All roads lead to Bangkok

Welcome drink in Bangkok

After four months of traveling, I'm back where I started: in Bangkok. This is where all roads lead in southeast Asia. Bangkok is the travel hub where people come to get visas, make travel arrangements, take flights or trains or buses to their next destinations, and meet their families who come to visit! Yes, my family is here! I'm so happy to see them after four months! They came here on a vacation from the snow back home and we will be traveling together for a while.

Looking at Bangkok four months later, after I have been hardening off in Asia for four months, it's not as daunting as it was the previous time around. I've learned to choose street food and all the animal parts such as intestines or chicken heads that are displayed on many food stalls don't bother me as much any more.

Compared to Phnom Penh, Bangkok's traffic is tame and so easy to navigate. And compared to Kuala Lumpur or Hong Kong, Bangkok quite measures up to the futuristic look and feel with skyscrapers, public transportation in the form of the skytrain and upscale shopping malls, escalators, walkways and pedestrian overpasses. Still, it has all the street stalls and exotic flavors of Asia. Out of all the Asian cities I've visited so far, Bangkok is the one that has it all.