The first day by myself couldn’t have been more uneventful. I just went to various malls around Bangkok just looking for free wifi. The Bangkok city administration is quite progressive in this regard, and provides free wifi service in several locations spread throughout the city. The connection is fairly decent in most shopping malls, but the speed is not so great. But who am I to complain when I’m not even paying for it?

Along with many of my other things, I had sent my big bulky camera packing to India with my friends. So I took the opportunity and bought myself a point-and-shoot digital camera at one of the malls. It has simple specifications of 3X optical zoom and 12 megapixels. But it is a sleek looking gadget and fits nicely in the pocket of my jeans.

The first picture taken from my new camera was of Ganapati. That should make my parents happy :)

Mall hopping in Bangkok

Later in the evening, Tomi took me to Chinatown - the Chinese quarter of Bangkok, to check out the Chinese New Year (Tet) celebrations. We visited the Golden Buddha temple, walked through the enormous crowds of people in Chinatown, sampled some of the fine foodstuff on display, and checked out the dragon dances.

The Golden Buddha

With Tomi, my Indonesian host

Checking Tomi’s photography skills

Tet celebrations 1

Tet celebrations 2

Tet celebrations 3

Tet celebrations 4