From Kanchanaburi we returned to Bangkok for a few days before our flight to Hong Kong. After our time in Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia it was wonderful to have marked prices in shops, instead of having to bargain for everything. Bartering might be good fun when you want to buy a rug in Egypt, but after 2 months of bartering for every bottle of water, it gets a bit tiring. There was plenty we needed, but the prospect of shopping for shampoo, soap, toothpaste, etc, and negotiating the price of every single item was too much until now, so we restocked. As we had some time on our hands, Simon went to a tailors and got fitted for a few suits (looks like we are returning to the real world and not going to live with the hippies in southern India). Despite my best efforts to resist, I ended up having a jacket made. Now firmly in the mood for a bit of retail therapy we went to Bangkok's weekend market. 15,000 stalls and 200,000 visitors each day. No doubt some peoples idea of hell, but it was good fun. We avoided the live animal section though. Before we left Bangkok, we checked out the city's seedier side. We wandered around its version of Soho, taking in the 'sights'. We went to a show and watched some very talented ladies who were able to fire all manner of items across the room. No further details here though! Having almost dreaded our arrival in Bangkok the first time around, we were now sad to be leaving. We had a great time in our two visits, and even talked about returning in the future. Lisa xx