I thought this picture might be appropriate... my first sunrise in the land of smiles. After arriving in a cover of darkness on a Friday night, I was pretty keen to see what my new home city looked like... and I wasn't really disappointed. The spectacular sunrise is mostly due to the layer of smog that hangs around the city, but I just thought it was pretty :)
So far, Bangkok has just been a miriad of sights, sounds and smells.... and not all of them good. Monday was probably the biggest day for contrast. Dan took me to a shopping complex called "The Emporium". Think chandaliers, designer clothes (the real stuff, not the fakes!)- Luis Vitton, Chanel etc.. So we stepped off the Skytrain into this complex, had a look around (and died at the prices) and then went to go and grab some dinner.... so we step out onto this street where the concrete has eroded so much that you could fit your shoe down the holes, there are people cooking meats of various origins (oh yeah, you can get the normal lamb and beef and chicken, but you never forget the sight... and smell... of squid) on portable hot plates, there is this disgusting smelling water flowing off the pavement into the enormous gutters (remind me again why I was wearing flip-flops on this particular day... ewww!), and you have to avoid the various motorcycles who are racing along the footpath to try to avoid the peak hour traffic!! There are these white lines on all the footpaths which are about 4 feet apart... and we still haven't worked out whether they are where pedestrians are supposed to walk, or where motorcycles are supposed to go!! I must ask a local sometime!!
The first four days of this experience have been amazing... I'm exhausted from walking everywhere and checking out shops, and my brain is fried from trying to remember our apartments address in Thai so that the taxi drivers know where to go.... but so far I have had the most wonderful time... especially for the fact that I'm now reunited with my boy.
I will try to take some photos of the markets on the weekend, but until then drop me an email (which is still my Uni addy) and let me know what is going on back home, or wherever you are in the world :)
Big hugs and kisses xxxx
Dan and I decided that we needed a pet or two here in Bangkok, and after thinking for a while we decided that fish would be the easiest thing we could give up when we went back to Australia. So after getting a great tank from the fish store, and waiting a week for the water to settle we finally have fish!! Mine is a gorgeous little siamese fighting fish, and we have no idea what Dan has because the name on the tank was written in Thai! But his two are definitely entertaining, considering they keep trying to beat the hell out of each other! We had a particularly scary moment last night when the two actually locked lips for about 20 seconds and they wouldn't let go! They are now sulking at opposite ends of the tank... probably trying to recover! Next week we'll get another couple of fishies... probably a catfish to take care of the algae in the tank (and because they are cool) and probably some tetras so that we have some nice schooling fish. We'll see :)
