update

Like Billy Pilgrim, I have become unstuck in time.  Nothing like being hurled through time and space for 22 hrs to make you feel unglued.  Your old life is shed like a snake skin and you are left feeling a little raw and vulnerable.  Did I say I liked that about travel?  Did I lie or does that only become true in retrospect?  I was lucky to have made it with no complications.  Apparently, a typhoon delayed many flights around the Pacific, but mine was only delayed about an hour.  Still, arriving in a foreign country after 22hrs. in the air is a bit unsettling and exhausting.  I woke up at 7 am, roused by the third world alarm clock of barking dogs and quickening traffic.  Three cups of coffe later, I was ready to make my way into Bangkok.  I took a tuk-tuk to the river boat-very fun!  You have to be quick on the boats because you are likely to be left behind if you prevaricate.  OSHA would have a field day here.
Bangkok has a rapid pulse that's hard to adjust to after living in Michigan.  Totally different vibe......  I would find it exhausting if I had to live here more than a day or two.  Several times today I made a mental note to never take my life for granted!
I visited the Grand Palace at Wat Pho (I think)  I found Bangkok hard to navigate- so frenetic!  Jet-lagged, I decided to head back to my hotel around 4pm.  I took the sky train-no problem- but got a little turned around when I took a tuk-tuk to my hotel.  As we were driving, the heavy sky finally opened up and just poured!!!   As the plastic was rolled down on the sides of the tuk-tuk, I couldn't see a thing!  The driver had mercy on me and transferred me to another driver....but by this time, I had no clue where I was.  I asked so many Thais- all very helpful and all with different directions!  At one point, I was so tired I wanted to cry.  I knew I was close, but since I had arrived in the dark, I didn't recognize a thing.  I asked an old lady and her daughter and they pointed in the right direction.  A few minutes later, between the rain drops, here comes the woman on an old motor bike!  I climb on the back for a hair raising drive (against traffic) and she dropped me at the doorstep of my hotel.  We laughed and hugged and I vowed ALWAYS to be nice to foreigners.  People here are so patient-- we could learn a lesson from that.  Like my waiter told me this morning- after recounting this sad tale- life is like a wheel- sometimes you are on the bottom and sometimes you are on the top.  Love to all of you.
Susan