Kanchanaburi (Bridge over the River Kwai)

is a pretty cool place.

There's a few museums about the death railway (during WWII the Japanese used Allied Forces POWs and Asian slave laborers to build a railway connecting Thailand and Burma, in appalling conditions (disease, torture, starvation, no medicines etc.) The exhibits were quite moving: there were excerpts of diaries, drawings and painting sdone by former POWs and photos. These men were all literally skin and bones and being forced to work 12-14 hour days in the tropical heat. Cholera and dysentary were common.

We went to Hellfire Pass (a particularly horrible part of the railway) and walked through parts of it. Before you go out, they tell you to make sure you are wearing comfortable shoes and have plenty of water for the 40 minute walk. Meanwhile, the POWs generally didn't have water or shoes for that matter.

Before Hellfire Pass we had gone to Erawan Falls which is a 7 tiered waterfall that has pools for swimming. We only made it up to tier 4, which had huge rocks you could slide into the water from. All over the park there are signs telling you to "be silent". Which is very difficult when you're in the water and there are these huge fish nibbling at you! It was pretty icky. Eventually, I gave up on the water and went exploring.

I came upon this family of monkeys playing in the water so I sat and watched them for a while. They were so cute: jumping off trees and rocks into the water, wrestling, swinging from branches and general monkey business. Then 2 monkeys had a go at it on top of a huge rock. I believe this particular monkey suffered from premature ejaculation, as it was over in about 2 seconds (and Intelligent Designers say we're not descended from monkeys ha ha).

Played some Connect 4 last night in a bar. Was mercilessly beaten. But not as bad as at the pool table later. It's hard to play pool here, the tables are 3/4 the size of snooker tables, and they play by English Rules, which I can't remember.

I can't believe I have to go home in less than 2 weeks.