Thailand- 1

Ante script- It is difficult for me to write individual emails, but I do apreciate hearing from you. I've been away for about 3 months now, it'd be nice to hear from you.

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Spent a few days in Bangkok (12 million), about half the people as Shanghai but about twice as dirty--congested streets/sidewalks, lots of noise and exhaust fumes. The back allies are really cool. It is a very dense place, where you can get lost amidst endless sideroads with interesting
things going on, like the local garbage man:

From what I have seen, Bangkok is mostly very unappleaing highways/malls/prostitutes/designer crap/blah.
One bright note was this Chitachuk market. A vast (5 square km or so) market crammed to the brim with stalls selling all sorts of stuff: cloths, art, books, food, and animals (so bad).

(here a guy mixing carnation instant breakfast ( ha!), the hard way)

So many people, you wouldn't believe people could stil move--it was not a place for the claustraphobic.

(hard to capture, but it was this crowded everywhere)

The density of the crowds also made the heat swealtering. I spent about 4.5 hours there and could have spent more had I not made a fruitless attempt at trying to get to the zoo (which was much more than a walk away! I discovered).

While in China I found a roundtrip flight from Bangkok south to Surat Thani for $0 + tax =$30. On the flight, I met an Austrian girl and a German couple who thought I had a good plan to get to one of the Islands (Ko Pha Ngan in the Gulf of Thailand) from the plane. So they came with me and we rushed from a taxi to catch the last boat of the day. On the boat a I guy sold us on a cheap bungalow (that turned out legitamite, fourtunatly) and we took his car to the place.

In all I had to take a bus-shuttle bus-plane-taxi-boat-taxi; although only 10 hours travel. Amazing how much travel you end up doing, eh!

The island is much more of what you would expect of a place like Thailand, it's pretty nice.
Liza, the Austrian chick I met on the plane, and I rented a scooter and buzzed about the island.
Went for a hike in the jungle. Had to Indiana Jones it a bit,

but we found the waterfall we were looking for.

The ants here are nasty--they're everywhere and they bite.

Another trip we made in search of yet another waterfall wasn't so lucky. We had to ditch our bike early, as the roads here can be pretty dodgy.

But we did come across some elephants.

And, on many of the trees along the road, there were all these sliced coconuts hangnig on the side, collecting this white goo. It felt like rubber and smelled like s*#t; don't know what it was.

The night market, in the only town on the island Song Thala, has been a cool place to eat dinner. It's outside and every vendor brings different options. Getting some good ideas to cook, e.g. rice steamed with coconut. And I can't seem to resist getting the $1 fruit shakes with basically every meal--coconut, banana, mango....em...

As we were on our way to check out the northern part of the island, Liza abrutly checked out on me for another island. I'm sure she was a bit over our partnership, as was I, but boy did she miss out...


The place I've found (and remained for a week) was fantastic; in fact, I've decided to stay here for a while: it's just the sorta place I've been hoping to find. I've got a little bungalow on the side of a beautiful, somewhat remote beach.

The view from my hammock:

It's only a bed and a hammock, but for $5/night I'm happy to walk a few minutes to the nearest running water (sink, toilet, shower) and live w/out electricity.

If you are looking for a great place to escape to the beach for some peaceful vacation, I highly recommend the Coral Bay Resort on the north side (Hat Khom) of Ko Pha Ngan. Tops!

Full moon party was pretty cool too... Save the fact that you had to think twice every time a local looked friendly towards you. For, more often than not, they were just trying to sell you glowsticks, alcohol, drugs, or sex.