Left is the view from my room - it's especially pretty right around sunset when the sun falls behind the buildings and the sky goes pink-orange. So India isn't all bad. I've largely given up on walking anywhere as the poverty and traffic are terrifying and my map is lousy. But I've found a few restaurants I can tolerate and am pretty quick at setting up my mozzy net at night (my room lacks window screens).

Saturday I visited the Government Museum despite the inflated foreigner rate. If you convert to dollars it's on par with most US museums - though we do usually have air con. The buildings themselves are quite beautiful and (like most of the collection) have a strong left over from the British era feel. Mostly it was nice to spend a day walking around somewhere quiet and safe. No matter how many times I refuse, people around the GH keep offering me drugs and Rs 30 tours of the city.

Tomorrow I attempt to make my way south toward Mamallapuram (Mahabalipuram for those of you with last year's map of the world). I say "attempt" because I need to find the bus station, find the correct bus and find a place to stay once I'm there. I guess the worst case scenario is continuing on to Puducherry (Pondicherry - or Pondy) straight off - but I would hate to miss communing with my fellow backpackers. Besides, four hours in a bus can take a lot out of a person - especially if it's standing room only. I'll let you know if I chicken out and stay in Chennai another week.

Happy Birthday Andrea!!!!!

Welcome to India

So a mere three hour flight and I am in Chennai, the fourth largest city in India (at the time my guide book was written). Having only been on the ground a few hours (long enough to find a place to stay - Paradise GH, and have dinner), I can't say I've formed much of an opinion on the place yet. Quite a bit dirtier than Bangkok but people seem to mind the lanes on the highway, though when you get to an intersection... well... the Lord hates a coward. I'm sure there are rules, they just don't seem to have anything to do with the traffic lights. Lots of the signs are in English, Hindi and what I think is Tamil (b/c Chennai is in the state Tamil Nadu, not because I have any knowledge of the language). I'll post some photos soon - just wanted to let everyone know I'm back on solid earth.

One Night in Bangkok...

... Okay, it will be more like five nights in Bangkok. But one would be enough. Actually, I'm not hating it here as much as I did the first time. The traveller's ghetto of about Khao San Road is everything you would expect from a traveller's ghetto (hippie clothes, people wondering around with giant backpacks, bars the serve beer at eight AM) but it's pretty quiet after midnight and there's good (if pricey) food to be had. I'm hoping Bangkok will ease the transition to Chennai but I really doubt it. I just keep telling myself I can bail out to Australia or move up my flight to Israel if the subcontinent gets to be too much. The first world is a swipe of my Visa card away.

This video (if it works) is a sweep of Suan Luang where I spent the bulk of the last week doing ...nothing. It's more of a sitting and watching the ocean place than a go see the sights place or a scuba- and sky-diving place. I miss my bungalow.

I realize this isn't the best picture, so I'll explain. Tonight, after three buses and a dash across six lanes of Thai express way, I am in Hua Hin (with every other tourist on the planet - this is Thailand's Cancun). The picture to the left is the view from my dinner table. I looked at the German places, and the Swiss places, and tons of Italian places (it's way to hot for pizza) and, in the end, decided on squid curry on a jetty over the Gulf of Thailand. And a Chang beer about the size of my lower leg. I dedicate this meal (which cost more than my room, not that that is saying much) to my dad - for his love of seafood, spicy food, and restaurants without menus in English.

To recap, I did not in fact make it to Sangkhlaburi to buy textiles from refugees and orphans. I feel bad about it, but I couldn't find a place to stay so I walked through Hellfire Pass and spent the night in a rafthouse. Hopefully, there's a Women for Weaving outlet in Bangkok. Saturday (back in Kanchanaburi) I visited the JEATH museum (Japan, Australia & America, England, Thailand, and Holland). If you ever find yourself in Kanchanaburi, I recommend seeing all three major museums (JEATH, Thai-Burma Railway and Hellfire Pass - I skipped the one by the bridge itself so I can't say either way). While they cover the same material, they do so in very different ways. JEATH, housed in a model POW bamboo hut, is like a cross next to the highway - a (mostly) spontaneous memorial to the horror that occurred here. The stated purpose of the museum is to remind people of how terrible war is so that we stop doing it. The focus is on the torture and disease suffered by the soldiers (and the hired Asian laborers, lacking doctors and military training they died in droves - the rough estimate is 90,000). The late, great Sir E.E. "Weary" Dunlop also features heavily (and deservedly), having saved innumerable lives as a camp doctor and for harboring no ill-will toward the Japanese after the war. If he's not in line for sainthood, he should be. Both TBRM and Hellfire Pass (right) are far more technologically "slick" but nothing really prepares you for walking down to the pass and realizing sick men on starvation rations cut through this solid rock by hand. The area itself is just beautiful - apparently even more so during the building of the railway before all the teak was removed. Not exactly the most cheerful few days, but am I grateful I had the opportunity to come here and see this place for myself. Even with the tour buses and the trinket stalls, it was startling and raw.

