Sa wat dee krap!

You know that point when jet lag hits you, Wham over the head! It could have happened at any point today really. It hit me about an hour ago. Not bad. I'm fighting the good fight to keep my eyes open right now, and damn it, I'm gonna blog.

The past 30 hours have been...fucking insane in retrospect. Almost all in a good way.

My flight here, and associated layover, took like 20 hours. Thankfully years of flying to Israel and a new found sense of patience in general meant the experience really was fine. Except I sat next to a 50-something Vietnamese man - former Vietcong, no doubt - who could not stop coughing. He didn't seem to like to cover his mouth either. Payback, I guess.

Anyway, here's me on the plane. Classic Roni plane picture. If you think back, you'll notice it looks almost identical to the Roni on the plane to Costa Rica pic. What a cute dork he is.

The flight was uneventful other than the germ warfare retribution thing, except for the first 6 minutes. Just as the plane took off, I hit song #1 on my new i-pod shuffle: the Star Wars theme song. Yes!

(BTW if you have yet to watch the video associated with my last post, do it. It's funny shit people.)

One more thing I'll say about my trip here is that the Taiwan airport is an interesting place. It's everything you'd expect of an advanced Asian transport hub: neon, commercial, and...really big on Hello Kitty!

Here I am in the Hello Kitty lounge. Maybe you're thinking, "OK Roni, that's cute, but obviously it's an American tourist thing." No, no. Actually after I left lots of other Asian adults sat in the Hello Kitty lounge like it was the most natural thing in the world to do. WEIRD!!!

OK, so Bangkok. Wow. I may have to invent a new term to describe how I'm feeling. How about, Culture Shock? Good one, Krouzman!

Really it is big here, in every way. Crazy driving of course. Lots of people, nearly all of them far shorter and far nicer than me. People here are ridiculously nice...and quite short.

There is food EVERYWHERE. Cheap, delicious food. You basically walk around grazing. You could be in the tiniest alley ever - and that's what I really enjoyed, walking the labarynthine alleys (another good one, Krouzman, even if you may have misspelled it) - and not have to walk more than 50 feet to pass someone selling something edible.

Today I bought and ate/drank:
* 1 chicken skewer - 28 cents
* 1 coconut - 60 cents
* 1 fish dinner - $5 (overpriced, but so good)
* 1 grilled corn on the cob dipped in coconut butter - 60 cents
* a few pieces of fruit that look like yellow peppers - 28 cents
* stir fried noodles with shrimp - 85 cents

And consider I only got into the city from the airport around 1:30pm. Yes, I am full now.

In addition to food, I am struck by the juxtaposition of modernity and antiquity here in Bangkok - and throughout Asia I imagine - as well as wealth and poverty. Like boat people floating past sky scrapers and cars driving from the airport past tin shacks with laundry hanging out front.

A lot of you know this drill, but it's striking to me, and I get to say it cus it's my blog!

OK to in addition to walking around a bunch and taking all these juxtapositions in, and sampling maybe 1/10 of 1% of the panaply of food options this city has to over, I also:
* took a tuk tuk (motorized 3-wheel little scooter / taxi like thing) with a cute Italian girl and a cuter French girl
* walked the famous tourist street everyone said to go to which I really didn't like, not the least of which because you could buy falafel there and there were actually signs in Hebrew for stuff
* and hung out in a park by the river

2 "Wow, that's cool Roni is such a neat off the beaten path traveler" moments...

First was going into one of the many Bhuddist monestaries in the city (Wats) just as one of the young monks was beginning a lesson for school kids. It was a beautiful gold sanctuary, and quite small. I sat there on the floor and listened as the monk spoke and the kids chanted and giggled. I didn't understand the words but I got some of the gist of it from the laughter and the smiles.

Second super cool local experience...It was toward the end of my evening when I spotted 4 of my favorite kinds of tables being used in a public park. OK I guess the pic sort of gives it away.

Yes, they were ping pong tables! I was invited to play and got my ass kicked by a very sweet 50 year old woman. Then I held my own against a guy a few years younger than me.

To be fair the woman was wearing a Beijing 2008 shirt, so she was probably on the Thai team. Actually, at that age, most likely their coach. And ya'll know how big ping pong is in Asia. OK that last part is for real.

It was super fun to play, with local people, and then hang out and try to communicate. They spoke hardly any English, and my one word - sa wat dee krap, which means hello - only gets you so far. It does however wrap up this post quite nicely.

Time for bed!

Love,
Roni

Oh God I am literally surrounded by Germans right now. You know how that freaks me out. Shit 2 of them are actually quite cute though. Hmmm...