For no good reason other than that I like food, here are some of the things i ate in thailand

Thus ends my thai vacation. With shelf exams, finals and step 1 coming up, i am sure i will have plenty of procrastinating power to keep you all amused for the next couple months

-J

After a stop at mini-siam, we requested that our driver take us to a beach where there were not a lot of people. SInce Pattaya is a beach resort town, we were not expecting too much, but the driver knew his business and managed to find us a beautiful stretch of relatively unpopulated beach to relax on.

row row row your boat

Just the way i like the beach…in site, but not close enough to get me.
How about some fresh cut coconut?

And with that in mind it’s time to change my latitude

After a few hours of relaxing, we decided to head out to get dinner somewhere close so we could watch the sunset. I am a big fan of sunsets and sunrises, esp w/my camera, and hopefully i can give you some of that joy

So we had basked on beaches, partaken pachyderm rides, toured temples, touched tigers, gone hiking, done a pretty large sampel of everything thailand has to offer…or had we?

Let’s head to Tiffany’s show!

Look at all those sexy men. Yes, EVERYONE in the above two photos is a guy. did you think i would go to thailand, land of transsexuals and NOT see a ladyboi show? clearly, you don’t know me at all. And i feel totally secure in my masculinity saying that some of the ones in the show we saw were even hotter than the ones in the pic (hotness measured by the dude to the right)

that said, we decided to not go clubbing in pattaya after seeing the show, given that there would be no way to tell the gender of the person we were trying to hit on

good times were had nonetheless, and we headed back to bangkok for our last day in thailand to begin on the morrow

-J

Welcome to my first reader from australia! Sometimes, i like to look at my cluster maps and pretend that it corresponds with my world domination. I almost have control of the US…at least the important parts. w00tsauce for me

anyhoo, on the dawn of our 2nd to last day in thailand, we decided to get some souvenir shopping done. Well, I did. Ward and Koh needed to sleep in a little bit from the slave driving pace i had been putting them through the rest of the trip. Traveling with me is not for the weak

So bright and early i caught the subway over to Chatuchak weekend market. How to describe this open air pavilion of all things tchatche?

Do
you ever feel tortured by internal conflict? Like there’s a constant battle
between light and darkness in your psyche? Like only one side of your
consciousness is capable of action and the other half is just shrieking,
“Folly! Folly!”? Like part of you is going, “Don’t waste your
money” and another part is whispering, “Buy some of those dried
lizards. Do it. Do it!”

Can you guess which part of me won?

The hungry part that wanted smiley bao!

Now i have a pretty good sense of direction. But the second i stepped off the beaten path into these little alleyways, I was totally and completely lost

Travel tip for thailand:
if you ever see a display of such stunning color, and you do not speak thai, do NOT ask if they are wax or edible

If you disregard this, when the vendor then sticks a toothpick into the pepper to prove its existence (METAPHYSICAL PEPPER!), do not take the pepper from him good naturedely

If you insist on ignoring the first two warning, for the love of whatever deity you worship, DO NOT EAT THE PEPPER. Your mouth will try to spontaneously combust, but it WILL NOT be able to. Then you will make a sad face while thai people laugh at you

but pretty colors, yes?

Around noon, Ward, Koh and I all met up and after lunch, booked a
driver to take us down to pattaya to check out the famed beaches of
thailand. On the way to the beach, we stopped at a theme park called
mini siam to check out some models of famous landmarks from thailand
and around the world

Now that i am done surveying my kingdom, lets head to the beach!

-J

So when i was preparing for my trip to thailand, a friend mentioned to me that i should look for a restaurant called condoms and cabbages, figuring it would be right up my alley of wacky porn related adventures. Now since i do not speak thai my chances of finding this location should be slim to none

and yet! for our last few days in thailand we stayed with the parents of a friend from med school. And as it so turns out, while we were searching for their apartment building, we just so happened to come across the restaurant RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET from where they live.

I <3 the universe

the following pics you are about to see, are totally work safe, and entirely made from condoms

Seriously, how cool are these lamps? I wish i had one

Ha ha…stick figure sex safety

Oh so here is the view from the Mahapatra apt

Pretty nice, huh. Though it may not appear that way when you are in the city, bangkok is basically still in the jungle, and has these islands of urbania among the trees. Craziness i know.

next time-Pattaya!