Hope you all are enjoying the new year. The remains of Buddhas (right) reside at Wat Ratcha Burana in Ayutthaya. The walls surrounding the main prang of both this and Wat Maha That are lined with (mostly headless) statues. Between the Burmese and treasure hunters there's not much left of old Ayutthaya but it was definitely worth the three foot jump off the train (they're platform is ...short).

I have just arrived in Kanchanaburi via minibus (thus skipping Bangkok!). After stumbling into a decent looking guesthouse, I walked over to the Thai-Burma Railway museum which presents a surprisingly steady take on the building of the railway. (Much of their material came from Japanese and Dutch sources, neither of whom seem distraught over the POW slave-labor "thing.") Friday I catch the Death railway to Nam Tok followed by a bus to the Hellfire Pass and (hopefully) another bus to Sangkhlaburi. Let no one say I don't know how to ring in the New Year.

From Chiang Mai, I started back to the south to Sukhothai, the first Thai (as opposed to Burmese or Khmer) capital in Thailand. Known for having the first free standing walking Buddhas in Thailand (the brown figure to the left), the old city and surrounds form a protected historical park. Not that new buildings don't exist, it's more that you pay to get in.

New Sukhothai (~15km away), despite being the base for most tourists coming to see the old city, doesn't have the "tourist zone" feel Pai (and even Chiang Mai) did. It could just be the lack of massage parlors and trinket stalls. Or maybe they're there but they aren't signed in English.

The next stop was seven hours nearly due east in Khon Kaen. Other than a little shopping (this is a good place to buy silk and cotton), I didn't accomplish much here. I did walk to the pond (Beung Kaen Nakhon) - the recreation area for the citizens of Khon Kaen - and pass by Wat Nongwang Muang Kao, home of the the recently completed (1997) numerologically auspicious (nine tiers - during the reign of Rama IX and the tenure of the nineth abbot since the founding of the wat...) very shiny and enormous pagoda . Not that you could miss it - it's just easier to get a photo up close (or across the lake - for a sense of scale).

Currently (until Saturday), I'm in Khorat aka Nakkon Ratchasima ("frontier country," on the road signs), about three hours by bus south of Khon Kaen. As a Christmas gift to myself, I'm staying at a proper hotel in an air-con room (highs in the high-80s in December?!?). They clean my room daily and I get the BBC world news. There are a few good day trips you can take from here - ruins at Phimai, pottery in Dan Kwian, ancient burial sites (and active archaeological dig) near Ban Prasat. There are also lots of retired expats so, in addition to Swiss and Lebanese food, most places serve burgers (not so common in Thailand).

Originally I'd planned to head south from here to the Gulf of Thailand but, as I am a little short on time, I will instead catch a train to Ayutthaya (the capitol of Thailand sacked by the Burmese - repeatedly - until the Thais moved to Bangkok) and then to Kanchanaburi and the bridge over the river Kwai. Then I can split my last ten days or so between Suan Luang (a beach town, gulf side, if I can find a room) and Bangkok (I will see the Grand Palace if I have to wear scuba gear to survive the smog). And then -- India. สวัสดีขีใหม ("Happy New Year!" pron: sawadee bee mai)

Tonight I'm back in Chiang Mai after five days in Pai (the hippie capital of Thailand). It's a lovely place to visit (as shown, left) and you can meet people from all over the world there. But you either have to work there or pass through for a few days because there is nothing to do otherwise. I considered it a vacation from my vacation. I did walk up to the "Pagoda on a hill" one morning, though to be honest I primarily did so to counter the gigantic breakfast I'd had earlier. It was the pagoda or the pool and you aren't supposed to swim right after you eat. I'll appreciate it more once I find someone to translate the signs (I took pictures). The language barrier is still the biggest issue I have here - my Thai phrasebook is turning out to be the best $7.99 I've ever spent. I get very chatty when I meet someone from another English speaking nation. You can't really get to know someone if you can only reliably say "Hello," "Thank you" and "twenty-six" (people always want to know how old I am... not quite sure why). Hope all is well - Happy Holidays!