I arrrived Saturday afternoon into Bangkok, 3 days before starting the conference I came for so I had time to explore! The hostel I booked in to was really nice and I ate dinner there then crashed Saturday.

On Sunday I got up and explored around Bangkok! It was a Buddhism holiday so a lot of things were restricted (like nobody could sell alcohol and all national monuments weren't allowing tourists for example!) and also everyone was wearing black. So because the King of Thailand died last year, the country has a 12 month mourning period before his funeral in a couple of months. And since the King is seen as God's representative on earth, any day that is a religious holiday is also a day to give worship to the king - which is done by attending the Royal Palace, and wearing black since its a mourning period still. Very different custom but cool to be in the midst of it! For lunch I met up with Mariam who studied at UM with me which was lovely - she took me to a cool local eatery then we hung out at her university for a bit. I love catching up with friends overseas especially when it's their home and they can show me cool local stuff!

On Monday I checked out of my hostel and made my way back to the airport to be picked up for the conference. The rest of my week was at the International Institute of Peace and Development Studies for the Youth for Peace 2017 Conference. With just over 30 attendees and some really great mentors/staff, I had a really good time!

I arrived Saturday afternoon and was met at the airport then taken to the centre which is about 45 minutes outside Bangkok. I was lucky enough to have my own room which was good for getting my down time! Other people came from all over Asia - Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Nepal, Cambodia, Myanmar and more! I even met 2 people from my uni in Malaysia which was awesome! I was the only non-Asian and thus, only white person which was challenging but I'll cover that later.

The weeks program included all different sessions with an overall focus on peace. My favourite session was about the power of peace education and how influential policies and schooling practices can be in shaping the future. It was really interesting in this session to hear from some of the Myanmar and Cambodia participants, and to see what is being done to move forward. The lack of knowledge the Cambodian students had was really eye opening about what I had learnt during my trip there which is that they are simply not taught any of their history in school prior to 1998 when Pol Pot died. Notable mention to a session on gender ran by a lecturer from Indonesia which spoke about the power of the collective when females work together for change - right up my alley!

Overall the conference was good and I enjoyed meeting people and the chitchat over lunch and whatnot but I was pretty disappointed that the standard was quite low, in that I didn't learn anything and wasn't challenged in any way. There was a lot of potential for it to be ran better and I gave a lot of feedback at the end which I hope they take on board.

I am grateful for the people I've met through the conference and I can hopefully see them again on my travels! There was an awesome bunch from Nepal so I will definitely hit them up when I make it to there!!

My last day in Bangkok I spent with Aaron and Quique who were in Thailand travelling also! We had lunch at Siam Paragon which is a huge mall and it was really really nice to end my week with them! We will next meet in Shanghai at the end of the month which I am so so keen for!

Bangkok was great to explore and there's such a cool mix of old architecture and modern buildings! Traffic was intense and the public transport didnt reach everywhere but the food was great and Thai people are lovely! I hope to come back and do Chang Mai and Phuket later in the year!