Bangkok

My only preparation for coming to Thailand was to read the book, 'The Beach'. I didn't bother with my Lonely Planet, as I've discovered the SE Asia version is pretty crap, and it doesn't even have pretty pictures like my other LPs did.

So I arrived at Bangkok airport, with no hotel reservation and not really knowing where to go. I decided to get a taxi (after much bus-searching) to the Khao San Road, which Alex Garland describes as 'a decompression chamber for anyone entering or leaving Thailand'. He's right, it is, but I imagined a quiet scene full of friendly backpackers drinking at cafes. I stepped out of the taxi and my senses were attacked from all sides. The sounds of music from the competing bootleg CD stalls, the colourful market stalls selling everything a backpacker might need, the smell of stale beer and cigarette smoke, and the feel of hundreds of people pushing past me and my rucksack as I stood there taking it all in. Also, the sound of someone shouting my name. Confused, I turned round to see Dave & Amy, the couple who I had met in Kaikoura, running towards me. I'd completely forgotten they were coming to Thailand.

Dave and Amy stopped me going into the nasty looking guesthouse I was standing in the doorway of, and took me to their hotel, a nice, clean, quiet and cheap affair located a couple of streets away. They also took me out that evening for a true backpacker welcome, and got me completely pissed. First night madness was a great night.

I had unfortunately arrived during some sort of Buddhist festival, which meant alcohol was a big no-no. One of my rules as a traveller is 'do as the locals do', but in this case I was desperate for a beer and as I haven't yet converted to Buddhism, I thought I would be ok. We found a cafe that would surreptitiously sell us beer, as long as we drank it out of mugs and pretended they were cups of tea. That was fine with me, as I think all alcohol tastes better drunken out of a mug.

We soon moved onto drinking rum & coke - buying a bottle of each from the 7-11 and mixing them together, standing on the street, like a load of pikeys. It was great, there were tons of people there (including lots of Thais), all doing similar things, and it was like some sort of weird, outdoors, messed up nightclub. The cacophony of music and flashing lights from the various stalls and bars was a bit crazy.

The next morning I woke up with a predictable hangover, but a shower, breakfast and a couple of tablets of nurofen later I felt ok. In the afternoon I had arranged to meet Colin, who was in Bangkok on business. He turned up with a Thai girl who he worked with, which was great as some local knowledge is useful in a strange city. She took us to a couple of temples, by river boat. The boat was pretty cool in itself, with lots of Buddhist monks in striking saffron coloured robes travelling with us.

The first temple contained a stunning statue of a reclining Buddha. I've never seen so much gold in my life, this thing is massive. We then had to put a coin in each of 120 buckets, for good luck. The sounds of hundreds of coins falling on other coins was pretty mesmerising. The second temple was equally as impressive, situated just across the river.

Colin, well Nestle actually, treated us to a dinner in a posh restaurant. It was made even nicer by the fact that lots of Thais were eating there, something that I never saw in Bali as the locals couldn't afford to eat out. After dinner we went to some night markets. I could have bought the whole place, the stuff was so cheap and also good quality, I was only limited by the lack of space in my rucksack.

The following day I visited Jim Thompson's house, something I wanted to do as there is a pub in Camberley named after him. JT was an America who came to live in Thailand and revolutionised the silk industry. He disappeared without a trace whilst on holiday in Malaysia, and no one knows what happened to him. His house is impressive, in a traditional Thai style the walls are a lovely dark maroon colour. There were lots of ancient artifacts there as well.

I spent a couple more nights with Colin, one in a very posh pub (on expenses again), where we mused about the fact that we have been out to dinner together in Huddersfield, London, Sydney and now Bangkok. Pretty cool hey. The next night we went to the Patpong markets, which are notorious for strip clubs. Apart from Colin getting constantly hassled by guys asking 'you want to see pingpong?', it wasn't too shocking. The red light district in Amsterdam is definitely worse. It was a bit upsetting to see the young Thai girls all dressed up though.

One of the best things about Bangkok is the transport. The taxis are very frustrating, they always tried to rip me off, refusing to put the meter on. They also had no idea of where they were going, even when I showed them a map and gave instructions in Thai. I guess it's pretty hard for them, as not only is Bangkok massive, all of the streets have both Thai and English names, and both are pronounced differently. I got lost in a taxi quite a few times. The river boats are cool, but the first time I got on one on my own, it just went across to the other side of the river and everyone got off. I had got totally the wrong boat, so had to make the journey back to where I had got on and start again. The tuk-tuks look great as well, although expensive. They are called tuk-tuks because that's the sound they make, extremely loud and pollution spews out of the back of them.

Another thing I love about Bangkok is the smells. Walking down the street, there are hundreds of little stalls cooking and selling food, and the different smells are amazing, smells that I have never come across before, and all intermingling with each other.