Steamin' Bangkok

Hey this is Eric,
Rob set this blog up so when I post something it looks like he is doing all of the writing! I hope that those of you who are checking in on our this trip are enjoying it and we will keep posting stuff as we move along. So I thought that I was prepared for the fact that Bangkok was going to be a veritable sauna, but this place is crazy hot! Walking around the city today, I thought that I was going to literally melt into the Grand Plaza courtyard. I have to drink a ton of water or else I get raging headaches that can only be eased by popping a couple of Excedrin. After we came back from the Grand Palace - I had "one of Those" headaches and had no excedrin and we were in the middle of one of those crazy Bangkok markets with every possible smell, sound, interesting foods and I was totally dehydrated. Surprisingly enough, after I downed a great fruit juice sith about 15 different ingredients, all of which I could not completely identify - and not really caring, my cranial icepick to the temple was gone. Gotta remember to stay hydrated over here or you are miserable! Once again, I find myself trying to put into words what we have been seeing over here and once again coming up short. I'm learning to survive on little sleep and sticky skin that often accumulates layer upon layer of sweat mixed with carbon monoxide. Its been interesting buying things on the barter system as well. At first I got taken several times in a row, but now I am slowly getting the hang of it with Rob's help. I am glad that the US is not on the barter system, I have a hard time with it over here sometimes because I know that the people in the shops selling stuff are working hard to earn a living. The people that I have seen in the shops and that drive us around and oh yea, massage us are very industrious and are always looking for ways to make a buck or two to take home. We have met so many interesting characters and had so many funny conversations - there is no way that I will be able to remember them all. I have been using my Camcorder quite a bit to capture as much as possible.
Well, once again I hope ya'll are doing great back in the states and I hope to see your comments. Rob uploaded some photos to the Blog so you can see some of the fun stuff that we have photographed so far. We will be taking off for Chang Mai tomorrow night on the night sleeper train which should be fun. I am looking forward to Northern Thailand and Laos too!