Six years ago I decided to quit smoking. I did this because I couldn't control the urge to smoke, even though I despised it. Every cigarette I lit pissed me off more than the previous one, until I finally had enough. Such is life, and I know other people that have quit, with varying degrees of success. It's a deeply personal thing, and the decision to smoke or not has to be left up to the individual.
England has made it a policy to disallow smoking inside of public places. This happened after I quit, so I was never inconvenienced by having to go outside to smoke. When I quit smoking I also quit going out, because I couldn't bear breathing the secondhand smoke of others. My husband joined me in the nonsmoking decision, and felt the same way about going out. This carried on until the nonsmoking law was passed. Blah blah blah.
Enough of that.
Here in Thailand smoking is allowed everywhere, and cigarettes are cheap. I mean seriously cheap. All the displaced smokers in the UK have ended up here, I swear. Cigs in the UK are something like £7 a pack. Here in Bangkok I think the cost is approximately the equivalent of £2.50 or so. Not only can you smoke everywhere but you can befoul the atmosphere all around you whilst staying on your travel budget! WIN!
I have just spent the last two hours in a restaurant/bar called Mulligan's on Khaosan Road. I did this because I treated someone to dinner, as a way of showing appreciation for a great big favor he did for me. My throat is raw, I can't get enough clean air in my lungs, and even though I took a shower I can still smell and taste cigarette smoke, and it is rank. Gah. I am so over cigarettes, and Mulligan's by association.
I know I'm being precious about the whole smoking thing, and smokers find ex-smokers' tirades tiresome, so all I will say is this: it's poison, and you will die from it. Keep smoking, there's seven billion people on this planet.
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