Bangkok, the beginning of my Thailand explorations

This is all I packed for my 3 months in SEA

Getting to Bangkok

After visiting friends in New York, I took a flight headed towards Bangkok, Thailand, with a 5 hour layover in Zurich, Switzerland. Here, in Zurich, I met up with my friend Ife, who would be my partner in Southeast asian exploration for the next 3 months (she flew out from Miami). Since the layover was 5 hours, we decided to explore the city. The weather was as perfect as the city as gorgeous (and expensive). And, as all major European cities do, it had a nice big river running through its center.

We mainly walked around. I checked out the university because I was applying to get a masters there, and we got drinks by the river. I kid you not… my TEA was 20 euros…

After feeling pain in our wallet from Switzerland, we got onto our next plane from Zurich -> Bangkok, arriving in Bangkok at 10AM on June 6th. Exhausted from barely sleeping on either flight, and thus practically being awake for 2 days, my times with my friends in NY and in Zurich already seemed weirdly far away.

Wat is Bangkok? Rainy.

We found our way from the airport to our hostel where we got stuck for 3 hours because of a sudden monsoon rain shower. However afterward we had the chance to go out and explore the city. We ran into a guy named Kieran who we had spoken with on the bus. He was with a group of his friends, all of which were newly graduated from Harvard. We spent the rest of the night walking around and exploring with them. We went to a couple of temples (called “Wat’s”)

AND we ate at a Michelin Star restaurant for only $3 each! did I mention this country is CHEAP

Our second day there, Ife and I set out to see the sights we hadn’t seen the day before.

As we wandered along the river we stopped to eat lunch and GOOD THING WE DID because IT STARTED POURING RAIN AGAIN and we ended up being trapped for another 3 hours! Ife and I finally decided to make a run for it and sprint through the pouring rain to buy some ponchos, and just as our luck would have it, as soon as we left the store with our ponchos, the rain stopped.

However, all the rain flooded the Wats, which led to some of my favorite photos of a Wat so far.

Khao San Road!

Our friend Trent flew in this day and met up with us at the Hostel that night. Once he was settled in we went out to eat some street food, then we went to Khao San Road which is the road where all the backpackers go to. It is filled with street vendors selling food, clothes (yes I have bought elephant pants already), and music blasting. There we ran into Kieran and his friends AGAIN made a group of new friends (all guys who go to SDSU who were visiting a friend of theirs that went on a trip to Thailand two years ago and then just never left).