Our hotel has free internet, woo, only half hour at a time though and this keyboard is confusing me so excuse spelling mistakes. The journey wasn't too bad: great films and food, what more could I want. I saw the Herne Bay wind farms and the pier and my house as we flew over! If time-travel was invented I'd prefer that option as 14 hours is a long time in an plane seat, but the flights went smoothly and the transfer onto a different plane to Bangkok from Doha was easy; landing in Doha at night was immense, I've never seen lights like it. My baggage made it to Bangkok which is a relief. Think 'Somtom' the taxi driver took me on the scenic route as I made him use the meter and what should have been about 300 baht was just over 500. Arrived at the Pinnacle Lumphinee Hotel just before 9am, 3am our time, so clocking up 24 hours since I left home. Had a five-hour nap when I got here in a nice double bed, then nipped out to the 7-Eleven to buy a phonecard to let the parentals know I'm here safe and sound, took about half hour to work out how to use the damn thing.

It's humid but not unbearable, Doha was much hotter. So far I've just seen lots of skyscrapers and taxi's, which was on the drive here, but am not venturing too far from the hotel today. The girl I'm sharing my room with doesn't arrive until later tonight, and hopefully some of the others will too. Everyone's really friendly here, the staff at the hotel are lovely. I'm going to spend the rest of the day brushing up (ok, learning) some Thai, and reading through the heavy guidebooks I lugged all the way here. Hasn't really sunk in that I'm here yet!