Sometimes the water here is sweet out of the bottle, a taste similar to sweat, especially if it is warm. And the flavors of the food are spicy in an eclectic way. Flavors that I have never tasted before. At times the spices taste like soap, but not in a bad way. Rather in a way that makes me feel as though my body is being purified possibly, made to be new.

In other ways my body feels confused. When my stomach twists endlessly on itself, back and forth starting and ending settled. I don't know what it is that makes my stomach loose like this, maybe the same spices that make me feel pure, and that this experience is something different. Maybe it's the endless realizations and the unsettled feeling of seeing yourself from the outside. I look at my life differently, as if I am drifting above it on a cloud. I see my father in the distance as an elusive puff of cigarette smoke. It still lingers in the room, but we may never see the source of it again. Maybe it's my fault that he lost interest, maybe I failed him because I forgot to tell him that he was okay, that we were okay. I feel for things that I had lost feelings for previously. I love it that I tingle like I used to, I've been made human again, despite the debauchery that ensues too frequently.

Last weekend the same group which went to Koh Tao went to Bangkok. We stayed on Kao San Road which is a real granola-fest. There are backpacks as far as the eye can see streaming down the center of the road. Along the edges are various merchandisers trying to impress the white-skins with their products: toads with ridges up their back which can be caressed to sound just like what they imitate in shape, knock off diesel, chanel, bathing apes, hipster-style t-shirts which show no evidence of where they were purchased. That's what the hipsters go for right?

The Australians love to take their holidays to Thailand. They spend months here after working and saving for months. And from what I've seen, they love to party and to drink. That is what I have done too.

Friday night was a mess. It was all greedy beings and "every man for himself" because we didn't have the minds to make reservations before venturing to Bangkok for the weekend. I had quite the sickness, a sinus infection and a terrible cough. At one point in the evening we thought that we were going to have to stay out all night and wait for one hotel's rooms to open up at 6 o'clock the next morning; at this point it was 10:30. I was up for it because I didn't want to be a needy nuisance which seemed to have surrounded me. Apparently there were too many of us once we got there; on the way everything was fine. But as we were racing to a hotel which might have room for five of the nine of us who were still homeless for the night, it could be heard that there were too many fucking people for this hotel, and implied that four of us didn't belong. Disgusting. I'm not sure what the fuck is wrong with people. People are made to feel too special growing up, as if there is always somewhere for them to sleep. Everything turned out though. John and I settled with a cute boy from Slovenia who liked to take pictures and woke up at 6 o'clock every morning to do so. The little (of course!) Japanese lady who owns the hotel set us up with him. Only one person with three twin beds.

Then we went out, binge drank our stomachs full and our minds into oblivion. Our limbs flailed on the dance floor, and I probably kissed a girl (her name is Chris) more than I should have. Then Nelly came on and I felt a certain right to it which I have never felt toward any rap song in my life. I had this insatiable desire to frolic around the club informing everyone of where I had come from, but I refrained. I don't think I have ever felt so patriotic in my life, and it was induced by a Nelly song. He's a rapper, in case you aren't down. Then I kissed another girl, someone got pissed, I almost got my ass kicked and realized that perhaps some people aren't as relaxed as I am in Thailand.

Saturday morning felt promising initially. We were going to enter the machine that is Bangkok and make our way through the huge weekend market. So 7 of us took taxis into town. The sun was piercing and drawing sweat out of the pores of my already dehydrated body. I felt vomit coming, but I tried to suppress it. We walked around and I was unable to focus on anything beneath the endless blue tarps where all of the merchants attempted to impress us once more. The smells of curry and hanging meat were overwhelming and trapped. I couldn't take it anymore. I took a cab back to the hotel and spent one of my few days in Bangkok trying to make sense of the second half of "Everything is Illuminated" and sleeping. I woke up at around 6 pm, tried to find the gay district, and we did it all over again.

"Ping Pong show?" Every seven steps there was a middle-aged Thai man propositioning twenty-something males and females alike. Some of us got more irritated than others. After being asked probably twelve times, Chris became especially agitated by one of the hair-thinned Thai locals, his red polo tucked into his jeans which ballooned beneath his belt. Her arms shot backward as she screamed "Mai Chai!!" ("NO!!"), alike to an elegant mythical beast ready to pounce on the agitator. Meanwhile I peered into the doors of the various clubs with names such as "Super Pussy." The women were hesitantly dancing on the stage amongst shiny poles, all with numbers pinned to their bikinis. It was a human auction, living, walking meat like at a 4 H conference. It makes me wonder what their fate was for the night, who outbid who to walk out of the club with a Thai treat on his arm? Is it detrimental to those ladies who aren't chosen? And then my mind went to ping pong balls shooting out of vaginas as though they had been manufactured by the Nerf ™ Company. Razor blades being pulled out on a string, and darts being shot at a target. I decided I would have enjoyed this a little too much seeing as how I was intoxicated, either that or it would have ruined my evening. I will return sober, and contemplative.

Our night in the gay/sex district was not so fruitful. We went into one bar and watched a Thai band do black-eyed peas covers for about an hour. And then we went on a search for clubs for dancing, but found that we were in the wrong part of town for that. We returned to Kao San Road and replicated the previous nights activities, with less drama, apologizing from the man who wanted to assault me for kissing what he thought was his property, street pad thai, and popped red balloons.

Bangkok was all fun buckets and disorienting.

Everyone went back to Hua Hin and some of us stayed behind. Jessica, Katie, and I went to the Golden Palace and the Lying Buddha on Monday. It was one of the most impressive things I have ever witnessed. The architecture and mosaic tile work was extremely intricate. And it was built for a king in the late 1700s! It is a religious structure where there is an emerald Buddha in the center. It's interesting when religious things are built for a secular ruler. It was raining, which in a way made the experience more serene, but in the sort of way that made me contemplate about how there is so much money and manpower put into these things. It certainly puts people in awe at the glory of the king and of the image of Buddha, but I didn't see it as spiritual, seeing as how the colonial style buildings and the parading chino shorts with DSLRs made me feel as though I was visiting Disney World before entering the gated temple structure.

It is now a week later, and tomorrow

Jessica and I are going to try and find a waterfall. I always feel much more serene and I am more likely to have a spiritual experience when I am surrounded by nature and not tourists, kackling away in their
various tongues.

Until next time, America.