Songkran in Chiang Mai and a quick stop in Laos!

I’m now in Laos! Country number 2 of the trip! I’m in a place called Luang Prabang, an ancient capital of Laos. It’s small and very beautiful, a bit like the north of Thailand, surrounded by forests and mountains! Unfortunately I really don’t have a lot of time left in Asia, so I’ve had to pretty much skip Laos, as I’m heading to Hanoi later today.

Anyway, before Laos I was in Chiang Mai celebrating the Thai New Year, which is called Songkran. After leaving Pai on the 12th, I took the minibus down the mountains to Chiang Mai, which is the second biggest city in Thailand. Initially I thought Chiang Mai would be similar to Bangkok, so I wasn’t sure what it would be like, but it was great, and nothing like Bangkok! Even though it is a big city, it never really seemed too big, there aren’t any skyscrapers, and almost everything is within walking distance. There appears to be a lot more culture too, there are coffee shops and bakeries everywhere, and quite a few arty shops. Chiang Mai is also divided into the old town, which is surrounded by a mote, and the rest of the city outside the mote. Songkran is meant to start on the 13th, but because Chiang Mai are extra crazy about Songkran, they tend to start the celebration a bit early, which made the walk from the minibus to my hostel risky! Luckily I didn’t have to walk through the main street, although as soon as I started walking a guy walked across the road and poured a bucket of water over my head, he was nice about it though! He let me put my bags down first and prepare myself…he then wished me a happy new year and let me go. Luckily the water fights calmed down a bit in the evening, so there were some really cool markets or shows to go to.

I spent most of Songkran with a friend called Kim, who I met at the safari park,from Holland, and her two friends Luke and Luke (one from England and one from Australia)!I had such a great time with them, we would meet at 11.30/12, all ready with our buckets and water guns, and start making our way down the main street, which is along the mote. The water festival was amazing, I’ve never seen so much water! It was one big party, with people on stages all along the road spraying water below, people on the side of the road, people walking down the road, and so many people in the back of trucks, all throwing water! It was hard to do anything else! I did do one of the famous cooking classes though, which was really fun! We got to eat lots too! We all also went to a ladyboy, with a friend called Fabian, who I met in Pai, a friend called Jennie, who was staying in my hostel, and then the two Luke’s, and Kim. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it was amazing! We sat quite close to the front, probably too close because it almost backfired when they came down to the audience! I didn’t really want to leave Chiang Mai, I had some good friends there and the hostel was really sociable, but I guess that’s travelling!

On the 16th I took the bus from Chiang Mai to Chiang Khong, which is at the Thai/Laos border, we crossed the border, which actually went quite smoothly, and then got the 13 hour night bus to Luang Prabang…so it was about 19 hours travelling in total! Luang Prabang is really nice, it has a mixture of Lao and French architecture, I’ve heard it’s because a few hundred years ago Laos got protection from the French after their military was weakened, so there are lots of little hints of France here, which is pretty cool! I’ve felt quite lonely since leaving Chiang Mai, it was incredibly social and I think I’d gotten quite used to Thailand! It has been good to experience just a little bit of Laos though! I leave for Hanoi in a couple of hours, which I’m looking forward, I just have to get through the 24 hour bus journey, which I’ve heard is gruelling, although I’ve kind of enjoyed the bus journeys so far!

I’m actually thinking about being spontaneous and buying a bike in Hanoi and riding down as much of Vietnam as possible! I don’t really know what’s come over me, but apparently it’s incredibly popular, so I’m hoping to meet some people who are doing the same in Hanoi!

Anyways, I better be going!

Life in Pai

So I’m in Pai! And life in Pai is very different to what I’ve experienced on my trip so far!

I left the safari park Monday morning, much to my sadness! I put my bags on the safari bus which goes into town, fed the leopards one more time, said my goodbyes and then took my bike back to Kanchanaburi! I quickly said my goodbyes to the staff in Kanchanaburi, jumped on a tuktuk and then caught my bus to Ayutthaya. I realised this was my first bus ride in Thailand, and actually the bus was great, I just mentioned Ayutthaya to somebody and he instantly started running, shouting at me to follow, he chucked me on a bus, and off I went to Suphanburi, where somebody again instantly ran me on to a bus Ayutthaya…easy! I then spent a few hours in Ayutthaya exploring before my night train! The night train was brilliant, it’s just a normal train and then when you want to go to sleep you ask a member of staff and they fold everything into beds. I met some really nice people, a French couple who had been travelling for almost two years! An American called Jon who had just started his travels and lots of other people from other nationalities! I actually got a good night’s sleep too! I arrived in Chiang Mai and went to get breakfast with Jon, and ended up being joined by Axul and Julius from Finland and Bruno from Germany! That’s one of the big things from travelling so far, one moment you can be feeling a tad lonely, the next you’ll be in a big group of people from all over the world going for breakfast!