-J

As it turns out, we decided to head over to Lumphini Stadium to catch a muay thai boxing match with ringside seats…now those of you who know me in person know that i am not a fan of sporting event in general with the exceptions of UFC and boxing, neither of which i can ever afford to see in person. So when i learned we could sit ringside for the equivalent of US $50, well it was on!

The Stadium

The crowds

In thai boxing, or muay thai, every part of your body is a weapon, and though the boxers wear gloves, far more blows are rained down using knees and elbows

The next fighter waiting for his match…there were a total of 10 matches in all, each one consisting of 5 3-minute rounds and the title match 5 5-minute rounds

Not good enough you say? you want to know what it was like being there? hearing the crowds, the hypnotic music, feeling the excitement firsthand?

it was kinda like that

And of course we wanted to take pics with the winner, because if you pay for vip seats you get special backstage privileges

Yes I know, compared to Ward and Koh, I appear like some kind of gnome, and I really dont know why…they are not that tall…well, Koh is, but i just shrink in pictures or something
fighters in the ready room

at halftime, we got treated to a demonstration of traditional muay thai, how it used to be fought back in the day…first the fighters warmed up

then they beat the living daylights out of one another

Then we took more pictures!

why the heck is Koh so big? Is it because the fighter is like 16 (no, seriously)

Bask in my paleness!

The Josh: bringing immaturity to the masses since 1981

You all know the saying though…its all fun and games til somebody loses an eye…then it’s just fun
or is it, it’s all fun and games til someone gets knocked the eff out

which is what happened to this poor fellow, who after repeated elbows to the head was bleeding rather profuself and had to be carried out of the ring in a stretcher

The fancy flowers means this is the winner of the title bout. Good times! Then it was out to the suan lum night bazaar for a late dinner

oh yeah baby…fresh from the tree coconut, and street vendor pad thai…I <3 street vendor food, and have been known to flirt with food poisoning on every international trip. Luckily, this trip there was nothing more than harmless flirting, and i didnt even get food poisonings number. Niiiiice

Next stop: checking in with Sid’s family, and restaurant of propylaxis?

-J

Sorry for the delays in posting…family was visiting for a week, and many good times were had, which i will get to telling…erm..in good time. yes, well

Returning from the excursion to the countryside of thailand, we came back to hang out a little bit more in the metropolis that is Bangkok, a truly international city. Seriously, i never saw so many white people who didnt speak english. Ward, Koh, and I would go up to try and sneak into to joining tour groups so we could learn about the places we were visiting, and with the 5 languages we speak between us, could not understand a single thing.

However, our second hotel, the golden horse lodge had an amazing view of Wat Saket from the window

we were also pretty close to the democracy monument

which we passed on our way to get a thai massage, where the only happy ending we needed or wanted was still the pleasantly sore muscles after having people walk on us, and bend us in every which way. Good times. I also may or may not have attended a ping-pong show. If you have to ask what it is, i did not attend ;-P

On a classier note, since we were so close to Wat Saket aka the Golden Mount, we decided to visit it

Then we continued walking along toward the chao praya river, taking in the sights as we went along

like the gian swing in sao ching cha, or monks bowl village, where all the buddhist monks purchase their monkly belongings, like their begging bowl (mmm delicious irony)

just a few extra pics from the base of wat saket…

bored tuk tuk driver stuck in traffic

Koh and a really cool looking tree

Finally we made it to the river and took a ferry over to Wat Arun, the temple of the dawn

After that, it was the ferry back across the river

In case i had not mentioned before, Bangkok is known as the venice of the east, and small wonder why

What is so exciting to Koh and I? Well hop on the tuk tuk with us as we head toward our next destination

A while ago, i had written a post about some bakery in thailand called the human bakery, or the eat bakery, or something to that effect. I have an ongoing fascination with cannibalism and zombies, as those of you who know me well may recall, and when i decided to actually go to thailand, I did everything i could to try and track down this human bakery in hopes of eating a human. But i am getting ahead of myself a bit. Lets go back to the beginning…

Attn: This place is seriously in the middle of nowhere, even a bunch of thai people i asked had never heard of it, INCLUDING our tour guide. So if you are ever inclined to go looking for it yourself, shoot me a line, and i will give you what info i remember

hmm…looks normal enough, you say, just a household making cakes for chinese new year…but then, through an open door, you espy

