MICHELE'S MUSINGS

October 12th
Our 2 weeks in Thailand have been quite different from the last time I was here 6 years ago...this has been more relaxing...despite spending more time in the city. We've divided our time between Bangkok and Ko Samet, an island 4.5 hours SE of B. We got off to a good start. Our 12 hour layover in Seoul Korea proved to be a lot of fun. Saw a Buddist department store, near a temple...guess monks have to buy thier clothes somewhere. On the plane from Korea to B we met Donn, from the Bay area...he coincidentally knew our friend Gifford in San Fran. (guess the hang gliding community is small). We all took a taxi into town together (arrived about midnight)...it's always a worry getting ripped off by the taxi drivers...but all worked out ok...I sat in front and tried to navigate to a driver who spoke no english, didn't read maps and probably didn't read thai either...but we managed (one of my proudest moments) to arrive at the guest house that I picked out of our lonely planet guidebook. Tavee guest house is a bit off the beaten track, for 220 baht (5.5 bucks) it's about the going rate. I'm amazed at how familiar things are to me...one thing that is better than I remembered is the awesome food...I could go on and on about all the amazing seafoods, curries, fresh fruit mmmmmmm. Anyway besides eating we have been taking buses all over creation (8 cents anywhere)...armed with a map we have no problem. The only draw back is you never know if someone talks to you to be friendly, or if they want your money (scams).We met both kinds. We both loved our visit to the national museum, which is on old palace grounds, with interesting thai structures, and more budda statuary than you could shake a stick at. We skipped the grand palace, which is over run with tourists, and rip off artists, and instead went to the Wat Pho buddist temple. It's one of the more famous wats. Its easy to get "watted out" after a while here. The best part of wat pho is their thai massage school. I got a fantastic massage for 120 baht 3.00 bucks. It was very methodical, thorough...they use their feet, knees, everything...stretch pull, push , twist...Yum! We headed off to Ko Samet,a small island that is supposedly a nat'l Park. We had a wonderful bungalow with bath fan and mosquito net for about 6 bucks...50 yards from the beach. the beach had white sand and the water was wonderfully warm...though not great for snorkelling as the monsoon season weather churns things up a bit. It usually rains at night...a few times a shower in the day..... We spent our time eating, reading, swimming, I got 3 massages, and if we felt ambitious, we'd go for a walk. It was a bit hard overlooking the obvious disregard for the environment (litter abounds everywhere in Thailand...especially plastic water bottles). There was also a lack of animal control. Though people are not cruel to animals, they are neglected...lots of litters of puppies. Many of the dogs are bald from skin conditions(look like a bunch of Yodas running around) The bus ride back to Bangkok was harrowing as always...not looking is really the only way to cope. Back in Bangkok we socialized with our fellow travellers at the guest house...getting tips and exchanging tales. Mr. Tavee the guest house owner brought out some fish cakes(it only occured to me later that the fish might have come from the Bangkok river),fermented juice of ginsing and hot chillies. I lived to regret that night. Last night we really went out on the town. We took a river boat cruise with dinner (12 buck splurge) It was almost all Thai's to our surprise. They really partied it up. We laughed when they sang happy birthday in English to a thai guy...is this a universal tune now? The tables were piled with mounds of beautiful food...looked good even if I couldn't recognize most of it. We passed under many intersting bridges...including the longest cable stay bridge in the world, so Drew went off today in the daylight to get some good bridge pictures for future use in his engineering lectures (think we can write this off on our taxes Jan?) Tomorrow its off to Nepal. Oh, p.s. steven, We haven't used toilet paper in 2 weeks!!!! MICHELE

This page hosted by Get your own Free Home Page