After Chiang Mai, I caught the bus to Pai, it was in a small mini van, and I was squashed in between a monk and a really really young looking Thai couple! The journey was amazing, it seemed like a mountain stage of a cycle tour, the roads just kept on going up, with a bend after every 50 metres, with an occasional stunning view of the mountains! So after about 3 hours of bumpy, windy roads, I arrived in Pai! The first thing I noticed was how beautiful all the mountains surrounding it were, it’s really really nice! The only downside perhaps is it has been taken over by tourists, there’s so many English and Americans! But people seem to come here to chill out and to get away from civilisation, so it’s very relaxed! It has been great to rent a bike for the day and go on road trips into the mountains, I’ve been to waterfalls, hot springs (which just makes the actual heat feel even worse), caves, and some really cool canyons! The hostel I’m staying at is really awesome as well, it’s all made out of bamboo, kind of like a big tree house, and I’m staying on the third level, which you use a ladder to climb up to, it’s amazing!

I’m heading to Chiang Mai soon, to celebrate Songkran, which is their new year, and just one big water festival…I hear there’s elephants! But to relax and see the beautiful mountains, Pai has been really good! I don’t think all of the people are for me, I’ve met some really nice people, but a lot of people come hear to just chill out and go out, so I’m kind of looking forward to moving onto Chiang Mai 🙂 Packing doesn’t seem to be too bad this time, maybe I’m getting better….

The whole family is out the country at the moment, which is really strange! Jack is in Berlin, Adam is in Iceland, and Mum and Dad are in Rome! So I hope you’re all having a great time guys!

P

My time at the safari is coming to an end…

It’s the 5th April today, and I’m planning on leaving the safari park on Monday 7th, which means my time here is almost over, although I really don’t want to leave! Despite not being crazy about Bangkok, it has possibly been the best start I could have hoped for on my trip. Working with the animals has been amazing, and incredibly surreal, and I have met some really great friends over the month, it has gone so quickly! I simply seem really settled here, and I’m actually quite nervous about starting to travel the rest of South East Asia. I just hope I get into the swing of things when I leave, and the coming month flys by like the past one has! 

The past few days have been really really good, I’ve been able to take more care of Bungle the bear as Maddi (who looks after him) has been in Kanchanaburi for the past couple of days. It has been amazing! He can be hard work at times, but is incredibly cute and fun! It’s just amazing to be working with a baby bear! I also spent the day on cubs yesterday, and we had the three baby lions at the front for the first time. They’re around a month and a week old, and spent the first couple of hours staggering around looking lost. Their fur is so so soft, and they haven’t really learnt to bite yet which is always nice, they just clamber all over you until they find somewhere comfy and then place themselves there for a while! I definitely won’t be forgetting them in a hurry! Yesterday I attempted to walk Muki the Zebra for the first time…it was a lot harder than I thought, I spent most of my time running in circles pouring milk that was meant for Muki all over myself! We got there though, and I guess not many people can say they’ve taken a zebra for a walk by themselves! We’ve all also been tubing in the river this week over lunch time which was so nice, the river has no current because of a dam, so we just chilled out chatting and exploring.

I was 19 on Monday too! I ended up having a really nice day! I spent most of it zooming round the Thai countryside seeing temples, monk houses, some really beautiful war memorials, and I got to see the River Kwai Bridge too. We had a barbecue with everyone in the evening, which was really great, and despite no WiFi and really bad signal, I eventually got sung to from home, which topped it off! It was so nice to speak to them! My really good friends in Amie, Lucy and Anne also put balloons around my door! I don’t think I like being 19 so far, it seems a lot older than 18…

This was just a quick post so I think I might go to bed now! Night!

