One night in Bangkok

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And the world's your oyster, according to the musical Chess.

I'm still not sure about that, but I definately love Bangkok and it certainly hasn't been as scary as I thought it might be!

I arrived on Friday 6th after a rather boring flight from Japan. My flight time had been pushed back about 8 hours and I'd forgotten to tell the transfer company this, in revenge for this they made me wait 2 hours for someone to share a taxi with into Bangkok after I made them get to the airport for 5am only for me to not show up. I would have just got one independantly if I'd known I was going to be there 2 hours but I guess fari enough...

Anyhoo, the girl (Claire) I ended up sharing the taxi with was really nice, fresh from the UK winter. We did our first venturing out into Bangkok together which made it less intimidating. However, Bangkok has nothing on Delhi for absolutely insane-ness. We did manage to get terribly lost looking for a restaurant I've read about in the LP, when we eventually found it the owners were on holiday. Tuh!

We met up the following day to explore Bangkok properly, along with a man from Quebec (Marcel) I'd met by the noticeboard. (The other two were on the same intrepid trip together so they were going to meet anyway). I managed to practice a bit of French, which I desperately need to do, win win.

We eventually found the river and took a long tail boat around the canals, past hundreds of shack like houses, the real Bangkok apparently - bit different! Touristy!

In the evening I tagged along with Marcel and Claire's tour group as I wasn't due to start mine until the following night. We discovered the Khao San Road and the mango man. I love mango.

The following day I decided to have a chilled out Lizzy day, doing a bit of shopping, getting my first pedicure and a Thai massage which was a little too vigorous for my liking, although I felt brilliant afterwards.

In the evening I met up with my own tour group who I would be going north with to Chiang Mai. Just the 5 of us (Mike, Damo, Stu, Gary and myself) and our Thai guide Dong (Dong Dong Dong Dong).

We headed out into Bangkok again, I sampled Chang beer, which is a lot stronger than one might think! We also for some reason went to a metal club (not *made* of metal mind), fun, but like the massage a little too vigourous for me...

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