Bangkok is noisy, loud, busy and chaotc. It's hot too, and to step into the road is to dice with death! I arrived on Tuesday after my jammy upgraded-to-business-class flight, and met Selina at our, er, 'cosy' hostel around 7ish. I was pretty shattered after the flight, so we just took a walk down nearby Th Silom, and looked at all the market stalls laid out on the pavements in front of all the Starbucks, Burger Kings, and McDonalds. Got some Pad Thai in a noodle bar, where I also tried fresh (ie non-fried) spring rolls for the first time - pretty tasty! - and then went to an Irish bar for a couple of G&Ts before heading home.

The next day, as Selina was a bit temple-d out from having been here two weeks already, and as I'd seen the grand palace and so on before, we decided to just hop on the skytrain and see where it took us. We stopped off at Sukhumvit for some breakfast and a wander round the market. Saw a few cool things to buy, but I wasn't quite ready for all the haggling yet - maybe I'll come back when I've got my bargaining head on! I did try my first piece of unusual fruit - it was called a rose apple, and was a kind of triangular, burgundy-coloured apple, but much juicier than those in England.

After that we took a long-tail boat ride from the pier, along the Mae Nam Chao river and the canals, passing a couple of temples, a reclining Buddha and a real mix of skyscraper-esque hotels and run-down brick house with corrogated iron roofs. Following dinner at a Thai/Japanese place in a big shopping centre, we collected our bags from the hostel and headed to the station to get the night train to Laos...