 

Maybe not quite, but I’m definitely at a good stage with nature compared to what I was! the odd scorpion, centipede or spider don’t even seem to bother me too much, as long as they’re not in my room! once I’m in bed and under my mosquito net, I feel quite content and happy about life and the wild world around me! It may sound silly, but I’m actually really pleased about this, I feel like at the moment I could stay wherever I like in south east Asia and have a worry free stay, saying that, I bet this disappears as soon as I get home, but for now, I think I’m good!
This has actually helped a decision of where to go next in Thailand! I’ve decided to leave the safari park 3 days early (even though I really don’t think I want to leave!) to give myself more time seeing as much as Thailand as possible. I think the plan is to head straight up north to Chiang Mai, to then catch a bus to Pai, a remote mountainous region in Mae Hong Son Province that is close to the Burmese border. It’s meant to be incredibly beautiful, but a great place to meet plenty of travellers as well. Apparently there’s lots of trekking to be done (which I actually wouldn’t mind doing a little bit of), waterfalls to be seen and general cool things to be doing! So I’m pretty sure that’s the plan, and then hopefully I can be in either Pai or Chiang Mai for the Thai New Year, which is a huge water festival called Songkran. I’ve heard it’s simply the biggest water fight ever, and you can’t avoid getting wet, so I’ll see how that goes! Everything at the safari park is still fun and busy!

Over the past few days I’ve been doing a few bits of filming for videos promoting the park and for new volunteers! I’ve been doing them with a volunteer called Lucy, and its been lots of fun! Yesterday for instance we drove round the safari park, with me on the back of the moped, facing backwards, filming as we went along, we also got another elephant trek out of it!

A lot has happened over the past few days for the cats too, Simba the lion snapped his chain whilst on the line, which meant there was a very big lion on the rampage. I wasn’t actually there to see what happened, but he jumped on Tat before Ned came running to get him. I think the impact alone must have hurt a lot, but luckily Ned said he’s just a big dog. The fact that Simba’s cord snapped meant he couldn’t go out on the line, and before we knew it he was going to be released into safari, which was great! We all got the safari bus the next day and got to see him. For Tat and Ned and everyone that has worked with him it is a really amazing thing to see, so that was pretty special! Not long after the snapped cord incident however, a volunteer called Maddi got knocked off her bike by a bus! Luckily she came away with just a nasty looking knee, but nothing else major…she then went straight off to pitch a design for a bear enclosure! Later on in the day, we went to see the crocodile show, which, as a show wasn’t actually too great, simply seeing the crocodiles so close was amazing! For some reason the Thai staff are always shouting my name, they call me Mr. Tom, so when it came to asking for a volunteer, they all started shouting my name! It was the part of the show where he was putting his hand in the crocodiles mouth, so I was building up the mental will power to put my hand inside its mouth, yet just as I was ready to do it, he told me to go and sit down, which, after speaking to Tat and Ned later on, was probably a good idea… Jack usually seems to do the volunteering in our family, so I felt a lot like him doing that! We went back later to help them clean out the arena, whilst the crocodiles were still inside, that was really cool, and I got a crocodiles tooth out of it!

It hasn’t been too crazy since that day, we went on the zip line going over the river yesterday during lunch! After 10 minutes of deciding whether we all trusted this Thai zip line, we all went down and it was really good fun! And very refreshing…despite the colour of the river!

It’s the 30th March today, which means it’s my birthday tomorrow! It has come around so quickly! We’re all going out for a meal tonight and then I’m having the day off tomorrow with a volunteer called Ollie to see a bit of Kanchanaburi! And then we’re having a barbecue when I get back tomorrow as well, with seven new volunteers! It should all be really good, and hopefully I can Skype everyone at home at some point too!

Day to day at the safari park.

It seems I completely failed to continue my last post from a few days ago! Time here just seems to fly! I’ve already been here almost two weeks and I don’t know where it’s gone! I’ll try and fit in everything I’ve been doing here since my first day at the park.

All new volunteers get the opportunity to do some awesome activities when they first arrive, so after my first morning of cleaning the monkey cages, I went on the Salapong tour! Salapong is the best zoo keeper at the park, everyone loves him, and he seems to love everyone! He’s always smiling and turns up to every English lesson as well! On his tour, he basically takes you round the safari, in a side car, feeding all the animals! The last stop on the tour was the giraffes, which was amazing! As soon as they see the food they all come swarming over and you suddenly find yourself ducking and running under legs coming from every direction! It was crazy, and quite scary when they are that close, but definitely a highlight of the trip so far! We work with Salapong everyday here and it’s a joy! He also loves to teach us Thai, yesterday for instance we spent a couple of hours while we were looking after the leopard cubs teaching each other Thai and English.
A few days ago we all also went on the safari bus, the giraffes again being the highlight because they all put their heads through the Windows to eat the food.

