Japan Adventure

Workers with a bamboo ladder.

The "House of Style" is no more.

Motorcycle taxis parked near these power lines.

Wouldn't my dad have had a fit about the apparent lack of safety here? Where's OSHA . . . ?

Notice the trash can right next to the left side of the potty?

That's because in most of Bangkok, you do NOT flush the toilet paper. You drop it in the always present trash can, which is always on the left side. (This was REALLY hard to remember, and I frequently forgot -- old habits!) Anyway, it's rude here to offer something to anyone with your left hand. This is because the right hand is for eating, but the left hand is for the toilet . . .

We've taken refuge from the heat in a coffee shop, which also has an interesting menu. These are our drinks. Notice mine has the "shapely" stirrer . . .

Stan tries his "young coconut" which is served inside a shaved coconut shell.

Margie enjoys a refreshing icy fruit drink. As long as we stopped every few hours for one of these, I could survive the Bangkok heat!

Closeup of Stan's coconut milk, which was not as refreshing as he thought it might be. But we liked this place, and decided to come back here later for lunch. After a rest, and another shower . . . Most days here were 2 or 3 shower days.

Refreshed, we're back out on the streets enjoying this beautiful garden with waterfall.

We're back for a late lunch & Stan has a Singha (Thai) beer, but I can't resist another iced chocolate drink. Under our drinks, you can see the pictures of the menu items -- very helpful.

Looking outside the restaurant as a HUGE bus goes down the narrow street. Of course, it's going the wrong way on a "one-way" street, but those are only a suggestion here . . .

Stan adds hot peppers to his fried rice.

Good thing Stan likes Thai peppers ~ this fish is covered with them!

I was more cautious with these delicious (but mild!) spring rolls.

Views from our hotel window shows the contrast between old & new . . .

The building in the lower center appears to have burned, but the bottom floor still looked occupied.

Driving under this beautiful lighted bridge as we approach the airport. We left our hotel about 10 PM on New Year's Eve for our 1 AM flight.

Inside this beautiful new airport.

Flat escalators make it easier to pull luggage.

That's our flight -- 1 AM to Fukuoka on Thai Airlines.

Beautiful sights inside the airport.

In the Bangkok airport.

Although we heard an announcement that the airport would celebrate the New Year, we didn't even realize when the New Year arrived! I looked at my watch and it was 5 after 12. We were down at the gate with Pam & Jake and the Andersons, who were all leaving on the same flight back to Japan. Happy New Year!

Our screen shows that we've just taken off from Bangkok.

We'll fly back over Southern China & South Vietnam.

My video screen shows we've just left Bangkok on our 1/1 1AM flight back to Japan.

As we near Japan, the sun is rising. We will arrive at 8 AM Japan time, but we've only been asleep about 3 hours!

As you can see, it's a long way from Bangkok back to Japan.

We're almost back to Japan!

First glimpse of Fukuoka International Airport.

Uh, is that snow?

For some reason, our plane parked a long way away & we had to walk across the tarmak. It was VERY cold!

We met this lovely lady on the shuttle bus at the Fukuoka airport. She was returning from 2 months schooling in England. She helped us find our way to the Subway that goes to the train. I LOVE Japan . . .