Sept. 3

The day our trip shifted from Australia to SE Asia, with a 9-hour flight from Sydney to Bangkok:

Land in Bangkok near midnight. Exit customs, see the sign for our hotel's courtesy car on the railing separating the newly-departed passengers from everyone else in the airport's lower level.
We're looking for the sign because we made the decision to spend $90 (about the same as we'll spend on all our accommodation combined the next three weeks) for a Western-style airport hotel. The thought of landing in Bangkok at midnight and dealing with the chaos and transport options made overpaying for a night seem justified.
We waited with a group of other Westerners headed to the same hotel. The driver didn't show for a few minutes, then came to say the car was full and some of us would have to wait.
When it comes back, the courtesy car turns out to be a packed van and a pickup piled high with baggage. Ours are added to the load, we're ushered into the crowded vehicles and are off.

Every driver in Bangkok, whether transporting tourists or riding a motorcycle, drives the same: just a shade faster than conditions permit, trusting everyone else to do the same. The traffic flows around and through itself against all logic. On a two-lane road, there will be three lanes of traffic. On a three-lane road, there will be four lines of vehicles squeezing past each other.

The cars took us across the expressway, then off into a maze of alleys lined with tin shacks selling food or beer, lit primarily by strings of Christmas lights. Chickens walked among the small buildings, then suddenly the hotel rose out of the incongruous surroundings.
The hotel wasn't worth $90 if it was in the States, much less here where our next night's room cost about $7. The guy in line ahead of us, without a reservation, got a room for two-thirds the price. But it was easier than navigating Bangkok at night dealing with jet lag and culture shock.