From Masala to Bollywood and everything in between! Catch up with me and my time around South Asia

What a breath of fresh air...after 3 months of living dirty and dusty it was a nice change to have civilized traffic patterns, and not see men peeing on the side of every wall. I had forgotten what a welcome sight a 7/11 could be...hehe, they have them everywhere in Bangkok...like Starbucks in the States! Gigi and I traveled on the same flight from Bangalore...we flew Thai Air, and what a pleasant experience this was. The flight attendants had the most beautiful uniforms on--traditional Thai silk suits, with fresh Orchids on their lapels. The food was even tasty on the flight--and this is not easy to accomplish when all you have is a microwave to zap the food. So we flew on a red eye that got us into Bangkok at 7am (3.5 hours of flight time across the Indian Ocean). I was impressed with the efficiency of the Thai customs process, and how clean and unique the airport was. Bangalore's airport barely has any shops or anything to keep your interest if you're delayed--as we were. It's interesting...when you go through security in India you walk through a metal detector and then women step into an enclosed booth to be further checked for any metals or liquids by a female security agent. Men are also checked in this way...but out in the open. Women's privacy is highly protected in India. So Gigi and I had a tour of the city from our cab driver, and then were dropped at our hotel to freshen up and await Samantha, my freshman dorm mate and close friend currently studying in Australia, and Jamie Rose a friend from D.C. who's studying in Japan!! After Sam and Jamie arrived I was then ready to explore this new Asian world! We arranged to only stay one night at that hotel and take an early bus to Pattaya--beach spot 2 hours by bus from Bangkok City. So without any hitches we packed up in the morning and despite a traffic jam made the 9am bus to Pattaya! We caught the bus by the skin on our teeth....and then slept happily until we arrived at the beach!