Jet lag has left me feeling like one of those crazy cuckoo birds that juts out of their clock haphazardly with no sense of rhythm or purpose. I am always tired but rarely sleepy, which has made this first weekend in Bangkok a fitful one. I am often awake, but feel as though I'm living in a thick cloud of neon fog, thanks to my own exhaustion coupled with the electric chaos of this city.
To describe living in Bangkok as an experience of sensory overload would be to put it very lightly. The perfume of the streets is complex with fried dough and sweet water for mangoes, spicy with scalded peppers and fish whose pupils are deep and inky and stare at you as you fumble through new currency that might as well be monopoly money for how well you understand its value. There is a hum of honking bright pink taxis, drivers yelling their offers of inexpensive tuktuk rides, the music of high schoolers practicing a dance in the shade of some crumbling building. It is a city that stretches for miles, crawling through ruins and clubs with bright signs that say things like "WE PLAY AMERICAN MUSIC" or "WE DONT CHECK IDS".
It is easy to feel lost and small here. I don't yet know if this feeling is a permanent one or one that will dissipate as easily as the large plumes of smoke that erupt from the cracks of Bangkok's hookah bars.
Tomorrow we officially begin orientation. Back to the classroom to learn ESOL teaching skills, the Thai language as well as Thai cultural norms.
Hopefully next time I write things will be less dizzy.
Cody
To describe living in Bangkok as an experience of sensory overload would be to put it very lightly. The perfume of the streets is complex with fried dough and sweet water for mangoes, spicy with scalded peppers and fish whose pupils are deep and inky and stare at you as you fumble through new currency that might as well be monopoly money for how well you understand its value. There is a hum of honking bright pink taxis, drivers yelling their offers of inexpensive tuktuk rides, the music of high schoolers practicing a dance in the shade of some crumbling building. It is a city that stretches for miles, crawling through ruins and clubs with bright signs that say things like "WE PLAY AMERICAN MUSIC" or "WE DONT CHECK IDS".
It is easy to feel lost and small here. I don't yet know if this feeling is a permanent one or one that will dissipate as easily as the large plumes of smoke that erupt from the cracks of Bangkok's hookah bars.
Tomorrow we officially begin orientation. Back to the classroom to learn ESOL teaching skills, the Thai language as well as Thai cultural norms.
Hopefully next time I write things will be less dizzy.
Cody
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