Prostitutes and Tuk Tuks

Bangkok is crazy. I mean, even the name of the city sounds a little crazy. I think that half of what makes Bangkok feel so crazy is its heat. In fact, that might account for more than half.

Now, I am a person who becomes both hot and cold fairly easily. If we're going to be honest, I'd prefer 75 sunny and breezy all of the time because really I can get a little worked up over the weather. I'd say it's the most high maintenance part about me. Bangkok makes every other time I've complained of heat look like a cool day. This city is so steamy, still and excrutiatingly hot that it's actually hard to focus on much else. So, at the end of the day everything kind of feels like a painful dream that involved sweat dripping in your eyes and you desperately seeking an air conditioned 7 Eleven. That makes Bangkok seem crazy.

But that's not it completely. There is an area - and actually even just one road- in this city that pretty much epitomizes what I imagined for backpacker culture in southeast asia. There, you can purchase tatoos, women, drugs and drink. All at relatively cheap prices apparently. And it is PACKED with westerners - most of them looking like they've been there a few weeks to long and all of them sweating. For those who want to fit in, but aren't keen on drugs and odd STDs, there is plenty of henna, hair braiding and hippie looking apparel for sale.

The first time we went to the street I actually really liked it. I don't know why. It was about a million degrees and it was that kind of heat that makes breathing feel a little painful. But it was cool. It was what I had imagined. And it was so amazing people watching.

But then we went back last night and frankly, prostitution makes me a little depressed. We had actually just been at a night market in the red light district before that and there, while it was bothersome, it still seemed illicit. In the neon lights and crowds of the backpacker district, watching normal looking American guys my age walk around touting their young prostitutes, I got a little down about it.

On a happier note though, Bangkok has these awesome little contraptions they call tuk tuks. They're like a glorified moped with a spot that can fit three small people in the back. The three of us fit, but not well. We rode in four of them yesterday and each driver seemed a little crazier than the last - this included drivers offering us "ping pong show" (this is a sex show. or sex. The derivation of this name is more than a little disturbing.), taking us to random jewelry shops we didn't ask for in hopes we'd buy stuff, and then finally, at the end of the night, driving around curves at about 80 miles an hour while laughing this crazy laugh and shaking his head like a maniac. I like the tuk tuks. I may be alone in our group in this sentiment.