23. Visa Extension, Accommodation Scouting and Unexpected Encounters
31.10.2023
It's been over 2 weeks since I wrote my last post. The biggest break I took from writing so far but I felt I needed it and also I didn't do many noteworthy activities. The biggest story is hands down my quest of finding the right hotel room and getting my visa extension so I can stay for a second months in Thailand. All of that happened on my 2nd and 3rd full day in Chiangmai.
The Noble House top floor hotel room was a huge disappointment. Thanks to Covid and the lack of tourists the hotel started renting out more of their rooms long-term to locals and expats. Those tenants did a lot of damage and nothing got fixed afterwards. Wall, floor, door and ceiling dents, stains and marks, major wear and tear on furniture, broken fan blades on the aircon, no wall fan anymore, wonky lights, no framed pictures on any wall. I made clear to the manager that this was not an acceptable room for me.
I got offered a better one on the third floor where I spent one night. The mattress wasn't great and the aircon had broken fan blades, too, meaning the airflow could not be directed away from my bed which got uncomfortable during the night. More importantly the aircon was very noisy plus all the visible damage dragged down my virtual rating for the room. It was a heartbreaking decision but I had to face the reality that the hotel was not providing me anymore with the comfort that made me stay there many times before.
I researched for alternative accommodations, walked a kilometre to a homestay to enquire about their king room. It was already booked but a traveller working there as volunteer showed me 2 places for long-term stay nearby. The first was a stuffy top floor room with bathroom across the aisle, the second one was a room in a bigger condo a few hundred metres further out from the old town. It looked better although it was in many ways a downgrade from the Noble House. Nevertheless I tried to convince myself that this would be a better option than having trouble to sleep with a noisy aircon. The price was a shock for 11,000 Baht and 9,000 without breakfast, but at least a bike rental and the electricity charge was included. I spent another hour at the entrance of the homestay to talk to other guests, many of them long-term travellers as myself. I chatted with a guy from the UK also holding an Australian and New Zealand passport but currently floating around the world without permanent residency - you can tell already he was an interesting character. I asked him where he had lived in Australia for 9 years. He said: ”It's a small place called Wynnum.” - I live in Wynnum West, the neighbouring suburb, and of course I knew his street and had cycled through it several times. Those coincidences are really getting out of hand! ;-) To give it perspective: Less than 10% of all Australians live in Brisbane and the city has 190 suburbs.
I headed over to my new apartment to be in the evening to give the on-site manager my passport so he could make a copy and send it to the authorities. I was promised to get a better, mainly lighter room than the one I had been shown. That supposedly better room was still occupied at the time of my inspection but would be free for move in the next day. I already started using the bicycle provided by the condo and was relieved I had solved the accommodation issue so quickly.
When I pushed my bike down Loi Kroh Road (because it's a one-way street and I was moving towards oncoming traffic) I heard someone shouting my name. It took me less than 2 seconds to recognise Margret (now going by the name Maggie), one of the first friends I had made in Chiangmai 10 years ago. We hadn't been in touch for 9 years but somehow while walking on the footpath she recognised me immediately. She invited me to join her for dinner at the nightmarket where she wanted to meet up with other people and watch the live music by a band whose singer is a friend of hers. I agreed and it was a great night. The band exhibited fantastic musicianship and played everything from Hotel California to an impromptu version of Baby Shark to get a cute little boy involved who was dancing in front of the stage. The singer had a strong voice and was a born entertainer, encouraging the audience to sing with her. At the end of their 2 hour performance dozens of people where cheering and dancing in front of the stage.
All pictures below are from my second Ploen Rudee Night Market meet up with Maggie as I didn’t have my camera with me the first time. The video clip taken on my $100.00 phone is the only footage from the first meet up at the market a good week prior. Excuse the shakiness, the audio quality is surprisingly bearable, though.
Unfortunately, for once I didn't have my camera with me and had to use my USD $100.00 phone to record a video snippet. Excuse the shakiness – the audio quality, though, is surprisingly bearable.
Since that encounter the Ploen Rudee Night Market has become my go to place for late night dinner when most restaurants are already closed. The market is focussing solely on food and live music and has a home-made 100% vegan food stall called Secret V. I have eaten there already 9-10 times and have tried half of their entire menu items by now. All meals are 80Baht, the quality is on point and you rarely have to wait for more than 5 minutes although everything is prepared fresh.
