From The Snow To The Eastern Sun

^{A Mural Artwork from a cafe in Bangkok}

We made it.

The Astralpirates have been sailing hard, working all straight through February to finally make it here. Bangkok.

We arrived last night, it was about 9pm local time when we made it to our hostel The Bamboo Guest House. It is a nice quiet little space, reasonaby priced and clean. The patio area is presenting a nice vibe where you can chill, relax or work, enjoy a drink in the shade on the side of a nice green house full of plants and fowers of all kinds.

^{Liam, barefoot, in the patio}

My first impression of Bangkok is a bit sweet and sour.
Sweet as it is amazing to finally be in this part of the world. I never took a plane East before. I have been over the Athlantic to Central America or to the Carribeans, and down to the North of Africa. But the Most East I had ever been before from my home base was Romania.

So everything here for me is discovery: the food, the people, the smells, the colours, the fashions. I was charmed to find a lot of places with trees and plants all around, and to be able to take a boat down to the city center today to find a co-working space where we could work on our Mabon VR project* and upload the first footage and sounds we have been recording for our vlog and documentary. I was so fulfilled and greatfull for the fish noodle soup we had on the outside table of a little empty shop on arrival, hand-made on the spot by a very welcoming lady who explained to us that she used to be a lecturer in university teaching neuro-medical science before they opened a modest food and drink place with her husband, to help out on their retirement. I was amazed with the price of everything. Maths is not a natural skill to me, and it always takes me a little longer than Liam to convert my GBPs into Thai BAHTs, so I rarely even bother, but when I do -I always have a huge smile after acknoledging the cheapness of it.

^{The Green House of our hostel}

However I am not much of a city person and while I enjoy visiting them and getting a cultural boost for a few days, I can hardly imagine myself living in one long term (never managed it for more than a year) and I always am a bit overwhelmed by the speed and the noises around me when I arrive in one. Finding my way around, not walking into people, being surrounded by traffic and having to take the underground: all experiences that I endure rather than enjoy, even though I know it is often well rewarded when you have reached destination and been able to explore some hidden streets, appreciate nice art or accidently witness some live events that you would be missing out on in the countryside. It is still a lifestyle that I struggle to embrace though. What struck me the most around here was the super high and modern architecture, with these sophisticated buildings that somehow I find a pinch threatening when I am in the middle of them. I always am unsure where to find the beauty in them, and I am intrigued by the global look given to our cities now a day. I am sure there is some sort of aesthetics appreciation to be found in these towers, and some can enjoy their shapes and design. Not me. They have always left me unsensible, and I often feel like an intruder when I am wandering amongst them.

^{High and Modern}

All in all, I am very please to be here. Liam and I have been working very hard to make this Astralpirates adventure go forwards.

Going everywhere with our camera to capture everything is good exercise. We hope to be able to create a good quality documentary, going around to other people's sustainable projects and meeting people who would be interested in working with us on the Astralship. We believe that our project is not the only one going at the moment and we would like to witness and record how other people work towards a more sustainable future.

We are working through to make this documentary and make new connections on little budget, and even though we don't have the certainty of success and have the pressure of making it happen on low resources, it seems to me that this is the next natural step on our @astralship project. We have already been supported by a lot of people (a special thanks to @elohprojects for donating a camera) and we know that no matter what, we are able to make it happen. I promise you that we will work our hardest to deliver the best content we can. Us, astralpirates, do not want to f*ck this one up.

With a lot of Thai Pirate Love,

Sail on.

• Mentioning our Mabon VR project. It is a Virtual Reality platform we are building at the moment to teach the Welsh language. If you want to know more about it, feel free to read this article from @astralship: https://steemit.com/vr/@astralship/is-language-learning-a-killer-app-for-vr