Back in Bangkok

I love this city more and more every day I am here.....

This week has been pretty relaxing so far, I went to school on monday, tuesday, and wednesday, and now my weekend has begun. classes here are interesting. i am taking an information systems class, international business, marketing planning, social and environmental marketing, and an accounting class. the thai students talk throughout the entire class period (to each other, and on their phones) and the professors seem to say the same thing over and over for 3 hours straight...i guess it is ok, and i am getting used to the other students talking all the time. also, there is something called "thai time" here, which is pretty cool! it's sort of like being on "hawaiian time" where people are ALWAYS late. regardless of where they are going or what they are doing, they are always late....even we are on thai time now. its sort of nice because we are never in a rush to go anywhere and the locals are the same way. the city is always awake and there is traffic at all times of the day, like in LA, but the people here are not usually in a rush. so, we can be up to 30 minutes late for class and still be counted as present, and classes that are scheduled for 9:30 don't actually start until 9:45, and our 15 minute breaks turn into 30 minute breaks...its easy to get used to ;) something else that is different here is that the presentations are very elaborate...the profs like the students to dress up and have props for their presentations. its like being in an acting class.

on tuesday night, we went to a HUGE shopping center called MBK to buy uniforms and look around. it was so cool...there were tons of places to eat and you could buy anything from a camera to underwear. it is like the outdoor markets here (and in china), but it was indoors. we are trying to get good at bargaining, but we haven't mastered the technique yet. after we went shopping, we went to an ice cream place that seems like the "pink berry" of thailand...it is supposedly super popular, and it is hard to get a seat in the store. it is called "monster ice" and it is shaved ice with tons of fruit or cookies or brownies, and some sort of syrup on top. then they put a scoop of ice cream on the very top. it was delicious :) :) when we got back from MBK we went to hang out with the boys and we discovered that we could go to the roof of our building and have a 360* view of Bangkok. it is the most beautiful sight and it is so surreal being in another country, on one of the highest buildings in miles, and being able to see everything below you. brad actually thought it was so wonderful that he passed out on the roof for a few hours!!!

Although we were all really tired from our trip this past weekend and from tuesday night, we somehow managed to go out to Wacky Wednesday at the Londoner last night. it was the most eventful taxi ride that i have had in bangkok so far because we got pulled over by thai police!!!! at first i wasn't scared, but then i started thinking about it and got scared! hahaha...marney was not wearing her seatbelt in the front seat, which is apparently illegal here, even though no one wears their seatbelt in the front seat, not even taxi drivers....but anyway, we got pulled over and ended up having to pay the taxi driver 500 baht..which is $3 each, but the worst part is that we think the taxi drivers conspire with the police because after we paid the police officer the 500 baht, he gave 100 of it back to the taxi driver! OH, and the taxi ride before this one was weird too because we had a lady driver! back to the londoner: it is going to become our wednesday night tradition here in Bangkok....an amazing way to start off the weekend (since most of us only go to school mon-wed, our weekend starts at 5pm on wed.) it is like a pub you might find in LA or anywhere in America, but better! since drinks are 2 for 1 all night it is the cheapest alcohol we can find (but we definitely spend the majority of our money on drinks...it is the only thing here that is relatively pricey...it really isn't that expensive, but when we pay $0.66 for lunch at school, a $4 beer seems like a lot!), and there is the most amazing thai cover band that plays on wednesdays....they are SO SO SO good! and we can request songs and they usually know them! there is one girl singer and the rest are guys...one has a really high voice, and one looks like a rasta (but thai style!) before wacky wednesday, we went to dinner at a mexican restaurant...it was a very interesting experience. before we even got to the restaurant, i looked up and there were thousands of small bats flying around and there were people catching the bats...then i felt something wet on my foot and i looked down and a bat pooped on my foot!!!!!!! it was soooooooo gross....i immediately went to the bathroom at the restaurant and washed and purelled my foot. yuck. yuck....yuckie. oh well. somehow, everytime we want to go to a restaurant on wednesday night, we can't find it, and we end up somewhere else....last week we wanted sushi but ended up at korean bbq....and this week we couldn't find our restaurant, then when we got to the londoner, it was literally right across the street. the only bad thing about last night was trying to get a taxi from dinner to the londoner...it is one of the most frustrating things in thailand because many of the taxi drivers do not let you ride with the meter because they can make a lot more money by trying to bargain. and since we were in a tourist district last night, they get away with it all the time. instead of a 70baht cab ride, they try to charge us 200 or 300 baht...so we ended up walking a few blocks and catching a cab outside of the tourist district...

Now, for my random thailand observations/fun facts:
-they sell things that definitely need a prescription on the street: dentures, contacts, birth control, medicine, reading glasses, etc.
-i might start eating chicken
-people fish in the EXTREMELY dirty river, so i am not going to eat any kind of street seafood near the river
-street corn on the cob is AMAZING
-shorts are ok to wear, but tank-tops are not as ok...i had to re-take my passport photos because i was wearing a tank top in it
-locals think it is funny when we try to speak thai, but they like it
-washing machines are bad...i'm going to send my wash out from now on
-lady boys are the prettiest of all
-they only have OB tampons
-all chips are rather taste-less
-the only cereal they have are: corn flakes, honey stars, cookie crisp, muesli, frosted flakes, and coco krispies....i definitely miss my puffins and kashi!
-the stray dog problem is outrageous
-i'm getting used to the smell of the city :)
-my favorite things to eat here are pad thai and ice cream sandwiches. yum-O!!!!
-speaking of "yum-o", definitely no food network here, go figure

here are the links to my facebook albums if you want to see pictures!
http://usc.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2203642&l=679f8&id=3406342
http://usc.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2203629&l=e67bc&id=3406342
http://usc.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2201637&l=07401&id=3406342

love love you all! xox