About a week later Maggie and I ran into each other again! To be precise, she saw me riding on my bike and made herself noticed by the power of her vocal chords – I would have missed her once again having tunnel vision. My story suggests Chiangmai is a small village where your path will cross with everyone you know eventually...except that “village” is populated by 300,000 citizens and tenthousands of tourists.
The morning after the concert I cycled to the Chiangmai immigration office located close to the airport. I had heard from other travellers that there could be a waiting time of two hours so I braced myself mentally for a not so smooth visa extension mission. From here on I will summarise the ordeal by listing the shoops I had to jump through.
1. Went around the main building to queue at a small building to get passport copies printed.
2. Grabbed the required TM.7 form from a covered outside waiting area with seats and some tables to fill out the forms.
3. Walked around in circles until I managed to get a pen from a volunteer helping people
4. Filled the form.
5. Volunteer told me I also needed a TM.30 form which I could get in the building around the corner with the copy shop. If the on-site manager of my new condo has sent copies of my passport to the immigration office I should be in their system. I took a number and waited for close to an hour for my turn.
6. The system showed that I was staying at the Noble House, not at the new condo. I explained that I would check out today and move to a different address. The lady at the counter made several phone calls and I got my TM.30 form.
7. With all documents ready I needed a new number from a little check-point booth at the entrance of the immigration office complex. After acquiring the number I had to go back back to the covered area from earlier.
Little intermission: On my way to get the number someone called my name. What the heck? Who in the world could it be this time, especially at the immigration office kilometres outside the old town? - It was Dao, my Thai massage teacher from 10 years ago. I felt like I was the most recognisable person in Chiangmai. I only know less than a handful of people in the city but miraculously I seemed to cross ways with pretty much all of them. Dao had matters to resolve in another building but a while later she joined me waiting and we had a nice catch-up chat. She has moved on from teaching massage and is now deeply dedicated to help curing people using natural medicine. We talked for half an hour until my number lit up on a display.
Pictures below show my lunch meet up with Dao at the Vegan Society Restaurant & Homestay 3 weeks later.
Back to my numbering:
8.I thought I would pay my 1,900 Thai Baht now and receive a few stamps in my passport but NO - my documents got only checked for completion and correctness. I was handed yet another piece of paper with yet another number. I headed over to the building where I could pay the fees due.
9. I entered a crowded waiting area with 10 counters of which only one was assigned to my kind of visa extension. I waited for a whole hour.
10. Finally, I showed a man at a counter my number, paid the money, gave him my passport. He explained to me that I had to take a seat again until they would call my name.
11. 40 minutes later Christian from Germany was summoned to take a photo at a different counter. I got up from the floor (because all seats were occupied), posed for 3 seconds in front of a ball-shaped webcam-like camera, received the thumbs up from the guy behind the glass...and was told - yes, right: to wait again.
12. Another 30minutes later a guy with a bunch of passports stepped into the waiting area and started to call the names of the people whose passports he was holding. While he gave them back to their respective owners, he proudly showed everyone the stamp with the extension date and the 100 Baht change (because most people paid 2000 Baht initially, not 1900) clamped onto a receipt. DONE!
A 5.5 hour odyssee came to an end and I was flat out starving. I never want to go through that process again. The poster on the glass wall that divided hundreds of waiting people from the staff on the other side was a slap in the face. Apart from the name of the institution and the validity of the visa nothing else stated on it could be further from the truth. I disregarded the “no photography” signs in the area and took a picture of that blatantly false advertisement.
After grabbing some food I was ready for the accommodation switch. To make it easier for myself I decided to first cycle with my carry-on- luggage and my camera gear to the condo, cycle back to the Noble House and then walk with my checked-in luggage 700m to the condo once again.
The moment I enter my new flat I realise I have made a mistake. The window is as small as in the other room I was shown - just a vertical slit of 30-40cm width. The bathroom, bedroom and balcony are only half the size of my Noble House arrangement. The room is dark although the sun is still up. The cold light of the fluorescent light tube on the ceiling brightens neither the room, nor my mood by much. It is hot and sticky, the doors are flimsy and although the room is clean, the build quality and furniture is cheap and typical for a residential Thai building, tiers below the 2 star hotel level of the Noble House. I am torn what to do. I know how much time I will spent inside and fear that the lighting situation will cause depression. I also realise that being several hundred metres further away from the old town, the market and shops is very inconvenient. I will rely on my bike for everything or invest a lot more time to walk. Also the common 5 litre water bottles are too big to fit into the basket attached to my bike’s handlebar. My intuition whispers to me that this is not my place to stay at for an entire month. But what to do?
