alyssum

1) Indian babies in particular seem to use shrieks and cries to express every possible emotion. "Oh, that was a happy shriek. And a concerned cry... and a conversational shriek, and then a cry... and now he's just really pissed off."
2) The ocean has things living in it, and it moves. Which creeped my shit out for about the first hour or so.
3) Swimming baby elephants are perhaps the most adorable things on the face of the planet. And their hair feels like wire.
4) Actual Thai food does not in fact taste anything like Thai food here, it tastes largely bland and horrible, and I found only one place that offered peanut sauce, which was... yes, bland and horrible. The Pad Thai was pretty awesome though. Oh, and the teriyaki pork/chicken burgers on a sticky-rice bun that McDonald's serves kick ass. Even the fried-pie thing filled with creamed corn was fairly delicious. I didn't have the inclination to try the taro-flavored version.
5) Frosted taro-chips, freeze-dried pineapples, rambutan, those funny-looking purple things, and mangosteen kick ass. Again, I think I managed to eat my weight in fruit.
6) Un-airconditioned 747s suck so bad as to be unbelievable. And avoid ~Row 55 on SQ flights, because that's the row behind where they put all the babies. Yes, this is official policy.
7) Hot towels on one's face in such a situation do not help. At all.
8) Side to side turbulence freaks me out much less than up and down turbulence.
9) Walking constantly for 8 days + sitting on a plane for the better part of 24 hours = grotesquely swollen legs.
10) Sooo very glad to be home and not sweaty.