THANYABURI

I live in the province of Pathum Thani, just north of Bangkok, in a district called Thanyaburi. Type it in on Google image search... actually don't, nothing interesting comes up. But I like it. I like my new neighborhood, and I'm definitely warming up to it. I'm not really sure if there's a central part of Thanyaburi, but from what I've observed it's just kind of this busy stretch of road. There doesn't seem to be much else, the streets that branch off the main road seem to just trickle out into quiet residential areas.

My building is a couple hundred yards off the main road. I live in a very simple and basic, third floor apartment. It's one room, a bed, a desk, and a dresser. I also have a little fridge and a fan. There are some windows that face north, directly into the building next to me, and a sliding glass door that faces west, opens up to my balcony, and lets in wonderful evening sunlight. I access my bathroom from my balcony, it's kind of weird, I have to be careful not to flash anyone when I get out of the shower. I don't have any hot water, but so far I have had no desire to use any. It wasn't the cleanest place when I first moved in, but I spent a good day or two scrubbing it down, now it feels like my own.

On the corner there is a 7 Eleven and TESCO Lotus Express, very convenient. There are also dozens of little food carts and an amazing night market just across the street, but I'll talk more about that later. A lazy, slow moving river parallels the busy main road, and on the far side of the river are a bunch of little shacks. It's an interesting juxtaposition, a bustling road lined on one side by big businesses and loud billboards, and a stones throw away are a bunch of rickety, primative shacks along the river. The top half of the picture is one side of the road and the bottom half is the other. You can literally turn your head from side to side and see these two different worlds. The top right picture is what I see when I look from my balcony down towards the main road, you can kind of see the little river shacks past the traffic.

The best part about my living situation is my commute. I can see my school from my balcony and I can walk there in about five minutes. How convenient.