First of all, I need to address my sister Janet's Anglo Puritan American Work Ethic Centered comment where she called us "lazy asses" for having a down day and getting massages instead of going into the 96 degree heat (with 500% humidity) to see where tortured and abused prisoners toiled to their death at Hellfire Pass. -sidebar: I am reading "Eat, Pray, Love" during this trip and am relating with the author that it is a good thing to relax and enjoy a country-. Yes, we are lazy asses sorry :^) . But we are working very, very hard at eating everything we lay our eyes on, does that count? You wanna hear about food?

First of all the layover in Korea was terrific in that it had a renowned food court that we exploited. Everything had garlic and chili of course but we shared seafood tofu hot pot, bibimbab and something else we can't remember. As soon as we got our room in Bamlamphu neighborhood of Bangkok we hit the street vendors at 1:30am for pork prik gow. From then on it's been largely street vendors since then: noodle soup, pad thai, fried chicken, some kind of preserved quail egg dipped in dough and fried on a stick, some kind of bamboo shoot stir fry, curries, fruit shakes. I don't know the names for all the Thai things we have eaten because the drill is stop, look, salivate and point. A yummy meal with a street vendor runs about 75 cents each and the same runs about $3 at a restaurant. We kind of prefer the street vendors because it is casual, rustic and friendly. Sawyer is eating 8 square meals a day. All he ever seems to say is "I'm hungry". He is leading the charge and is an adventurous eater as always.

We left Kanchanaburi yesterday to head to Ko Samui (where we are right now) via Bangkok. Our mission was to stay as cool as possible during the transfer, so walking around looking at temples with backpacks was out (again, sorry Janet). So we went to a MEGA indoor mall called MBK so we could be in air-conditioning. I can't begin to tell you was a sensory overload this mall was; THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS of shoppers perusing BILLIONS of goods; escalators into the heavens; an indoor Times Square on steroids. There was an international food court there, so thats were we hung out most of the time, eating sushi, dim sum, ramen noodles, crazy yummy desserts and some complimentary neon red gaggy sweet soda that was disgusting. We had access to American and Italian food there but fhooey on that! Which brings us to today. We have checked in for three nights at The Smile Resort in Hat Bo Phut Beach in Ko Samui. The hotel is gorgeous in the Thai style with bungalows. About $85/night at the higher end due to high holiday season rates. This is a very nice quiet and quaint beach compared to Hat Chaweng and Hat Lamai which have an abundance of bars, cars, expat drunks and noise. I included a picture of part of my breakfast this morning. There is a fleshy fruit here and I don't know what it is. It's white with black seeds and is encased in magenta colored skin. It is rather bland but beautiful. Bill got out early and shot some morning activity; monks going door to door accepting offerings and giving blessings. Soy and I got a nice beach massage then we took a cab to the other side of the island to Hat Lamai Beach. They have a tourist attraction there; rock formations called Grandmother and Grandfather. The formations bear a strong resemblance to male and female genitalia. (Again sorry Janet, this is how we spent our day). But tomorrow we are going on a snorkeling excursion to Ko Tao island so stay tuned for pictures. We ended our day with "banana pancakes" from a street vendor with stupendous showmanship. They are more like crepes; I had mine with Nutella, Soy had banana lemon and Bill had banana p-nut butter. I'm stuffed and can hardly wait until breakfast.

Anyway we are having the time of our lives enjoying the food, the people, culture and the little things of this wonderful country. We'll try to get a little more ambitious about exploring famous sites, Janet but no promises!