Yet another highlight from being here so far is the bare back elephant trekking. Simply being on an elephant going for a stroll through a beautiful forest was an amazing feeling! I really hope to do it again.

The days at the safari park start at 6am….everyday, which I’m getting used to now, we have a quick breakfast and are usually off cleaning monkey cages, feeding baby lions or walking the baby bear by 7. Cleaning the monkey poo is definitely getting tedious, but now more volunteers are starting to arrive, so it gets done more quickly and we can enjoy the rest of the day. There are three different typical days here; rescue retreat, cubs, and cats. Rescue retreat is spending the day with the monkeys; feeding them, and providing enrichment for them throughout the day. If you’re on cubs you pretty much spend your day playing with leopard cubs. I think we have 20 odd leopard cubs here at the park, and so far we’ve been looking after 10, the youngest being Meo, Nuo, Tuki and Boci, who are around a month and a half old! If you’re on cats for the day, you spend it with the bigger cats. This is a great day, running around taking Mata (a leopard) for walks, or playing with Simba, a lion who’s very almost fully grown, but he’s the friendliest lion ever!

When I first arrived at the park I thought the days may be a bit repetitive, yet no day seems to be the same, yesterday for example instead of cleaning I went off to feed three baby lions that are 23 days old, and took the opportunity to peak at the newly born tiger, he’s just 3 days old, it was incredible, especially after seeing Simba and Yaya (the two fully grown lion and tiger). I also spent some of yesterday sewing up bags full of elephant poo, which is something I didn’t expect I’d be doing! A lot of the day is also working on special projects, which may be making videos, writing articles, designing enclosures, working on fundraising ideas, etc. At the moment I’m putting together a video with a volunteer called Lucy to promote Mata the leopard, Bungle the bear and Muki the Zebra.

I still feel really settled here, and I’m making some great friends. The insect situation is still going well, I’ve only seen a few scorpions so far! Another cockroach has moved into my bathroom though, so I know have two. Tat says they can fly, so I don’t know why they don’t just fly out!

I have been taking lots of photos, but unfortunately I don’t have a laptop so I haven’t been able to upload them, hopefully I’ll be able to soon though!

I think that’s all for now, I’ll try and post more soon! 🙂

/p>

My

My first week at the safari park!

It’s now been a week since I’ve arrived at the safari park! I would have liked to have written more on here but I just seem to lose time while I’ve been here!

Since being here I’ve realised how a lot can change in a week, I feel like I’ve settled into this travelling malarkey, and feel a whole better about everything that’s to come! I’m really looking forward to it all! This really better not just be an ‘up’ that I’m having, but I don’t think it is.

I travelled to Kanchanaburi from Bangkok on the 12th, getting the train at 7.30am I arrived at Kanchanaburi just before 11. I loved the train, it was wooden seats, with all sorts of people, and I could just sit with the window wide open and enjoy going from big and busy city of Bangkok to the beautiful green country with rice paddies in every field! I arrived and rang Tat, who runs the volunteering program alongside Ned. ‘Let me just put this leopard back in its cage and I’ll come straight away’, she said, which pretty much sums up what it’s like working with the animals here. You get to work so closely with the animals, something you wouldn’t get to do in many other places throughout the world. Over the past few days I’ve taken leopards for walks and been used as a climbing frame for many of the baby leopards, hung out with lions, played with a moon bear, looked after an ostrich, ridden elephants, ran under the legs of giraffes and cleaned out lots and lots of monkey cages!

After managing to relax a bit in Kanchanaburi, I met Tat at The Jolly Frog Guesthouse in Kanchanaburi, and we headed straight to the motorbike rental place round the corner, where I found out I would be riding the bike 30k away to the safari park, which ended up being incredibly fun once I got used to it! We soon arrived at the park, and I was thrown straight into the animals, starting with seeing the baby leopards and the bear.

We then went to the house to settle down and get used to everything. There were three other volunteers at the park when I arrived, Maddi from Canada, Blair from Australia, Margarita from Latvia, and then I arrived at the same time as Sheldon from China. The first day at the safari park was a shock, it’s very remote, I’ve never been anywhere like it so I was thinking a lot about home on the first night, but thankfully I feel like I’ve settled down really well! Even the insects haven’t been too bad, it’s mostly lizards. I have a cockroach that has moved into my bathroom, but I think we’re working things out!