ZOMG!!!

once we got our foot in the door, we wondered, what kind of sick person could be fascinated by such things?

well, other than me mmmm BRAINS!

earlier attempts. btw, all these things you are seeing are made out of bread. yes, bread. and then coated with some kind of preservative so they can remain all delicious looking forever

Ward wasnt too picky about trying things, and Koh just wanted to pig out

but i can always use a hand in my adventures

soon we had to face the music, it was time to head out

we didnt lose our heads though, and made sure to credit the artist responsible for such work

Take a good look folks. This might just be one of the happiest moments in my life

at least until crystal succeeds in finding where this restaurant in japan is for me…

mmm…japanese banquet of cannabalism

Next time, return to bangkok!

-J

After rafting it was time to go on one more hike out in nature before heading back to bangkok. Erawan means 3 headed elephant, and the waterfall at the top is supposed to look like a three headed elephant. creative, huh?

So, come with me on a hike to each of the seven stations of the waterfall, each one higher than the next

awww! baby monkey!

2nd station

3rd station

4th station…that waterfall on the left doubles as a waterslide, or so some of the swimmers used it

5th station, by far my favorite

6th station…had to do some crawling and climbing to reach it

like so…see me camoflaging?


The hike was pretty easy up til 6th station. but from 6th to 7th, the tourists thinned out, the trail got steeper and harder, and the views even more stunning as we stopped frequently to catch our breath in the 90plus heat

finally we had made it to the top..7th station, the 3 headed elephant waterfall, and man oh man would you look at that crystal clear water? Then we began the hike back down, taking our time and sweating like mad

In fact, we opted to stop at 4th station for a bit to catch our breath and take a swim. Well, ward took a swim, but i came really close…stripped down to my boxers and was waist deep in the water getting a fish massage. What is a fish massage?

see all those tiny little fish near my foot and leg…if you did not move, they would attach themselves to you and start chewing on you…except since they have no teeth it was simply a very strange, though not unpleasant tingly feeling which would change anytime you moved and the fish freaked out and swam away for all of 10 seconds til you stood still again. Rejoice for me people…this is the closest i have come to swimming w/my hydrophobia since i was about 11…over a decade ago. Pushing the barriers every day

even bigfoot came out to watch
finally we finished our hike, changed into fresh clothes, and then bid goodbye to our guide Jang, wishing her well and thanking her for leading a wonderful tour…our adventure was not quite over though, as we had arranged with our driver to make a brief stop at a place i had tracked down called the human bakery…

to be continued…

So after the elephant ride it was time to go rafting down the river. Now i know what some of you are thinking…Josh? rafting? WTF? doesn’t he have so much hydrophobia he could practically WALK on water?

And ordinarily you would be right…not about my near messianic capabilities, but about my uneasiness about all things dihydrogen monoxide related. However, I am all about trying new things and testing my limits, and as you will see the water was super calm and not whitewater.

We all took turns looking out for crocodiles like the one i had previously wrestled into submission. We also took turns poling the raft which was not so much a raft as a series of loosely bound bamboo sitting in what i can safely assume was probably unsanitary water

I’m the Cap’n

Our guide asked several times if we wanted to go swimming. I laughed because no way in heck. Ward and Koh considered it until we saw a large piece of elephant dung go floating downriver, then not so much.

poling….poling….poling on the river. Yes, proud mary and one night in bangkok were on constant repeat in my head through this whole trip

We finally arrived at the end of the rafting route and caught a van over toward erawan national park where we would do some hiking to see the seven waterfalls

-J

As the third and final day of our excursion into the countryside began, we opted to start off the morning with an elephant ride before going rafting.

The stepladder to climb up on the elephants was a bit high

The elephant camp where all the trainers live
 
So you are thinking maybe, hey josh, anyone can sit on a bench on an elephants back, but we have come to expect more from you…*sigh* the things i do for my loyal followers

After, we watched the elephants take a bath

my favorite is the submariner in the photo above. I just picture the elephant humming the jaws theme music

On an interesting side note-while thai monkeys may not care for bananas, thai elephants LOVE them. Also, elephants have very powerful tongues which fold up around your hand when you place a banana on it. Strange feeling. Good, but strange

Next post: rafting! (yes, Josh will go on the water, just not in it)