I leave my bags in the room and cycle back to the Noble House. I ask the manager if she has another room available, one without so much damage and a loud aircon. To my surprise she replies that she has kept a room unoccupied for a loyal guest who had announced to visit next month. Fortunately she told him that she couldn't guarantee to keep it for him if someone else wants to rent it… for instance ME!
That almost to good to be true room is 213. It has a brand new aircon, only minor damage. The manager not wanting to miss out on the opportunity to rent out the room for a month she proactively offers to install a wall fan and fix all the remaining issues.
I am sold! I sign the contract, cycle back to the condo, get my bags out, leave the bicycle there and walk back to the Noble House. I then visit the bike shop I rented my bike from in 2013. It takes 20minutes and testing out 4 different bicycles having all kinds of problems before I pick my poison. I pay 1000 Baht for the monthly rent and am out of money. However, I still need to pay another 1000 Baht deposit, so I tell the shop I will be back in 20minutes for the additional payment. A few minutes and I am back at the Noble House to get my wallet out of the safe at the reception. However, the receptionist doesn't know the passcode and can't reach the manager. After some explaining what I need the money for he kindly lends me 1000 Baht until the morning when the safe can be opened again by the manager. He also gives me her phone number and encourages me to try calling her again later. I cycle to the bike shop and pay the deposit. One less to-do task on my check list.
(To make this post a bit more colourful I sprinkle in a gallery with random images from the old town of Chiangmai and the area around it, taken in the first weeks after my arrival.)
I make my way to the homestay to give back the keys for the condo room I don't want anymore. I anticipate that they might want me to pay 50 Baht for the bike I used. What I didn’t anticipate, though, is the unfriendly reaction, informing me they had filed a TM.30 form for me and indirectly accusing me of taking advantage of them for that. I don’t even know at that point why the TM.30 form is such a big deal. As if I would pretend that I want to rent a condo and then bail out so I would have local residence registration at the Chiangmai immigration office for free. It’s nonsense because the Noble House did the registration for me already.
The owner insists that I have to pay for 1 night. I tell the volunteer guy that I can't pay right now as my money is locked up in the hotel safe that can't be opened at the moment. He says: “Then we have a problem”. He forwards my dilemma to the homestay owner in the shortened version: “He says he can't pay today”. The owner replies brisk and hostile that in that case they will tear up the TM.30 form. I have no idea if that would affect me negatively but after my neverending nightmare at the immigration office, potential paperwork trouble and even the slightest risk to get my visa extension revoked is the last thing I need now. In my desperation I ask the homestay volunteer if he could borrow me 550 Baht until the next morning but he declines that request. I call the Noble House manager and I am more than relieved she picks up the phone. Apparently she already shared the safe password with the receptionist.
Because those homestay people don't have any trust in me, the volunteer guy escorts me on his bicycle to the Noble House where I get my stuff out of the safe and pay him the amount asked for.
This day has been the worst of my entire trip so far with all the waiting, cycling back and forth, the extremely uncomfortable encounter with the homestay owner and staff and as the cherry on top paying for a room I won’t even occupy.
Anyway, in hindsight I made the right decision. The aircon in my room is fabulous, the next day a guy acting as plumber, electrician and general handyman fixed a power socket hanging out of the wall, installed a fan, corrected a crocked lamp shade, put a bulb in, replaced the yellowish bathroom light with a much brighter in white colour, reinstalled a tilted hot water heater, tightened the faucet, stopped the leaking of the toilet cistern and last but not least tightened the lose door knob cover. A maid came a few hours later and placed a second topper under the bed linen to soften the mattress.
The sum of those alterations makes a huge difference in comfort. If I had to quantify it, I would say I have 85%-90% of the comfort I experienced back in 2013 for almost half the price. I am very happy the Noble House ultimately has worked out for me once again as long-term accommodation. Not only is its location perfect for me but I also cherish to live in a place that I have many fond memories.
I have put my clothes on the shelf in the wardrobe and hung my shirts on coathangers – this simple act has a deeper meaning for me: this is my home now for a while. I am not on the go anymore living out of a suitcase. That realisation has a calming effect on my psyche and makes it easier to fully relax and enjoy my time in Chiangmai.
