Sunday I met up with Rebekah, a friend of a camp friend from back home. She is currently on a 2 month trip to Bangkok teaching English. She is from Sulphur, Oklahoma and such a lovely woman. We decided to meet up and visit the Jim Thompson house together. We rode the skytrain to the closest stop and decided to hop in a taxi to have the driver take us to the house. When we got in the guy told us we could walk. We asked him to just drive us there, much more convenient when it is blazing hot outside. The man finally agreed and began to drive. He drove a total of about 100 yards, and directed us to the overhead footpath to cross and said it was just at the bottom of the stairs on the other side. He then charged us 20 baht to drive 100 yards. Seriously?! We walked across the footpath and the house wasn’t even where he told us! We walked down a few side streets before finally finding the right one.

20 Bhat for 100 yards…. a good laugh now.

Jim Thompson was an American who brought the silk industry to Asia. He was in the US military and a part of the CIA. He was also a Princeton graduate and architect in New York for more than a decade. Upon discharge from the service he decided to move to Bangkok, Thailand permanently.

Jim built a beautiful home in Bangkok, which has now been turned into a museum. In his home he had two horoscopes; the first of which predicted good luck in 1959. This was the year he moved into his house in Bangkok and retired from the U.S. Army. The other horoscope was to bring bad luck at the age of 61, which was his age when he went missing. Jim Thompson had been on holiday in Malaysia and took a walk in the woods, never to return. To this day nobody knows his whereabouts or what happened. His remains have never been found. It will forever remain a mystery. His house was so beautiful and unique. My favorite part was that nothing in the house was level. The door frames were all crooked, the floors and ceilings were slanted. It was such a neat place!

Below is a picture of different types of silk cocoons.

Sunday evening I met up with Stephaine and some friends she had in town. We went to Wat Pho, the temple of reclining Buddha.

Wow…. Reclining Buddha ain’t messin’ around. He is HUGE.

After walking around Wat Pho for a bit we decided to have dinner along the river. I hadn’t been to that part of Bangkok yet, so I was quite excited. Even more excited when I realized there is a Ferris wheel along the river! Bonus! My phone was out of charge, so no pictures of the area. It is definitely a place I will be visiting again soon…. I have got to ride the Ferris wheel, of course. Pictures to come!