So, the one day I did spend in Bangkok, I found it well, annoying. It seems like everyone is just after your money and they want you to spend spend spend! But I guess it may be the same all over Asia? I walked around, shopping and trying to get to the Grand Palace and found that I could not walk more than 50 metres without some tuktuk driver coming up to me and offering me "good deal just for you" to the Grand Palace. Whatever. They told us at the tour group that the tuktuk drivers will offer a good deal to anywhere "10 baht anywhere you want" but will actually take you to some shop where they will get commission for whatever you spend (at highly inflated prices, of course). They will also tell you that the Grand Palace is closed until a certain time, so why not go to see a 'friend' of theirs (in some shop of course) first. So annoying. I finally got tired of trying to get to the Grand Palace and gave up. I just had no energy to fend them off anymore. I only imagined it would be worse once I got to Tourist Central (the Grand Palace). So I took some pictures around the neighborhood only to be told "miss, no pictures allowed here" (ya whatever, i'm sure the bigwigs are 7-11 would really mind me taking photos of their sign). Or "hello miss, welcome to thailand, you like to see my shop?" "miss, you want to buy juice?" "excuse me miss, excuse me, where are you going, why you ignore me?" ahhhhh.....it gets tiring after awhile. so i just bought my souvenirs I didn't even bother to bargain too much since it all seemed so cheap anyway.

I guess one day I'll have to go back to Thailand and see what it's like outside of Bangkok. Maybe not so much harrassment from touts? I would hope so. I guess they're just trying to make a living but it's downright nasty to take someone somewhere they just don't want to be or force stuff on them. Then again, we are the 'rich' ones, when most of them are quite poor so maybe it's all fair after all. Who knows. It really reminded me of Mexico, I guess you just have to learn to ignore it and go about your business.