Pad Thai-land

After 10 weeks in places without real roads or consistent electricity, turning up in Bangkok's uber-modern airport and grabbing an air-conditioned taxi on smooth roads was a real pleasure. The nine of us, ready to trade our hiking boots for flip-flops, high-tailed it to Koh Chang, one of the nearest island beaches to Bangkok. We arrived during a torrential rainstorm, but even that wasn't enough to spoil our fun. In fact, swimming among the monsoon was one of our more memorable experiences. What ensued were days of sheer relaxation at the beach by day and buckets of booze and skinny-dipping by night.

Our dear friend Steve surprised us by booking us a night in one of the beach resorts- a huge step up from the $7 dollar a night, ant-infested bungalow we were staying at. It was by far the best accommodation we had stayed in thus far. Thanks again, Steve!!

We finally had to part ways and left for Kanchanaburi, best known for being the home of the Bridge on the River Kwai. This bridge was part of the larger Thailand-Burma Railway, nicknamed The Death Railway because of the more than 100,000 deaths that occurred when the Japanese forced POWs and Asian laborers to build the railway under horrendous conditions. A local museum dedicated to preserving this history had put together one of the best exhibits we'd ever been to- it did a phenomenal job contextualizing the deaths and showing the human side of the atrocities.

We also splurged and took a Thai cooking class at Apple Guesthouse. Our teacher, Noi, started out the day by taking us through the local market and describing and having us try out various ingredients used in Thai cuisine. Back at her kitchen, we cooked up the best Thai meals we'd had yet: chicken pad thai, massaman curry, green curry, and tom ka kai soup. It was seriously delicious and eating it all induced a food coma that put us out of commission the rest of the day. The good news is we took copious notes and are anxious to try out our skills on all of you when we get back!

In between all this we had many rest stops in Bangkok, which started to feel like a home away from home, with the exception of lady boys, auto rickshaws (tuk tuks), and flooded streets. We spent a good amount of our time at the side street stalls consuming as much pad thai and mango sticky rice as we could. Maybe because it was off-season, or maybe because we had become desensitized in India, but Bangkok wasn't half as hectic as we expected. We managed to leave without buying any of the novelty items that were constantly hawked on Khao San Road, the main tourist street. And we did pick up a great travel tip for getting tuk tuk rides- let the driver bring you to a vendor that provides him with petrol tickets as commission, spend ten minutes acting interested, and he'll bring you to your actual destination for virtually nothing (about $.30). Seeing as we weren't on any rigid schedule, we took full advantage.

Nick's pics: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=132992&id=547921549&l=f9af6c75c7

Rebecca's pics: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2051516&id=35300950&l=40c0a39849

Video of a typical monsoon. It also shows the type of bungalows we often stay in: