We landed in Bangkok at 7pm local time, just barely making it off the plane before we were greeted by a wall of heat. Heavy, clammy heat - completely unlike the fresh rays of the sun that beamed on us through much of South America, this was an in your face, humidity factor HIGH, even-when-the-sun's-gone-down, oppressive heat. It represented the beginning of a very different chapter in our travels.

We hopped in a taxi and steamed straight to our hostel (with only a few communication issues at this point mainly due to Dean's amusing lapse into Spanish). Tired from the day of travel and mildly jet-lagged, we gawped in awe out of the taxi window as all things new and different flashed past. Off in the distance, huge streaks of lightning were tearing through the night sky - beautiful, but not greatly significant to us uninformed travellers.

An hour later we were happily settled in at our hostel. I ventured to the shared bathroom - the first encounter of a hostel bathroom is always a tentative one. What will I find here? Will there be toilet roll or soap? Will there even be a toilet or just a hole in the ground and two handy footprints for squatting-guidance? Will it be so tiny that I can comfortably brush my teeth whilst sitting on the loo AND taking a shower?

Thankfully this bathroom was rather pleasant, with a reasonable distance between bathroom activities, soap, shampoo and even conditioner dispensers - happily I dropped my trousers and sat down on the loo. A second later, the feeling of being watched was unbearable and in slow motion my eyes were unwillingly but unavoidably drawn to the plant pot attached to the wall - to my complete horror, in addition to the naff fake flower there was also now a huge cockroach, peering over the top at me and ... waving??? His shiny brown shell glinted in the light, his beady eyes glared at me hungrily and his long thin antennae wiggled furiously in the air - I don't know semaphore but I'm pretty sure he was saying "I'M COMING TO GET YOOOOUUUUU!" ... I was out of there like a shot, barely managing to hoik up my trousers first.

I short while later, with the decorative bed runner firmly shoved into the crack under the door I felt ready to relax (despite Dean helpfully telling me the runner wouldn't actually stop the cockroach from getting into our room if it wanted to). My first encounter with a cockroach was over, I wasn't happy about it but if I was going to survive SE Asia I was going to have to get used to it.

Bangkok is a heaving, colourful, chaotic city. It's deceptively large and not at all easily covered by foot which we stubbornly learnt the hard way. The large roads are four or more lanes wide and crawling with buses, taxis, cars, tuk-tuks and motorcycles. The taxis are a highlight, all painted in vibrant shades of pink, blue, green, red and yellow. Pedestrians once again have a raw deal - there are lights telling you when to cross but the turning traffic isn't required to stop and the motorcycles often crowd forward onto the crossing, waiting for the light to change. Once on our first day a friendly guy noticed our hesitation and encouraged us to cross with him, weaving through the bikes, before shaking his head and muttering something about the "crazy Thailand roads".

When we weren't on foot we travelled by tuk-tuk ... you tell the driver where you're going, ask the price and then waste 5 minutes haggling, before reluctantly getting in, knowing you've still been ripped off a bit. It's just the way things work. If you're really unlucky your driver will change his mind about where he's taking you altogether and instead drop you at a jewellers or tailors where he will get a commission for bringing you and you will get harassed by pushy Thai salesmen. This is just one of the tourist cons to look out for in Bangkok. We were lucky enough not to have this problem but one thing we did get a lot of was people "helpfully" informing us the monument we were trying to visit was closed but in the meantime they could take us to so-and-so sight instead... Thankfully we'd read about all this before coming so we always continued on to our chosen tourist spot regardless - and it was always open.

Our first day, an early trip to the Vietnamese Embassy left us in Downtown Bangkok, possibly the busiest, noisiest part of the city. We decided to walk back across town to our hostel, following a route that would take us past various tourist sights. The first place we stopped at was the Erawan Shrine: huge, glittering and humming of incense, it was hard to miss. The Erawan Shrine is a huge spirit house dedicated to Brahma the Hindu God of Creation. Although Buddhism is the prevailing religion in Thailand, Hinduism has had much influence over the years: spirit houses being just one example. Whenever a structure is built anywhere in Thailand an accompanying spirit house must be built too, to appease the local spirits. For the most part the spirit houses resemble ornate birdhouses positioned on a stand, usually with miniature Buddhas placed inside and permanent offerings of incense, lotus buds and candles in front. The size and grandeur of the spirit house must reflect the size of the building which has been erected. Being attached to a rather large, smart hotel, the Erawan Shrine is one of the most elaborate spirit houses that we've come across in our travels. It is a popular place of worship for locals and it was quite crowded when we arrived. The two roads which flank the shrine are lined with people selling incense etc for locals to leave at the foot of the shrine when they pray. Next to the shrine there is a little group of musicians and dancers who, when paid, will give a performance, dedicated to Brahma on your behalf. There is even the option to buy a little bird from a stall by the entrance and "set it free" - this is meant to bring good luck to the individual who frees the bird ... the fact that the bird had to be captured in the first place doesn't seem to worry anyone.

After we'd gawped for a while at the spectacle of this large, glittering shrine we continued on to Chinatown. Here we visited Wat Traimit and the Golden Buddha. Well, I say visited - we actually just took some photos from the outside and stuck our noses in a side door to stare into the room where the Golden Buddha lives, (we call this the "Stonehenge Approach", a sort of drive-by visit). We got quite a good look at the world's largest solid gold Buddha, just by peering through the side door. For anyone into gold it is VERY pretty. Whilst we were ogling from the doorway there seemed to be some sort of service going on. Some monks were chanting at the front and locals were permitted to actually enter and take a seat on the floor in front. Most bizarrely we noticed that many of the locals already sat on the floor had a piece of string tied round their head: these strings dropped down from a whole network of string suspended in the air and apparently all leading back to the golden statue... Some sort of direct phone line to Buddha?

Tired but with every intention of continuing our walk back to the hostel, we turned a corner and stopped to admire yet another Chinatown temple. It wasn't on the map so I can't tell you anything about it - but it wasn't the temple that was important for us in the next 5 minutes but rather the local man who got talking to us and kindly delivered the depressing news of the floods in central Thailand... We hadn't been keeping up with the news, and in fact very little information about the floods was yet to be found in the international news or on the Internet. Central Thailand was under 2 metres of water already.

The conversation with the "friendly" local is a bit of a blur now, but the message was clear - we wouldn't be going to Ayutthaya or Sukhothai. Before we knew it we had been ushered into a tuk-tuk, for which our informative friend kindly haggled a very low un-touristy fee and whisked off to what we thought was the T.A.T. (Tourism Authority of Thailand - government-run trusted organisation), but what we later realised was called TOT and had nothing to do with the government. Here we were plonked in front of an amusing if patronising Thai lady who confirmed our worst fears and immediately suggested a 3 day tour out West followed by a train ticket taking us South, to avoid the water. The tour would take us to two places west of Bangkok which I'd had on my itinerary anyway, so, reeling from the shocking news of the floods we quickly signed up for both tour and train tickets south. All we had to do was return on Monday to collect our train tickets (we couldn't come over the weekend because the office was closed, something which should have alerted us to the fact this wasn't the proper tourist office but we were very slow on the uptake on this occasion)!

We left the agency, completely miserable and defeated and jumped in a tuk-tuk straight back to the hostel - no more sight-seeing to be done, we had to replan our Thailand trip.

Back at the hostel, beer was of little consolation. I was particularly upset, being as this was the part of the trip I had planned and was personally really looking forward to. Hardest of all, we found it quite difficult to find any accurate information online - the worst case scenario suggested that flooding was occurring in Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam as well, to such an extent it crossed our minds that we might be better off going somewhere entirely different, or even coming home. It has since all worked itself out and we are happily back on track now. The flooding has been a disaster for Thailand and has finally made the international news. Contrary to our early thoughts, we have been exceptionally lucky.

