Los Angeles of the Orient

Narrator : Mike and Angel are now on famous (or some may say infamous) Khao San Road in Thailand. Having just completed another round of massages, they recount their first few nights in this "Land of Smiles".

Mike : Our hotel the first night was in the business district, so we saw lots of white guys with their Thai "lady friends". I think I was the only white guy there without a Thai honey.

Angel : ... yeah, because you KNOW Chinese honey is sweeter (and cheaper).

Mike : Cheaper? We then went to the Bangkok zoo, which was pretty fly. Every time I'm in a zoo, I revert back to a 10 year old. "Wow! Hippos are big!... Hippos are big animals! They are mammals!" Luckily, Angel didn't kill me.

Angel: Okay, I must admit, I was tempted to throw him into the tiger pits more than once. After the zoo, we also enjoyed a Chinese opera at a huge Chinese temple. I didn't understand a word, but the costumes were pretty.

Mike: I always ask Angel to translate any Chinese dialect, and then bug her when she says she doesn't understand it. I mistakingly think that it's the equivalent of me translating British English to American English. It would be like me watching a play with the actors saying stuff like, "Bollocks, my good chap! Fish and chips!"
Anyway, we got a massage after that, which was pretty cool.

Today, we took a short river trip, saw some Buddhist temples here in town, and went to the royal palace. We then went up to Khaosan Road, which is where we are right now. There are more white people than Thais here. Dreadlocks and tattoos abound- the people on Khaosan are a mix of frat guys, and the type of people you'd see buying hummus at Trader Joe's.

Narrator: I see that you are barefoot. What's up?

Mike: Oh yeah. We're in a massage place. We just got Thai massages, and foot reflexology.

Narrator: Any final thoughts?

Mike : Bangkok is a pretty diverse city- we've seen lots of things here. Angel and I compared it to Los Angeles- it's huge and sprawling, with lots of traffic and smog. Even though it has some cool things, it's really not an enjoyable atmosphere. Lots of energy is spent just trying to navigate around the big city. I'll be glad once I'm gone. However, we're planning on seeing some Muay Thai tomorrow, so I might change my mind.
Oh, but the food has been excellent. Angel?

Angel : Lots of banana pancakes (standard backpacker staple) and even saw stands selling insects. We haven't tried any yet, but that's just because Mike is chicken. HAHA, get it? Chicken. I crack myself up.

Narrator : Any other plans?

Angel : Since neither of us like Bangkok very much, we've decided to leave a day early on Wednesday. We just bought tickets to Ko Chang. We are hoping the weather holds up on us, but if it does decide to rain, at least we bought a deck of cards with us this time around. Now if you don't mind excusing us, we gotta get going to the "scruffy" bar next door, so I can get my moog... I mean, groove... on. Care to join us, Narrator?

Narrator : Umm... no, I'm not going to a bar with scruffs and other low-lifes. You KNOW I only drink at high class establishments, like the Oriental or the Peninsula.

Mike: They aren't low-lifes. They are people, just like us, only they have dreadlocks and don't wear deoderant. And eat hummus.

Narrator : ... and with that, we bid you all adieu!

Note : No scruffs, frat boys or weirdos were harmed during the production of this blog entry.