I don't like cricket...

... its a little too chewy for my liking. The man selling the insects was nice enough though - must be used to the fa rang i guess.

As I'm coming to the end of my first Bangkok stint I suppose I should give my opinions on the city.

Bangkok is almost indescribable - it attacks all of the senses at once.

The smell of the city is among the most powerful things I have encountered in my life. And I say this as someone who has followed Charles into the bathroom. Unlike that situation, once you get used to it the smell here is actually pretty nice, with food vendors on pretty much every street corner.

The city never seems to sleep and there is always noise to go with that - the touisty Ko Sahn Road has bars which are busy until the small hours of the morning and then the Thai people seem to waken up for morning at about 5 am and then the noise starts again.

The Royal palace - which I visited yesterday - is by far the most beautiful man made thing I have ever seen. Along with the temple of the Emerald Buddha, they are just awe inspiring beautiful. There will be pictures to follow, but not as many as I would have liked as 1) I had forgotten the memory card for my camera (it had also decided to set itself to 3MP instead of ten) and 2) we were not allowed photos in the Royal museum - which contained some amazingly beautiful things) or in the temple of the Buddha itself.

We got to the palace by Tuk Tuk - which are definitely not built to hold 5 people other than the driver, but its always fun and games on the Thai roads. I now truly understand what a god friend meant when she told me that I would have to commit to crossing the road here. The red light/green man seems to be taken as a suggestion rather than an instruction by drivers. I'm also amused (and slightly scared) by the fact the green man (who moves here) speeds up his walking as the lights get closer to changing.

Tomorrow I take the Day time sleeper train (go figure) on an 8 hour ride to Chumpon on the coast - spending a couple of days there and then I'm heading to Ko Tao for some diving. Just hope the weather clears up as I go south....