from a different planet

went to the book fair in queen sirkit convention centre yesterday with a friend, and was struck by a familiar feeling...
it happenend a few times before, not too common since bangkok is such an international city.
first time was when the staff at pla dib (bar/restaurant where i work) invited me to come with them after work to a place they know. under the expressway near our soi there is a snooker club and outside there is a "restaurant" consisting of some tables and chairs and an outdoor kitchen. they serve the spiciest food i have ever tried to digest, from the northeast region of thailand called "isaan". they love to put lots of chillies in the food, leaves my mouth burning for days. but they managed to cook some stuff especially for me that i could eat without tears rolling down my face. after eating we went inside to play snooker, which turns out to not be snooker at all, just normal 9-ball. the people in this place were mostly cab drivers having a break from pretending to be michael schumacher. they didn't try to kick me out or anything but it was pretty clear i needed to be with my friends or else i would not be so welcome...
thais have a love/hate relationship with us foreigners. they love that we come here to spend money on their services but hate when we take up too much of their space. so they have these dark little places that are impossible to find unless you are thai...and they can relax and not think too much about us.
anyway, as long as i behave well and don't act like i own the joint, they don't mind, cause i was invited by my thai friends after all.
i can without a doubt say i was the only foreigner they ever had in that place.
i felt the same feeling when i decided to take the scenic route for my first visa-run. if i had been hanging out with other foreigners, they probably would have insisted i take one of the organised bus trips that leave kao san road every morning to take people to the border and then back.
i hate doing what everybody else is doing so i found out what other ways i could do the trip and decided on the train. it's a little bit slower but takes you through the countryside with the rice fields, and the farmers are so close you could snatch their hats as you go by
loved that trip, and was the only foreigner on the whole train. little kids looked at me like i had just stepped out of my space ship, visiting from a different planet.
and couldn't stop talking to me even though i couldnt understand much of what they said.
i wouldn't swap this for that bus packed with sexpats for any sum of money.

the feeling of walking around the convention centre was the same but as im not a big book reader and don't read thai yet, one hour was enough. before i had a chance to get bored i took the subway home.