup (thanks for the peer pressure, JC!), it was definitely one of the highlights of my 2008. :)

Update: I've been trying to link up to the other blogs for a more well-rounded account of the meetup, so do check out their blogs!