Goodbye Bangkok (and Asia)

The last few days in Bangkok have been fantastic, but it feels like a sweet-sounding swan song to our entire journey. We've returned to the trip's birthplace, our metaphorical glasses coloured by our many weeks abroad. To tell the truth, Bangkok looks very different after being through the rest of Southeast Asia. Initially, what I found exciting yet frightening, offensive yet exhilirating, I still manage to find a way to love.

I've said to Taylor that I intend to visit back to Bangkok when I'm rich and eccentric (when, not if) although it will probably happen sooner.

On our first full day back, we ended up crossing to the other side of the dirty, dirty river that runs through Bangkok, our destination being the Forensic Medical Museum we had heard so much about. This was...probably the most disgusting thing I've ever seen. I've decided to attach a picture of an elephantitic scrotum I furtively snapped (photography wasn't allowed) in the less disgusting part of the museum.

If you zoom in below the scrotum in the display case (about one foot in diameter) you can see the picture of the guy it actually came off of. This was actually the less empty and less disgusting part of the museum. The real treat was the area filled with pictures with captions such as "bullet wound through skull" "beheading due to car accident" and "grenade in torso". Part of the exhibit was a bloodied shirt that was the result of a stabbing death by a sharp dildo.

Needless to say, this was in Lonely Planet under the section "Quirky Bangkok". We walked around the other, safer parts of Bangkok for the rest of the day.

Yesterday, Taylor and I acquired a tailor, and had shirts made. Needless to say, these are of excellent quality that we'd never find in Canada. The tailor will actually keep our measurements for five years, so we can both now say "We have our shirts made for us in Bangkok". We also wandered the world's classiest mall. We ALSO saw 28 weeks later, in possibly the nicest theatre I've ever been in.

Today, we spent the day at Chatuchak Market, with somewhere between 10,000-15,000 individual stalls, spending an incredibly small amount of money for great stuff. I bought a sword. We picked up our shirts, and had possibly the most satisfying meal of the trip. I broke down and had a Guinness on tap with a Burger. Taylor had Laphroig and another Burger. Delicious

Then, we took a taxi/skytrain to where our bags are being stored. We walked down Khao San Road for the last time, pictured below. Taylor, my loyal Sherpa, is on the right.

We have little money left, but we think we can make it home. 36 hours left!