Thailand is a great introduction to travel in Southeast Asia.  Quite accustomed to tourists, it received a whooping 26.5 million visitors in 2014, securing its ranking as the 10th most visited country in the world.    For us, Thailand was the perfect place to acclimatize to a new continent while treating ourselves to some comforts that we hadn't experienced in months. 

We settled into Bangkok for a week.   What better place to get accustomed to the new (delicious) food, cool transport, and the pervasive religion, Buddhism, with its exquisite temples and orange clad monks?  (Note this blog post covers our entire 3 weeks in Thailand, which was split up into two visits,( 1.Bangkok and 2.Chaing Mai),  by our three week jaunt to Myanmar, covered in a previous post)

Since Kiko and I have spent a fair bit of time in our pre-kid lives traveling through Southeast Asia, entering Thailand was tinted with a bit of a "coming home" sort of feeling.  A sensation that was no doubt amplified by our previous 2 months in Africa, which while being an utterly amazing and unforgettable experience, was althogher new ground for me, and to a large extent Kiko as well.   But what surprised me the most about Bangkok was the ease at which the kids adjusted.  Can it really be as simple as some parenting literature suggests; i.e. the kids simply reflect the parents' attitude?  Hum, something to ponder when considering some of the rough patches on this trip...

Or maybe it just boils down to the fact that Thailand is super traveler friendly.   I think what captivated us first and foremost was the delicious food.  Street food and local restaurants all seemed to delight.  One exception would be the food aimed solely at the backpackers, which tends to be super cheap and rather bland.  

Our flexibility was rewarded.  Stories of a land reminiscent of Thailand 30 years ago, with beauty and friendliness that even the most jaded of travelers couldn't help but be taken with, were finding us at every turn as we stood perched in Bangkok, the entryway to our open 3 month S.E. Asia leg of our journey.  The common refrain was an unequivocal, "Go to Myanmar now, before it changes."  It took a little research to rid myself of outdated ideas of Burma, officially changed to Myanmar in 1989, as a dangerous and inaccessible land of never-ending opium fields, with its refugees flooding into Thailand, which I still held from my previous SE Asia travel, 20 years ago.   With small yet consistent positive changes in the government, and improvements with human rights,  Myanmar slowly began opening to tourism in the late 1990.  After much research on the internet, available at a speed in Bangkok which we hadn't experienced since Europe, and planning visa/flight logistics, Myanmar found its way onto our itinerary.  

Our entry point was the city of Yangon and our first outing, a morning visit to the most important Pagoda in Myanmar, 2500 year old Shwedagon, with its tall gilded stupa.  With this visit I immediately realized we had been well guided in our decision.   Myanmar's maintains a strong belief in Theravada Buddhism, which is evident with the countless temples and scores of monks and nuns seen throughout the country.     

As we wondered through Yangon I found an undefinable beauty in the dilapidated and chaotic streets

As always we were quite happy to stumble on some street markets, which make for a quick way to familiarize oneself with a place through its food, dress, and social interactions.   Constantly on the look out for new gluten free snacks, the kids were pleased with the wide choice of rice and coconut goodies, along with the wonderful selection of fresh fruits and veggies.  

With our allotted 3 weeks in Myanmar, we were eager to explore more rural areas.  Bagan, the land of mist covered pagodas,  was  "just" a 10 hr bus trip away.