The following morning, we got up and decided we weren't going to be beaten ... we would go out and tread the tourist trail like it had never been trod before. On the list today were the Bangkok biggies: the Grand Palace and Wat Pho with the reclining Buddha.

We set off early, in already baking heat. I have never sweated so much in my whole life as I have whilst in SE Asia. The sweat just pours out of you, collecting on your upper lip (sexy) and running down your back in streams (really sexy). At first it's hard to get used to and you feel completely revolting, but somehow it becomes the norm! It doesn't help that for visits to temples you have to dress appropriately with long trousers/skirts and shoulders/upper arms covered.

After about a 30 minute walk we reached the grounds of the Grand Palace. The first entrance brings you within the walls of the complex before you follow a path to the ticket booths and actual entrance. At the start of the path there are a couple of Thais sat at a desk, occasionally grabbing up a megaphone and barking at the tourists "SIR, NO SHORTS!" or "MAM, NO VWEST ... PWEESE COVA SHOLDA" - if inappropriately dressed you can hire a shawl or sarong from another office to the right. Smugly, having read all about the dress code, we sauntered past the bossy Thais and on down the path. A few minutes later we bought our tickets and passed through the turnstiles into the main site. We got momentarily squashed in a build-up of tourists but once through this, we stopped and looked around us, chins hitting the floor.

From what we'd read or seen in photos we were expecting a big, brash, gaudy affair, swamped with tourists. It was all of these things and could easily be one of those sights which you come away hating, on account of it being over the top and full of people, but I loved it. Consisting of 2 main features (the Grand Palace and neighbouring royal temple, Wat Phra Kaeo) and a number of other buildings, the site is very large and very busy. We had a look at the Grand Palace before we left but it was closed to the public as Thailand is currently in a state of mourning for a member of the royal family. It was a beautiful building, not nearly as gawdy as the royal temple which we spent most of our time in.

Wat Phra Kaeo was built as the royal private temple and is the holiest Buddhist site in the country. It consists of various chapels and chedis (conical towers, often housing the ashes of wealthy, important families) and in the largest building, the bot, (main sanctuary), lives the most important image of Buddhism in Thailand, the Emerald Buddha.

Wandering round the maze of glittering buildings, you feel as if you've stepped into a fantasy world. The buildings are elegant but coated in sparkle and glitz. Everything is covered in intricate tile work, coloured glass and gilt, all the colours of the rainbow rain down on you. Small golden bells hang from the roof overhangs, chiming gently in the breeze (bells are a symbol of good luck). Huge statues of yaksha, demons from the Ramakien, guard every entrance to the temple, warding off evil spirits. The outer buildings are lined with a mural depicting the whole story of the Ramakien too - this is the tale of Rama and Sita which originally comes from India, known there as the Ramayana. There are brightly coloured statues of garudas (birdmen) and nagas (serpents) everywhere. The actual Bot is an extremey holy place and the crowd is ushered in quietly, after first removing shoes. You must kneel on the floor whilst you're in the bot, with your feet pointing away from Buddha (feet are considered by Thais to be the dirtiest, least sacred part of the body, so you must never point them at Buddha or another person) and no photos are allowed. It was very beautiful see this Emerald Buddha which is extremely highly revered by the Thai people and thought to bring great fortune.

Emerging a long while later from the chintzy glamour of Wat Phra Kaeo (Wat by the way means "temple" and Phra I've just learnt means "honorific term, literally meaning "excellent"" - ha!) we headed next for Wat Pho. This is another temple complex made up of beautiful buildings, somewhat less gaudy and including the Chapel of the Reclining Buddha. In here you will find the incredible 45m long gilded statue of Buddha lying with his head raised on his hand. This reclining pose appears amusingly camp at first, but it is in fact one of several poses in which Buddha is usually depicted. Each position represents a moment in Buddha's life - the reclining position shows him entering Nirvana. The statue here is simply enormous and because the chapel is only marginally bigger you can't stand back and have a good look, which leaves an even larger impression of the statue in your mind. Along one side there is a row of 108 bowls - you can buy a small pot of pennies and dropping a penny in each bowl is meant to bring good luck and long life.

