Eat, Eat, Eat

(Sorry to disappoint, but you won't be seeing any photos from now on.  A bunch of my photos seem to have been corrupted somehow and a lot of them correspond to photos I've uploaded to my blog - a.k.a. my favourites!  Not sure if there really is a connection, but I don't really want to take the chance.  I'll try not to be too wordy.)

After the Philippines, I moved onto Thailand, and more specifically Bangkok.  My friend Joe (who you heard about very early on in this blog from my Arizona visit) is Thai and has a lot of family in Bangkok, some of whom own a hotel.  I was meant to be heading straight through Bangkok to explore Laos for a couple of weeks, but I was feeling a bit tired of traveling alone and just a bit burnt out on traveling altogether.  As luck would have it, Joe and his mum and sister were arriving in Bangkok at the same time as me for a family visit and they invited me along!  It was a wonderful experience.  Joe's family was very welcoming and I got the chance to do some things that I wouldn't have on my own.

I've had a few jokes about me being on some sort of Eat, Pray, Love trip which isn't really true since I haven't fallen in love or done any praying.  Joy (Joe's sister) and I joked though that if I were to write a book about my time in Bangkok with their family it would have to be called Eat, Eat, Eat.  It is unbelievable how much food these tiny little Thai people can pack away.  Lunch and dinner were often big group outings and I learned quickly to have a very light breakfast as it was the only time I could control my food intake.  If I didn't eat enough with the family they would worry that I didn't like the food.  Very sweet, but my waistband definitely got a little uncomfortable at times!  That said, I can't blame it entirely on Joe's family.  The food was amazing (for the most part anyway - cow's tongue made me gag a little) and I wasn't necessarily that great at holding myself back. :)  Some of my favourites: panang chicken, tom yum soup and some sort of leaf wrap thing that I don't know the name of.

A tip for future travellers - Dukoral is a very good thing!  Definitely take it.  I ate (almost) anything that came my way and didn't have any issues.  Hooray for drugs!