I’m sat once again in the free wif-fi section of Incheon aiport having done another visa run to Malaysia.\u00a0 This time I went via Bangkok and enjoyed an uneventful weekend in the heart of the nightclub district.<\/p>\n
Uneventful because instead of\u00a0rounding up a troupe of ladyboys\u00a0and a sack of cocaine as planned I\u00a0found a banjo for sale in a music shop and spent both nights in my room trying to play it: just as well\u00a0most people in Bangkok hotels\u00a0on a weekend don’t\u00a0plan on sleeping.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As usual, the Russian embassy in KL was as unpredictable as ever, charging me less than\u00a0I thought they would and\u00a0turning my visa around in a day rather than the 3 days it is supposed to take.\u00a0 I’m wondering if Russian embassies are a franchise where the\u00a0Kremlin sets the products and\u00a0does the marketing and the local consul sets the prices within certain boundaries, a bit like MacDonalds.\u00a0 That would explain why I got a free toy and a coupon for\u00a0next time.<\/p>\n
On the way back through my wife gave me the usual instructions,\u00a0based on some dubious story or other about how she’d only just lost something whilst I’d been away, to buy cosmetics in the duty free.\u00a0 My experience of buying cosmetics prior to about a year ago consisted in its entirety of buying underarm deodorant and shaving foam.\u00a0 Even\u00a0my after shave gets given to me\u00a0as presents, no doubt by people who would prefer I’d bought soap while I was at it.\u00a0 Now I am fast realising that buying cosmetics is like\u00a0procuring machinery parts: all grades, numbers, and suffixes.\u00a0 An example:<\/p>\n
Guerlain PARURE – Compact Foundation, with Crystal Pearls, SPF20, PA++, nb. 12<\/em><\/p>\n Tell me that wasn’t dreamed up by a SAP technician!\u00a0 The only differences being machinery parts are considerably cheaper than cosmetics, at least by weight, and the costs can be passed onto the end user.<\/p>\n UPDATE<\/strong><\/p>\n Oh dear.\u00a0 I was so busy blogging I missed my flight.\u00a0 Dammit.\u00a0 I’ll have to take tomorrow’s.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m sat once again in the free wif-fi section of Incheon aiport having done another visa run to Malaysia.\u00a0 This time I went via Bangkok and enjoyed an uneventful weekend in the heart of the nightclub district. Uneventful because instead … Continue reading