These two sites were quite a lavish first introduction to Buddhism for us, however as we've seen since, its a common theme throughout Thailand - holy sites everywhere in the country from the huge wats right down to the smallest spirit houses are glamorous affairs. Temples pop up at you every few hundred metres, caked in gilt and glowing in the sun - embarrassingly extravagant next to the modest everyday architecture of Thai homes and shops. Dean has found the apparent extravagance of Buddhism to be a bit distasteful. The religion believes in karma and living a good life in order to achieve a better status in the next life. Buddhists can strive for good karma by "merit-making", which is done by attending a service, giving a monk a free meal or donating money and gifts to the local temple etc. The point of merit-making is the purity of intention behind the good deed and it's this which seems to have been lost.... These days it seems to be about making lots of merit as quickly as possible, by buying the most or biggest gifts to offer to Buddha. On top of which the brilliant, colourful design of the temples can seem gaudy when visited in the city, but when seen in a small, provincial town where the locals live very basic lives, it can be even more of a shock.

That aside, I've found it all quite fascinating. As far as religion goes, I've never been particularly inspired by anything I've learnt (and that's even after fumbling my way through a Theology AS Level). But there is something captivating about Buddhism, which has brought out a childlike superstition in me. I get quite nervous around monks ... its that same daft feeling you get when you pass a policeman on the street - sort of guilty even though you've done nothing wrong?

Our remaining time in Bangkok was made touring the city by foot, taking in other sites such as Victory Monument, Democracy Monument, the Giant Swing... We wandered down Khao San Road one night - a heavily backpacker-oriented street crammed with bright lights, street sellers, bars and pumping music, not our favourite kind of scene. We were still a little scared of the street food at this point, indulging only in the occasional bag of freshly carved pineapple - seriously delicious. We went to a little restaurant near our hostel a couple of times too which did good food - I tried my first Tom Yum Kung soup, a national dish of spicy and sour soup with prawns. It was delicious, except for the straw-like lemon grass which I later learnt you don't actually have to eat, its just part of the "flavour group" (courtesy of cooking course in Chiang Mai!). We also made sure to try the very popular fast food equivalent of a Pot Noodle - they're really cheap and much tastier here, you can buy them in most shops and they usually have hot water on site so you can make it up straight away!

We also had a fantastic night at a Muy Thai Boxing tournament. We arrived for the 4th fight and stayed almost till the end. From our ringside seats (thrust upon us with the warning that any other seats in the arena would be packed with steaming, crazy locals - completely not the case) we had a great view between the ropes and with a steady flow of beer coming our way we were quickly sucked in. Consisting of five rounds of 3 minutes, each match is preceded by a ritual where the fighters enter the ring and perform a routine, involving bowing to the town where he was born and various other motions - very elegant. And then the fight begins..

It was frightening how quickly I went from finding it hard to watch these young boys laying into each other (I've never been to a boxing match and hate watching any sort of physical violence), to feeling impressed by their skill and finally all but cheering them on as they landed stinging blows. The 5th match was actually incredible - a Thai kid of no more than 17 or 18 against a Japanese guy of the same age. The Japanese guy's pale skin quickly showed up in massive red welts, demonstrating the power behind their moves ... the Thai guy was quite cocky at first, but the Japanese guy worked away steadily through the five rounds to win the fight. Both Dean and I left feeling slightly bewildered by how much we'd enjoyed it....

After 4 days we were ready to leave the manic streets of Bangkok behind. We collected our train tickets from the "TOT" office, where I finally tired of the pushy woman and snapped at her attempts to tell us we couldn't go ANYWHERE in Thailand except somewhere that she could sell us a tour or train ticket for (can you believe it - I worried about that bad karma later!) Finally we were on our way again - a 3 day tour to Kanchanaburi ahead of us but very little idea of what to do after that...