An Educational Experience

As Cody mentioned, we planned our Thailand vacation around a conference he had to attend in Bangkok. Sunday night went smooth catching our flight from Koh Samui to Bangkok. The Koh Samui airport was the coolest ever!
Even though the hotel in Bangkok was nice, we both decided we prefer the laid-back atmosphere of the beach bungalows.

Cody's conference was from Monday through Thursday, so Jadyn and I got to explore the city without him for a few days and even had a "super star" siting (as a nice Thai lady called them).

It was fun to see Jadyn learn first hand things she had only seen in books (or at the zoo when she was much younger). It started with the airplane ride(s), then the elephants (I don't think she will EVER forget what an elephant is). Then we went to Siam Ocean World where we saw lots of fish, sharks, sting ray, turtles, eels...etc., etc. She says fish, shark, and turtle all the time now.

We went to Jim Thompson's house. Click here to learn more about it. Here Jadyn learned how to spin an origami top that the lady workers (not sure what they are really termed) made for her. That thing sure came in handy; when she would get bored listening to the tour, I would remind her she had it and she would squat down and spin it.

We went on a city temple tour which consisted of a short boat ride to see Wat Arun, Wat Pho, and Wat Benchamabophit. Jadyn loved climbing up all the stairs at Wat Arun. She also loved the stone statues. I said something to her like, "hey, look at that guy," pointing at one of the structures. Then she ran around pointing at them and saying, "a guy, a guy, a guy!" all day. The stone lions were also a hit (also pointing at them saying "lion, lion, lion!" every time she saw one). She can recognize them as lions better than she can real ones. I also told her to hold one of the statue's "hands" so I could get a picture and she was even pretty excited about it!

Wat Arun
Wat Pho
Wat Benchamabophit (Gotta love how we just stand in front of another group for a picture--apparently our group was a bit impatient by the time we got to this temple.)

On our last full day in Bangkok, we packed our day with two tours: the canal (khlong) and Grand Palace tours. Thus allowing Cody to see some of Bangkok's high points.

Khlong Tour Jadyn can now recognize a boat--any shape, color, or size--and say the word "boat." She also had a great time seeing all the animals and snake show up-close-and-personal at the--we'll call it--animal park the boat stopped off at mid-tour. Although the animals looked worse than neglected, it was cool to only have a chain linked fence between them (monkeys, iguanas, tropical birds, bears, tigers, crocodiles, etc.) and us. Sometimes a little nerve-racking. Like when the monkey was on the fence and I was afraid he could pee on us any minute. (And, yes, that is a viper in that man's mouth--he picked it up that way.)

Grand Palace Tour This place was incredible--and huge. Again Jadyn loved pointing at all the statues, "lion, lion, lion" or "ephant, ephant, ephant" or "a guy, a guy, a guy." By the end of the trip she was also saying "temple." I kind of felt bad that she wasn't learning that word by seeing an LDS temple. Jadyn was also getting really good at making friends with all the people giving her attention. One of the security guards even let her play with his radio, and a mom really wanted to get a picture of Jadyn and her daughter. Jadyn loved sitting next to the girl (and the lion), but the little girl was a bit less excited about it than her mother and Jadyn.

Jadyn was talking a lot before our trip to Thailand, but it seems her vocabulary exploded with all the new things we were seeing and doing. It was so much fun to witness! Now her favorite thing to do is sit at the computer and point at all our Thailand pictures saying, "shark", "turtle", "lion", "fish", "boat", "elephant", "airplane", etc.