bangkok: day one

still hard getting used to the 11 hour time difference. it's monday morning here in bangkok, sunday night back home! i spent a good chunk of yesterday catching up on my sleep - including a mid-afternoon nap. but i did get out on the streets for a walk around sukhumvit neighborhood in the morning. that was on the heels of getting in some tough miles on an ancient treadmill (easily the same one i used 3 years ago when i last stayed at this hotel). i'm going to avoid, at all costs, a return trip to that machine.

last night jose and i took the sky train to siam paragon (pictured above) for dinner. it's hard to believe a shopping mall is a serious tourist destination - even if it includes an aquarium (which we checked out my last time here). after an international dinner (we both started with thai soup, jose went indian and i went japanese, and we had some cuban mojitos to round out the flavors) in a spacious restuarant, we checked out an incredible bookstore, before riding the sky train back to the hotel.

this morning i took my running outside - and got in a decent 5 miles before breakfast. the highlight of that run was finding a small park that had a 300 meter loop track. it's going to be my new morning run destination. right now, however, time to head to class.