My first post

This posting is my very first ever. i am new to this blogging thing so please bear with me. I am starting this blog simply to allow my friends and family a more unique way to access my travels than by group emails or the like. However, anyone is of course welcome to read on!

I arrived in Bangkok around midnight on March 31st via Seoul on Korean Air. I left Chicago at 8 am on March 29th and arrived practically 2 full days later! The flight went very smoothly with good food, attentive service, and multiple movies to choose from. I arrived in the brand-spanking new International Airport in BKK where I found everything from customs and baggage claim to go smoothly and quickly. Within a half of an hour I found myself in line for a taxi into the city. These were not 'normal' taxis by American standards, not your boring old yellow NYC taxicabs, we were in Bangkok afterall. These taxis ranged from dayglo orange, to hot pink with purple stripes, from turquoise blue with flames, to half neon green and yellow. Luckily, I soon found myself being spirited away (quite literally at over 120 km/hr!) by a hot pink number with a "I Heart Farang" bumbersticker. "Farang" being the Thai word for 'foreigner', namely Westerners. The only thing my driver knew how to say in English was, "You like music?" and music I do like, so we were immediately jammin' out to the newest Thai disco. A taxi into the city should be no more than 400 baht (at 35 baht to the $1), but use a metered taxi as it will be cheaper. I was meeting my Uncle, who lives in Phuket, at the Rembrandt Hotel on Soi 18, off of Sukhumvit Road, a very popular road for hotels, shops, restaurants. It was very nice at 2800 BH for a large double (2 double beds) with ensuite, Satellite TV, minibar, and breakfast. They even had piped in birdsong in the hallways and elevators, giving you the constant impression you were outside.

The next day we went directly to Phuket so I could spend some time with my cousins there. I have been here since then doing basically nothing but swimming, boating, and lots and lots of eating! The food in Thailand is really quite wonderful, especially for those of us who love truly spicy food. I have been eating fresh blue crabs, steamed white Snapper with garlic and pepper, pomelo and shrimp salad, mango, avocado, and rock lobster salad, fresh oysters the size of your palm, shrimp noodle soup for a $1, curried tuna sandwiches, the requisite Pad Thai, and the mouthwatering list simply goes on and on! I do not think I will be losing much weight here if I continue to eat this way! But that is just fine by me!

I went for my first dive today; my first dive, in fact, in over 2 years! It was a nice easy, shallow dive, perfect for buffing up my lost diving skills. Even though the water was rather choppy today, we were able to see lobsters, eels, octopi (puses?), sting rays, sea snails, and a plethora of colorful fish and coral. We dove from a spot called Bungalow Bay about an hour by a very slow boat from Phuket. I went with the dive company Bubble Dive, a friend of my Uncle's where the going rate for 2 dives, breakfast, lunch, and a snack, plus transportation is 3000 BH.

I will be in Phuket until the 10th of April when we will be going to my Aunt's village of 450 people for Songkran, the Thai New Year. This should be a most interesting cultural experience as there will be no other Farang other than my Uncle and myself for 5 days. I will post a blog about that experience shortly afterwards.

I hope you enjoyed this first of many amateur blogs!