The longest, shortest day of my life

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So we've made it! We arrived in Bangkok last night around midnight. We were in airports and on planes for about 30 hours and lost 12 on the way here, so about a 2 day process! In other words it was the shortest day of my life (only 12 hours) but it definatley felt like the longest. I am happy to say that all our flights and what not were on time, and customs was smooth sailing! So far we haven't had any problems and I'm starting to feel like something has to happen soon haha, knock on wood.

When we arrived we turned down the cab drivers at the door with the advice of a Thai man on the plane who said he would overcharge us and took a public taxi with another backpacker so we paid like 1/8 the price of the first guys offer. And then we got here and ran into two people from Toronto right away who showed us this cheap and clean hostel they were staying at, and got a room there, saving ourselves a lot of money from where we were going to stay. It has a pool and A/C so everything you need!

We hung out on Khao San Road for a bit that night because we were no where near tired, and it's pretty crazy! Bangkok is very dirty, garbage everwhere, stray dogs and cat, vendors line the streets, and I saw three rats... the first one really surprised me, I definately screamed. It's also smelly. There temples are gorgeous which we looked at all day today, and then the rest of the city is pretty yucky and polluted but definatley a sight to see!

We also feel pretty lucky because today happened to be Buddhist Day so we got to visit a bunch of temples for free, no admission. And our tuk-tuk driver stayed with us all day for about a dollar U.S. because he got free gas from the government if he took us to this Thailand Tourism shop. He took us to a couple other shops too with kind was getting annoying, then finally we were like just take us to the Grand Palace. He was supposed to stay with us till 5, but he left us there making up some lame excuse about how he had to get home to visit his neighbor. The Grand Palace was absolutely amazing we took tons of pics which I'm sure don't do it justice, but it's really hard to believe that something like that exists, it's really beautiful just tall golden buildings detailed with glass, jewels, and ceramic. Very beautiful, and then across the street is piles of garbage haha.. Very weird city. We are ready to get out of here, we take an overnight train to Ko Tao tomorrow to get our diving course and then the Full Moon Party is on the 20th. So that's our plan for the next few days! I dont' think there is much for amenities on the little island of Ko Tao so hopefully I can let you all know how our diving course is going but I'm not to sure.

I'm already down a pair of pants, I got a huge rip in them when I was walking some stairs to see a 45 m. Buddha and it spread all day, right in the crotch! So I had to toss those babies, which is okay we are starting to think we maybe packed to much 😊 but that was to be expected~! Well I am running out of internet time here, talk to you soon.

Love your little Asian explorer, Chels.

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