BANGKOK, THAILAND

Once again Chris and I have decided to join forces with another traveler, which always makes things more interesting and fun. Kyle Honda, who sounds a little like a car dealership, is actually a very cool guy from Hilo, Hawaii, who's here on a two-week vacation. He's never been to Thailand before, but he's interested in seeing the northern part of the country like we are, so now it looks like we'll heading there together in the next couple of days. Oh, and he's also half-Japanese, like me, which is kind of cool.

Yesterday the three of us headed downtown to meet up with a Thai guy named Surawit who Chris met on his return flight to Bangkok. He's a chef who works at the Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas, back in Thailand for a few weeks' vacation. Chris had talked to him on the plane about meeting up in Bangkok and going out to eat--I think the idea was that since he's a chef, he would take us to a really exceptional local restaurant. As it turns out, we met at the mall, and ate at a cheap Chinese restaurant near there, which was fine, if not exactly world-class.

Oh, and speaking of world-class dining, today I ate a bug.

Yep. I think I mentioned in a previous post that there's a vendor on Khao San Road who sells deep-fried crickets, grubs, water beetles, scorpions, etc. Well, after weeks of walking past his cart, I finally got up enough nerve to try one this evening. I chose a big crunchy grasshopper, which actually didn't taste too bad--the worst part were the back legs, which were like eating two sticks. I guess it just goes to prove that you can deep-fry anything and it tastes pretty good. (A scary thought, I know.)

And here's an amusing postscript: To get the taste of the grasshopper out of my mouth, I bought some chicken on a skewer from another street vendor, which is usually quite yummy. I had thought I was buying pieces of breast meat, but on closer inspection, I couldn't figure out what part of the chicken it was--they were little plump triangles, with a bit of backbone in the middle. I ate a couple, but they were a little too fatty for me, so I gave the rest to Chris. Anyway, later I described what I bought to a Thai guy, and asked him what part of the chicken it was. "Oh, that was chicken ass," he said. Great....