It is rainy season now and it has been bucketing down here. Loud thunder claps were going off nearby and the soi was full of big puddles. But now it has stopped and I can walk to the market for lunch. I walk down my soi and cross Thannon Serithai. Instead of going straight to the market I decide today to go through the park.

I live opposite Suan Serithai and love it very much. I come here almost everyday to run or use the gym equipment that is provided free by the government and some of the local residents. The other day as I entered the park for a walk I saw a squirrel running up a tree. Today I see a medium sized lizard just inside the gate. I look at him, he looks at me. As I go closer for a better look he dives into the lake to get away from me. I keep on walking. There are lots of sparrows and little fan- tailed birds dancing about.

Love it or loathe it, our nation’s capital is a kaleidoscope of colours, crowds, crack-pots and characteristics which are sure to have a serious effect upon anyone’s nervous-system and leave them with a flurry of upbeat emotions. To say that Bangkok is not Thailand is like summing-up that London is not England or Paris is not France.

Everyone knows that Bangkok ranks right up there in the world’s top five for a series of innumerable feats, including for example, the amount of taxis per person, drivers fleeing the scenes of accidents and the excruciatingly long-time length of its red-lights. Then, just last week, while watching one of me favourite morning chat shows, us viewers were informed that Bangkok now ranks third in the world for the amount of Billboards that plaster the city like the plaque.

Alone in Bangkok now, the nights were so sad and frigthening to me. If you wonder why, try to take a taxi around 12pm and go somewhere, just "rot". How the taxi drivers are crazy, how your homeboys are crazy too, how your Thai is sadly poor, it seems this is a punishement for ever, you're here for two weeks and it's always the same: unable to say those stupid things that would turn your life much more simple... give it up. Sometimes it seems missunderstangings are richest that pure and clear conversations. Note that it's certainly espacially true when one side is drunk.

Yesterday, I told you how I drove down to visit the Beach in Bangkok. It wasn't really a beach in the traditional sense. There was no sand to play in and you wouldn't want to swim in the muddy water. However, a boat ride along a canal in the mangrove forest was really refreshing and a good way to beat the summer temperatures.