I feel like I finally settled in this week. No more running around on tours or attending Meetups. I did some urban exploring on my own, met up with the brother of a friend, and worked on some winter projects.

The nice thing about staying in the less touristy part of Bangkok is that I get to see local life. My walks through the streets and alleys around my place are not necessarily picturesque, but they are interesting. One street I walked along was absolutely unimpressive except for this ultra modern coffee shop in the middle of the block.

As I was returning home from that street, I came across a pack of wild dogs. They sensed me as a stranger and immediately began barking. Fortunately, they were on the other side of a canal from me.

As I was observing them, a girl pulled up on a scooter and told me she feeds them every afternoon in between her two jobs. I was blown away by her generosity given the number of dogs she fed with the two bulging bags of meat she had hanging from the handlebars of her scooter.

She told me there were about 60 dogs in 12 different packs. She let me cross the bridge to watch her first hand as she fed them. Just in case, however, an old man on the other side of the canal came out with a slingshot should the dogs turn on me. Anyone who knows my experience with dogs, however, knows I can handle myself.

The woman motioned me to stay where I was while she walked deeper into the trees to feed the different packs. While they initially barked at me, they happily trotted along after her with her bag of meat as if she were the pied piper. We returned across the bridge without incident, and I gave her some money towards feeding the dogs. I worried that it was but a small fraction of what she actually spends.

Later in the week, I got a text from a friend’s brother. I had met his sister, Michele, outside a coffee shop in Guanajuato. It was a quick casual conversation as I waited for Joan to get an iced tea, but it resulted in our gathering together with her and a couple other single female travelers at a rooftop bar in Mexico.

A few months later Michele texted me that her brother was going to Bangkok and wanted some suggestions on what to do. As luck would have it, I happened to be here when they arrived so we got together at Palate Bangkok, a rooftop restaurant, on the other side of the world, and enjoyed a huge meal while we talked about the different styles of travel.

Towards the end of the week, I got busy on a project that I’ve been ambiguous about: video blogging. It seems like more people are turning to videos today for information, so it’s something I’ve considered investing more time in. The problem is just that, it’s a large investment in time, and that is often time that I’d rather spend just enjoying the thing that I’m trying to make a video of.

I think the key is to try not to combine work and pleasure. I need to go and enjoy something first, and then I can make a video about it later when I know it well. I do have a YouTube channel with years of footage, but I’m only now beginning to create videos with purpose.

I put together a couple videos this week: one on How much it costs to stay in Bangkok and one where I have breakfast at a place called Crackhouse. I definitely don’t enjoy the experience as much as writing, but I’ll continue to give it a try until I just don’t care. At least I’ve begun to diversify how I spend my time here, and it’s nice to feel more like a resident than a tourist.