It’s getting pretty late here, so I think I will try and continue this tomorrow! Night!

My last couple of days in Bangkok.

My last couple of days in Bangkok were up and down! It started with a day at The Grand Palace to see the Emerald Buddha, I went with somebody called Mara, (from Philadelphia!) who was in my dorm, and her friend from Norway who really annoyingly I can’t remember the name of..but I will find out!

The Grand Palace was so impressive! Lots of amazing buildings, The Emerald Buddha is in the main palace, and looks as if it’s sitting on a pile of gold..it’s just amazing, I felt like I could sit there for hours just looking at it! Although to get in your legs had to be covered up, which made the heat even worse! After the palace we jumped on the river boat and went to Khao San Road, which is the main backpacking road in Bangkok, and is apparently a must simply because it’s crazy for backpackers. To start with the road is huge, lined with hostels, bars, clubs, all kinds of markets, people receiving massages, tattoo parlours and lots more that I probably can’t think of. It was jam packed, with so many tourists, and with Thai salesman walking up and down following you in the hope you’ll buy a suit, jewellery, musical instruments and lots more crazy items! We soon got out of there and got the river boat back!

That night I felt really bad! I thought I was mostly tired but it turned to have been the food, and it wasn’t good! So I spent the rest of that evening and the next day in bed feeling sorry for myself. Annoyingly I had to go and collect my Vietnam visa the next day, but felt better that evening, which is when I had to pack for the safari park, so I was ready for a 6 o clock start to catch the train the next day!

My last few days in Bangkok weren’t as I’d hoped, and I wanted to see a little more, but I guess I got to see all that I could in the days I was there! I don’t think I actually enjoyed Bangkok all that much, a lot of the temples were brilliant, and seeing the markets for the first time is really cool, but the smell, the size and the amount of people made it all seem too much! I was glad to be getting away! I did however meet some really nice people to start off the trip!

I m

 

Day 5 – Omtip

Sorry I haven’t done this for a few days, I just haven’t gotten round to it, but this is what I started writing a few days ago that I’ve just finished…

Day 5 was a really great day, it made me feel a lot better about being here 🙂 I got picked up by Omtip, Suvicha (her husband), and Ing (their daughter). I jumped in the car, met them all, and we headed for the old/ancient city, which is north of Bangkok, the journey firstly made me realise how big Bangkok is, it took us around 40 minutes to get to the old city, all on nice fast and clear roads! It was also really nice to speak to somebody who knew my family back home, and the whole family were so so nice!

We managed to fit lots in, the first stop was the floating markets, which is a great site! Seeing hundreds of boats all with their own unique food and gifts lined along the river. What was great though was having somebody explain what’s what, and what’s good to try. Ing showed me lots of Thai specialties that I wouldn’t have tried without them, for example coconut ice cream and noodle cakes…they were interesting, they were nice, I just don’t think Thai food has grown on me yet!

We then went straight to a floating restaurant, which was apparently one of their favourites! I felt like I tried proper Thai food then, as they had been there before, they all ordered as soon as we arrived and not long after all these Thai dishes came out! It was a bit different to street food as most of it was fresh water, and there was a specific way of eating it. At the moment, I think I prefer fish and chips…it was brilliant though, especially to have an understanding of it all!

After the floating markets, we stopped off at a few different temples, the first few were just small ones, but it was great having the whole procedure explained! We ended up at a great temple, called Bang Pa in Palace, which is where the Royal family stay when they are in Bangkok. It was a huge estate, with lots of really cool temples and buildings dotted around, in between amazing gardens and lakes. There was a mixture of temples and houses from different times that were modelled on different countries architecture, such as China and India. Suvicha seemed to take a real interest in it all which was great!

The final stop was their home and another bit to eat. Their house is amazing, and seemed to bring together everything Suvicha had talked about and seemed to love during the day. It was pretty much all antique, in an original Thai house, spread over two floors of just amazingly old things from all over the world! He had dozens a these huge Chinese containers that were used to make tea from hundreds of years ago!

We had a quick tea, which involved blood and intestine…for them, and whatever else there was for me. We then said our goodbyes after they dropped me off at the hostel. It was a really great day!

