“Sir, book your excursions now!”
“Taxi? Sir?”
“Limousine, mister?”
“Cheap tours to the River Kwai!”
“Sir, explore Bangkok with us!”
“Change money, sir?”
Paul exchanged two hundred pounds, and from that moment on he felt dizzy from the commotion. The arrival terminal of the airport seemed to be full of representatives from every single travel agency and taxi enterprise in Thailand. He almost gave in to the coaxing of the first taxi company, but someone took hold of his arm. It was the gray-haired man from the plane, the man who had given him his business card back in Amsterdam.
“Don’t do it,” he growled. “Over there…” he nodded towards the exit.
Paul followed him mutely. As soon as they stepped out of the building, he was overcome with the muggy, incredibly hot – or rather, scorching – air. Paul had never felt anything like it before. A drop of perspiration slid down his forehead and soon other drops followed in close succession. Suddenly, the jeans and T-shirt he was wearing proved to be way too hot. He already had his sweater slung over his arm.
“Haggle until you get to three-hundred bahts!” the man ordered.
“But the driver doesn’t even know where I’m going!” Paul said, bewildered, clearing his throat.
That blasted hoarseness again. The gray-haired man smiled.
“It doesn’t matter, my friend. Three hundred bahts, remember. Unless you’re headed to the River Kwai. And come find me. I’ll show you what’s worth visiting, what’s not in the guide books. Call me beforehand,” he added, extending his hand.
He should have also told Paul how to haggle. Over the course of his forty years of life, Paul had never done it before. He was turned down by quite a few drivers before he got the hang of it; finally, he got the fare down to three-hundred for a trip into the city. He sat in an air-conditioned, red-and-blue, Bangkok taxi; excluding numbers, the driver seemingly understood not a single word of English. Paul sat on the back seat, his suitcase lying on the passenger seat beside the driver, secured with a seat belt.
Why did I come here, wondered Paul, as they inched their way forward through the insane traffic. Several traffic policemen wearing surgical masks blew their whistles constantly, but their efforts were completely futile. This was a paradise for the insolent: only those who pressed on with the required aggression could move forward or change lanes. There were many brand new cars on the road mingled among old, rumbling busses emitting foul-smelling smoke. The motorcyclists held Paul’s attention with their death-defying feats. The “buffet cars” inching along in the outer lane slowed the traffic, and to top it off, the motor-powered, three-wheeled taxis, the tuk-tuks, cut in front of every vehicle. In Paul’s ordered world. The chaos of Bangkok traffic tumbled like an avalanche onto Paul’s ordered world.’
Bangkok: a sizzling, all-embracing, exotic city where the past and the present intertwine. It’s a place where anything can happen… and anything really does happen. The paths of seven people cross in this metropolis. Seven seekers, for whom this city might be a final destination. Or perhaps it is only the start of a new journey? A successful businessman; a celebrated supermodel; a man who is forever the outsider; a young mother who suddenly loses everything; a talented surgeon, who could not give the woman he loved all that she desired; a brothel’s madam; and a charming young woman adopted at birth. Why these seven? Why did they come to Bangkok now, at the same time? Do chance encounters truly exist?
Bangkok Transit is a Central European best-seller. The author, Eva Fejos, a Hungarian writer and journalist, is a regular contributor to women’s magazines and is often herself a featured personality. Bangkok Transit was her first best-seller, which sold more than 100,000 copies and is still selling. Following the initial publication of this novel in 2008, she went on to write twelve other best-sellers, thus becoming a publishing phenomena in Hungary According to accounts given by her readers, the author’s books are “therapeutic journeys,” full of flesh and blood characters who never give up on their dreams. Many readers have been inspired to change the course of their own lives after reading her books. “Take your life into your own hands,” is one of the important messages the author wishes to convey.
Try it for yourself, and let Eva Fejos whisk you off on one of her whirlwind journeys... that might lead deep into your own heart.
About Eva Fejos, the author of Bangkok Transit
- Eva Fejos is a Hungarian writer and journalist.
She:
- has had 13 best-selling novels published in Hungary so far.
- Bangkok Transit is her first best-seller, published in 2008.
- has won several awards as a journalist, and thanks to one of her articles, the legislation pertaining to human egg donation was modified, allowing couples in need to acquire donor eggs more easily.
- spends her winters in Bangkok.
- likes novels that have several storylines running parallel.
- visited all the places she’s written about.
- spent a few days at an elephant orphanage in Thailand; and has investigated the process of how Thai children are put up for adoption while visiting several orphanages.
- founded her own publishing company in Hungary last year, where she not only publishes her own books, but foreign books too, hand-picked by her.
- Her books published in Hungary thus far are:
Till Death Do Us Part (Holtodiglan) | Bangkok Transit | Hotel Bali | Chicks (Csajok) | Strawberries for Breakfast (Eper reggelire) | The Mexican (A mexikói) | Cuba Libre | Dalma | Hello, London | Christmas in New York (Karácsony New Yorkban) | Caribbean Summer (Karibi nyár) | Bangkok, I Love You (Szeretlek, Bangkok) | Starting Now – the new edition of Till Death Do Us Part (Most kezdődik) | Vacation in Naples – the English version will be published in summer, 2014 (Nápolyi vakáció)
To be published in spring of 2014: I Waited One Hundred Nights (Száz éjjel vártam)
Bangkok Transit (English version): http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HDIT4UY
Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre - Women's Fiction, Contemporary
Rating – PG-13
More details about the author
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