A few days ago a Thai friend offered me a ride in his car because he was visiting his family in Supanburi and asked me if I wanted to go along for the ride. Because Supanburi is nearer to Bangkok than where I live now, I agreed to go along, as I had to arrange for a new passport with the British Embassy in Bangkok, because my current passport is now full and I have to go to Penang again in early December to get a new Thai visa, so I thought that this would help.

I stayed in Supanburi with my friend's family for a couple of days and then made the trip into Bangkok to arrange for my new passport. I know the opening times for the embassy, so when I arrived in Bangkok at about lunchtime, I decided to have a meal and then go to the embassy when they opened again after lunch. When I arrived at the embassy, I was a little surprised that there was no queue at the entrance, because every time that I have been there before there has always been a long queue of people waiting to go in.

I spoke to a security guard at the entrance and asked to go in, he asked me what I required, so I told him that I needed to get a new passport issued because my old one is full now. He then told me that the embassy was closed that day for Staff Training and that there was only a skeleton crew working that day to deal with emergencies only. Being a Friday, the embassy doesn't open again until the following Monday and I had nowhere to stay in Bangkok, so I just had to make my own legless way, slowly back to my home in Nakhon Sawan.

So now I am back home and I have just two weeks before I have to leave for Penang again, I have to get a new passport before I go and I know that the passport takes five working days to prepare, so time is getting a little tight now. I don't have a choice with this, my visa expires on the 11th December and the Thai government have now introduced quite a hefty daily fine for any overstay on the visa.

It just seems to be the way my luck has been running for a long time now. Why did the British embassy staff have to have a training day on the one day that I could go there comfortably? Why don't they do their training at the weekends or in the evenings when it interferes with nobody else?

Cheers for now, Legless.