As our first foray into Southeast Asia proper, Thailand has been a great jumping off point. We are spending the next three weeks in Vietnam and Cambodia until returning to explore Thailand's notoriously beautiful beaches. Here are our top takeaways so far.
This is how a traditional Thai massage ends!
1. Thai iced coffee and iced tea are amazing, once you get used to the sweetness! They are always available - on the street and in restaurants - and really help to beat the heat. But be prepared...they are super sweet!
2. Mosquitos are no joke. We've been through a bottle of bug spray already and take our malaria pills daily but still wound up with a ton of swollen bites.
3. The music of choice at hotels and restaurants consists almost exclusively of American covers - slower versions of recognizable songs, which has been somewhat amusing to us. Imagine smooth jazz versions of Ke$ha's songs...
4. Thai massages are a bit different than what we are used to - lots more stretching and pulling! Also, mine ended with a fancy hair braid that I wasn't expecting (see above)!
5. Hiking and running don't seem very prevalent here. There aren't consistent sidewalks and no one could point us to hiking trails so it was hard to see how one would go about these activities.
6. People are very nice here, just like in Japan. However, unlike Japan, many people tried to hawk us various items or services, even our hotel attendants.
7. A love of spicy food is a must. We're big fans of the red chili sauce used in most dishes - which is good because it's hard to find bland food here!
8. Infrastructure is a work-in-progress. Modern hotels and malls exist alongside produce stalls, run-down buildings and spiderwebs of electrical wires. As we mentioned in our Bangkok post, walking around is not always the best choice in getting from A to B.
9. The temples are beautiful and varied. While the Thai temples are far more intricately designed than the more simple Japanese versions, they are also sometimes more kitschy as well. We loved the older, ornate ones but found some of the newer temples (think fake animals and plastic Buddhas) to hold less charm.
10. Sanitary concerns pretty much fly out the window unless you are at a more upscale western-style place. Besides bottled water there isn't much you can do but roll with it. We prefer not to see how the food is being cooked or if the dishes are being washed - so far so good!
Peak: Playing with the elephants at Patara
Pit: Walking through the stifling heat and humidity in the industrial part of Bangkok
Next stop: Hanoi, Vietnam