Wat Thai of Los Angeles

In my post last year, I talked about Wat Thai of Los Angeles - the biggest Thai temple in the United States! Well, last summer, July - August, I went on a 6 week road trip with a couple of friends and convinced them to make a stop at this temple! It was a sweaty, hot day and it reminded me of the sweaty, hot days I lived in Thailand. There is also a food market on the grounds that has Thai iced tea and all sorts of other goods - I didn't see any roti, though!

Thai temple in the distance!

Queen's birthday is occasion to celebrate Mother's Day!

Gosh, I miss these altars.

Reminded me of the goods sold during lunch at the school I volunteered at - Thai iced tea included.

The American version of a Thai food market. Awesome.

Thai iced tea, of course!

And then across the street, we went to Pratanum Market where I stocked up on goodies!

Plenty of Thai tea to go around. The Tamarind candies were gross. Of course, all of this added up to well over how much one would pay for it in Thailand. Well worth the detour, though!

I'm comin' back!

Dear friends and readers!

First off, I have had 99 hits to my blog in the first 10 days of February! How is this possible? I am not sure, but I thank you all!

Secondly, it is my pleasure to report my return to Southeast Asia and specifically Thailand in May! Yes, indeed, good ol' me purchased a ticket today to leave good ol' New York City on May 4th and arrive in Bangkok on May 6th (at 1am - kind of blows)! Hoorah! Hoorah!

There will basically be no time in between the end of my spring semester (and first year of graduate school!) and my flight, but that's a good thing. There isn't much for me to do or look forward to in New York once the term is over anyway.

On my Southeast Asian agenda:
- Koh Tao where I will finally learn to Scuba Dive with Astrid (of Chiang Mai fame).
- Railay Beach where I will hopefully take a few days worth of rock climbing courses. (Remember my favorite place in the world?)
- Nong Khai to visit my Openmind peeps!
- Krabi Town to visit my other Openmind peeps and to see what it's like there a 13 months after I left (like did they finish the Temple?!!)
- I am also hoping to fly to Indonesia to meet up with a classmate and travel around for a few weeks.

Anyone else going? Anyone else interested in meeting up? Anyone else want postcards?

Living the dream.

Yours Truly,

D-

This summer in Bryce Canyon one of America's natural wonders!