Bangkok

Internet cafe in Bangkok. It's Sunday night, and we're in the really touristy part of town, where Thai people are few and far between. By the recommendation of the travel agency in Seoul where I booked our flights and hotel here, we are NOT staying with the rest of the Americans, Europeans and other sightseers, but rather in a slightly remote but extremely posh hotel. The Grand Hotel is grrrrand indeed. But only $50 a night!

On Friday night, even though we were dead tired, we went out to a fabulous night market -- Suan Lum Night Bazaar -- where I tasted heaven in the form of a spicy papaya salad so piquante that my mouth burned for 20 minutes after. A bit like a German biergarten, the Night Bazaar is composed of a large square in which tables are packed. You get your food from the dozens of vendors lining the square, and order your beer from the skimpily clad teenagers waiting on the tables.

After eating, we roamed the stalls behind the square and I learned how really, really cheap merchandise is here. "And these are the really overpriced prices that they tell tourists," Wendy advised.

Yesterday we did the touristy thing and went to see the Royal Palace and a couple temples. The Royal Palace is a place of great respect for Thais, and accordingly, all visitors have to wear the appropriate clothing. Which meant that Wendy, who was wearing a pair of shorts, had to borrow a sarong to wrap around herself. (They lend the sarongs for free.) I have a picture of this, but Wendy has forbidden me to post it online. Even though it's really kind of cute. Oh well. You'll just have to ask me to email it to you. (Just kidding, Wendy!)

Wendy is sitting next to me doing her email. I just started writing something about her but she just looked my way so I had to erase it. Just kidding. Oh god, this reminds me of college when we first discovered instant messaging and Rosa and I would sit next to each other in the computer room and instant message each other for two hours. Okay, quit it.

So after the Royal Palace, in the same compound, we saw the temple of the Emerald Buddha. This Buddha is made of jasper, not emerald (source: Wendy), and has three outfits -- the rainy season outfit, the cold season, and the hot season. The Thai king personally changes the Emerald Buddha's outfit when the time comes each season.

After the Emerald Buddha, we went to see the famous reclining Buddha. Forty-six meters (source: Wendy) of gold-plated enlightenment. This is the image that is quintessentially Thai, and it is totally all that you think it is and more. Absolutely stunning.

I should write more but Wendy's done and my back's starting to ache from sitting in this uncomfortable chair. In brief: after reclining Buddha, dinner by the river and across from Wat Arun (Temple of the Dawn) as the sun set; a riverboat to the famed Oriental Hotel, where we were refused entry because of Wendy's shorts and my sandals; and an hour-long Thai massage which was weird at first but eventually relaxing.

And today? Hours at the biggest street market in Bangkok, where silk sells for $5 a yard and you can find anything, ANYTHING you need. Outfits for dogs? Check. Siamese fighting fish? Check. Sculptures? Check. 1940s-era U.S. cigarette cards? Check. Electric violins? Yessir. In fact, the guy playing the electric violin is accompanied by a 66-year-old singer and six other violinists hanging out around the stall, and you end up striking up a conversation with him, after which you are so charmed by the music and the talk that you go and buy 5 beers for them. And then? You buy 5 bazillion yards of silk for a friend, decide that you too want a bazillion yards of silk, discover that the saleswoman knows the English word "sage," amazingly enough, though inaccurately, as she was actually referring to chartreuse. In any case, you get a great deal of silk and manage to finagle a 50 percent discount on a silk bag as well, all of which is of course at a price 100 times higher than Thai people would buy at, but oh well, you're American and you're on vacation, and $5 a yard is really a pretty good deal.

Okay, gotta go. Will write again as soon as have the chance.