The first weeks thoughts

It has now officially been a week here in this crazy, crazy city. It seems as though it has been a month but here are some of my thoughts and things I've learned about Bangkok.

1-This city has very little trash. As in, the street vendors throw out very little at the end of the day. The city is making a strong effort to conserve the environment and its very very impressive.

2- Tuk-Tuks are a tourist rip off. BAD. We figured out after traveling by tuk-tuk for the first couple days that taxis (which are in fact actual cars and have air conditioning, might i add!) are about 2/3 of the price! When you are talking in baht, its a HUGE difference!

3- This city is quite expensive to live in when living off a "teacher's salary." Jenn and I will have to live quite cheaper than we were planning to make it work....

4- We only know how to say hello/goodbye and thank you. Thai is hard...

5- The sidewalks here are horrible. We have been walking everywhere, but the sidewalks are so bumpy and I tripped 7 times tonight on the way to dinner. Maybe I should pay more attention...

6- Not many Americans here so far.

7- We are thankful to NOT get whistled at like we do in the states

8- Nothing really opens here till about 11 am. Hard to find breakfast places.

9- Lots of white bread and fried food. They haven't learned yet. Neither have the Americans I guess...

10- Order food from stands that have women cooking; they are cleaner. This is just our personal observation. We have yet to order anything "daring." maybe next week...

11- This city has so much western in it.

12-Thais have really fun hair and style.

This week has been long, intense, emotionally draining and so full of life, learning and dirt on my face!!! I'm so incredibly grateful and excited for what next week brings...

have i mentioned that everything smells like fish sauce?

Not much has happened in the last couple days worth mentioning! We are sweating our little hearts out, searching for a job for Jenn, searching for a living space and in the mean time trying to figure out our budget! Not to mention that we are still getting adjusted to the food....

Books, music and Facebook are keeping us sane right now. Im hoping one of these days I will get used to this smell....

no english?

After my episode with the mango shake, my body was pummeled and I just woke up from sleeping for 16 hours straight. The last time I slept for that long was when I had mono in high school. The good news is that I feel back to life now...

One of the most unexpected things on our journey so far has been the lack of people speaking English. I don't necessarily mean the Thais themselves, but more so the white people that we see. We have yet to meet any other Americans. We see quite a few white people but they are speaking other languages! We have met a few Australians but no Americans. It has been quite surprising.

Today we continue on our search for housing and jobs....we have to remind ourselves regularly that it is only day 5.

Day 4, really, thats it?

So much has happened in 4 days its crazy and Jen and I also feel like not enough has happened either! We are still looking for places to live, but feeling a little more hopeful about the situation. We contacted some people yesterday that are hopefully going to be able to help us out! Jen starts her hunt for jobs tomorrow.

On another note, I have now officially had my first disagreement with food here. surprisingly it was a mango shake from a restaurant. needless today, today I am pretty tender all over and low energy from making best friends with the toilet last night. dang it!! mangoes are some of my favorites!

Good thing its sunday today so there is not alot on the agenda...

First days activities

Yesterday was a crazy day. We had booked a hostel for one night so when we woke up, we had to eat breakfast and lug all of our stuff to the next hostel. the funniest part is that the taxis here aren't big enough to carry our bags AND us in them, so we ended up having to strap our bags by bungee cords inside the trunks! we immediately said to ourselves, "lets find a place to live quickly so we dont have to do this anymore!" not to mention the fact that everyone was making fun of us for how big our bags were! After we got situated, we started walking to Kho San Road (its the touristy part) and found a guy in the mean time that was telling us all about how it was the one day a year that we could get a really really cheap tuk-tuk ride around the city and visit certain places for free (its some kind of government day/incentive). so he put us on a tuk-tuk and we went to 3 different statues/temples and several other places for 20 baht. 33 baht is 1 dollar, so we rode around the city and got to see some cool things for the whole afternoon on less than a dollar!!! What an adventurous way to start our trip! Today we are scouting out places to live.....wish us luck!

Arrived in Bangkok!

I cant believe Im finally here!! Its 3pm here in Bangkok on Thursday and 2am in Denver. I took some anti-anxiety medication on the plane ride over and pretty much slept the whole way....and then some. Jen and I calculated that I slept for something like 18 hours yesterday. oopsies!! I think 1 pill was a little too much for me!! We just arrived at the hostel that we are going to be staying at for the next 3 days. today our plan is to go explore and hopefully in the next couple days find a place to live. carrying our suitcases this whole way was quite a bitch!! (surprise, right?!?!) This city is absolutely massive and I am going to love it!! I am also going to love sweating at all hours of the day....

Feelin the good times!

I am in a good place, which is incredibly refreshing! I got alot done today for my trip such as making phone calls to all my "responsibilities" and weeding things out of my condo. I had a lovely break last night with Terry and some ladies up at the ballet in Vail. It was a great retreat for a day, but I actually slept(which I haven't in weeks now)! This week is my last week at work and is gonna be absolutely nuts but Im choosing to stay present and enjoy each moment. I love my life and Im SO grateful for it!