Arrival in Thailand

After waking up at 4:00 am on Monday, checking in at the airport, and being scanned through TSA, I had finally started my journey. My first flight took me to the LA airport, a busy loud and confusing place for me. After waiting for about two hours, I boarded my next plane awaiting a 13 hour flight to Shanghai. After landing, I stayed there for a few hours, and meet two Aussie guys around my same age. They helped the time pass as I waited for my final flight to board.
I touched down in Thailand at 12:50am on Wednesday, or about 9:50 am Tuesday Pacific time. Luckily I was able to get a little sleep on the last four-hour leg of my journey. Exhausted, I walked through the passport check, grabbed my luggage and ran to get a taxi. At 1:15 am I finally made it to my hotel thanks to the kind taxi driver. I was asleep by 1:30.
I woke up around 9:00, and treated myself to a well needed shower before heading out to find some grub. After stepping out of my hostel I took in a big deep breath of the Thai air, remembering the last time I was here and how the muggy air filled my lungs. Its interesting how different places give off different sensations and smells. I continued down the street towards the skytrain entrance, with a few things to do: get a sim card, get a toothbrush, toothpaste, etc, and most importantly FOOD! The weather was beautiful and sunny, with some clouds here and there. I boarded the train headed to the big shopping malls. After searching high and low for the popular Thai mobile company AIS, I discovered I needed my passport in order to buy a sim card, and that I had left it in my hostel. I guess that will teach me! On my way back to the hostel, I stoped at a little road side food place to buy some food. I got some of my favorite Thai food, Som Tom. It is a papaya salad made with dried shrimps, lime juice, tomatoes, some plum sugar, and chili peppers of course. Needless to say it was very spicy, so much so that I couldn't finish.

My lunch

Ready to hit the streets

The view from my hostel room

My hostel room

Looking down on the street from the hostel

Looking down at dusk

After retrieving my passport, I hurried back to the malls, found an AIS store and bought my sim card. No problems with it so far, lets hope it stays that way. I then stopped by a 7/11 and got all of my necessities as well as some snacks. I explored a little of the city from the Skytrain, went window shopping and tried to find some good places to eat. On my way back to the hotel for some rest before dinner, it started to rain. The rains in Thailand aren't like the ones in the US. It was raining so hard you could say it was raining tigers and elephants instead of cats and dogs. I stopped by a cart to grab some mangos in-between raindrops. I will hopefully post some photos of that in the future, as I will be going to lots of food carts while I'm here.