I will try and write about my last few days in Bangkok tomorrow, they weren’t very exciting don’t worry. I’m now at the safari park near a town called Kanchanaburi, which is about 2 hours north of Bangkok and is very remote..or it seems like that! It’s hard because I’ve done nothing like this before, it’s very basic…but also brilliant, I’ve been on safari with giraffes and bears, ridden elephants, taken leopards, lions and tigers for walks and cleaned lots dirty cages! It’s hard work but very rewarding, and it’ll be an experience 🙂 I’ll give you more on what I’ve been up to soon!

I think I should get to bed here, everyone else has! Night!

Day 4 – Temples!

It’s quite late here so I may do a bit now to draw you in (:P) and then finish it off tomorrow! Today though, I decided I really needed to start actually seeing the sites, so I decided to take a river boat, stopping off at the temples along the way. Luckily the river is a 5 minute walk from the hostel so I didn’t have to spend long wandering the streets of Bangkok looking for where I was meant to be. The first stop was called Tha Tien to see the temple Wat Po, which is famous for the countries largest reclining Buddha, which is basically a 50m long, gold buddha lying down. It was pretty impressive, and Wat Po as a place is like a village of small temples, dotted everywhere.

After Wat Po I ended up speaking to some sort of ‘helper’, who I didn’t really want to speak to, but he dragged me over and told me where I should go…he was nice but I just didn’t want to go to any of those places! After our chat I sneaked off in the opposite direction to where he suggested and tried to find the boat that takes you to the other side of the river to a temple called Wat Aran, a really impressive looking temple. It was pretty different from Wat Po,  it was incredibly tall and had steps going up to about half way….the steepest steps I have ever seen. So after conquering some crazy mental barriers going up these steps, I made it to the top, or as far as you could go (I hope you’re all proud family!) The views at the top were great…but then I had to try and get down…

As it’s really late I think I’ll finish this tomorrow…I have just finished skyping Mum though which was really great and has made me feel a lot better!

Night night!!

Hello again!

I have just got back from a day out with Omtip, Suvicha and Ing. Omtip is an old friend of Mum’s family, and stayed with them when she was about 20 when she was studying in England, although she has lived in Bangkok pretty much her entire life!

However first, here are some more photos from yesterday…

The photos above are all from Wat Po and Wat Aran, you had to cross the river to get to Wat Aran, and the sun setting made it a really nice scene to sit and watch. Once I had climbed down the vertical drop from Wat Aran, I got back on the river boat and headed for the hostel! I was shattered, so had a shower and then went to get some street food with Hornow (really don’t know how you spell it) from Brazil and Carey from Ireland, and then I skyped Mother…which was sooo good!

That’s pretty much it for yesterday, the photos below are from a night time visit to a place called Victory Monument. It was about 11pm but still so so busy! Bangkok doesn’t seem to calm down!

I might try and write a post for today but it’s quite late so I might have to do it tomorrow!

Byee!

 

Day 3

While writing this lizards are chasing each other on the wall, luckily they’re on the outside of the wall so I’m not worrying too much….

It’s just gone 8pm here, and is pretty much dark, although the traffic outside is still non stop! Today I just planned to get my vietnam visa and sort out a local sim card, and then explore a bit. I went with somebody from my dorm called Maum, from Switzerland, who also needed to pick up a visa. The Vietnam embassy was a few train stops away, with a very unnoticeable small green door as its entrance, with nothing to say what it was.  But after asking somebody we found it and got our visas sorted, they keep hold of your passports until you go and collect the visa (11th), which makes me feel strangely vulnerable and lost (!), which doesn’t help the feeling of being lost I already had! From what I have seen so far, I don’t actually love Bangkok that much, it’s very busy, hot and very run down in most places, and I haven’t seen any amazing sites yet. I guess it’s just very different from home, and hopefully when I see more I’ll like it more 🙂

After doing my visa application and getting my sim, I explored Siam a little, which is one of the busiest places in the city center (I hope!) It was crazy, filled with street markets on one side of the road, and high end shops on the other. There were also lots of shrines along the way.
 When I got back it was already 5pm, so I chilled out for a bit and got my sim sorted. I thought it would be good to see something at night in Bangkok, so I’m trying to research it now, and may try and see something later!

I think that’s pretty much it for today, feeling better than yesterday but still missing home a bit and 5 months still seems like a long time, I’ll let you know when it doesn’t!

Night night!

Tom