In Thailand

Hong Kong from the Peak tram
At two am this morning I arrived in Thailand after about a week in
Hong Kong and Shenzhen. A friend from school put me up and helped me
sample expat life in the Asian business hub. Most expats I met must
have been spending every other week in a different East or Southeast
Asian city on work.
One of HK's first tourist stops is a mountain sitting on top of the
city's downtown called the Peak: take San Francisco's Telegraph Hill,
make it three times as tall and wide, and relocate it to the middle of
downtown at Powell and Market streets, and you get the idea of how
closely HK's developed areas have had to squeeze against and around
it's sharp geographic features. Walking around the Peak I could get
the lay of the land. I think Hong Kong's most recognizable features
are its ubiquitous residential towers which for their narrow girth
look unnaturally tall.
I arrived in Thailand early this morning. I'm on a bus now making my
way to one of Thailand's islands. I'm gratified to have made good on
a recent friend's advice to 'get out of Bangkok as soon as possible'.
For a while it seemed like I was going to be stuck in an urban
backpacker district that looks like the first stop in Southeast Asia
for every British gap year student looking for quick and dirty
partying on arrival. For the next week I'm taking a diving course in
Ko Tao, finishing it in plenty of time to reach the storied full moon
festival in Ko Pha Ngan. Everyone I've ever met while traveling has
always had only glowing things to say about Thailand, so I decided to
invest all of my three weeks before France in this country,
particularly around its islands. In the interest of moving around
like a true backpacker, I've left all of my business and metropolitan
clothing behind in a hotel's left luggage area. Everything except . .
. my laptop. One must have principles after all.