Arrival in Bangkok

I'm not actually sure whether I can remember being anywhere quite this hot! Definitely not this humid. And I'm almost certain that I saw a man running a few minutes ago. Crazy person. At 8am this morning when we landed it was already 28 degrees!

The journey went very smoothly. The flights were basically all on time and I watched 5 films over the two flights. Productive.

My hostel is, as expected, very basic and a little scummy. But its clean, has air conditioning and the staff seem to be friendly. And I get breakfast in the morning :) I did learn how to say thank you in Thai about 10 minutes ago, but I've forgotten now. I'll have to ask again.

Bangkok is kind of hard to explain as a city. It doesn't seem quite so manic as Cairo, but the roads are still a bit crazy. There is a mix of big wide streets with several lanes of traffic and small winding streets with cars parked everywhere and street stalls taking over most of the pavement. There are loads of people around asking if I want taxis, all the time. I walked down one street a minute ago that seemed dedicated to wedding dresses and silver. There seem to be a lot of spa type things down this road. I really want to have a massage, but I think I would probably fall asleep and not wake up for ages. I've just hit the being awake for 24 hours mark. And I need to try and stay awake for about another 10 if I don't want to almost completely nocturnal for the first week. There are tattoo parlours and piercing shops everywhere! They remind me of Faliraki. The streets also seem very clean, despite many of the building looking decidedly shabby. Like, really clean. But it does smell a little!

I'm definitely going to have to take up drinking beer, its about 1 pound (there is no pound sign on this keyboard) for a bottle of tiger. Although tonight I think I will probably just pass out. Probably about 8 or 9 o'clock. I think I'm going to go in search of some food now, I should probably try and learn what things are on these little food stalls!
xx