Time for a new country, a new language, and a new set of challenges. Thailand offered it all. After breezing through immigration we made her way to the nearest cash machine. I'm not sure whether I (Claire) entered the wrong pin number or what but it immediately proceeded to swallow my card. Doh!! Fortunately there was an associated counter beside the machine where we could "talk" to people and managed to get the card back relatively quickly (20mins). An Israeli guy asked if we would like to share a taxi to the Banglamphu district and we did and very soon we were whizzing our way through the bright lights of chaotic & exotic Bangkok by night. It is always nice when a cabbie drops you right at the door of your accommodation and they actually have a record of your booking. So far so good.
After the cold of Melbourne Bangkok felt hot and sticky and that's because it was. We were staying very close to Khao San Road so we decided to go check it out. It was now 11pm and the road was hopping. I was reminded of that early scene (maybe it was the opening scene) from "The Beach" where Leonardo Di Caprio is walking along Khao San and it's just crazy with people and madness. That's how it feels. Lots of bright lights, ladies touting massages, others holding placards stating that they sell cheap drinks and "we don't check id cards". There was no shortage of gringo's either...eh sorry, over here they are called farangs. It didn't feel unsafe, it felt more like a crazy theme park for adults. Knowing that I'd have to bare my legs the following day I decided to have a leg wax, that's where the fun began. The tiny Thai lady led me to a a private room at the back of the busy salon and proceeded to de fuzz the legs, all was well until she asked me to remove my knickers. I refused & informed her I didn't mind if she got wax on them but she was having none of it. Whilst wrestling me to remove my knickers she told me not to fear because she sees "it" every day! She may have been tiny but she was a strong and feisty lady. Jeepers, I was exhausted by the end of the struggle never mind the incident involving the hot wax on regions that, let's just say, had never seen hot wax before. Aghh.
The next day was a write-off as the heat, the jet lag, and the travel caught up with us. After some early reconnaissance we slept for the remainder of the day (it helped that our room was really nice). Having bought a Lonely Planet from a street vendor "a funny thing happened" on our way to the tourist information office. A local spotted us looking at our map and to cut a long story short before we knew it we were in a tuk tuk (motorbike with carriage for 2 people in the back) en route to what we thought was a government TAT office (Tourist Authority of Thailand). No sooner had we entered the office but they managed to swipe our credit card for what would be considered a small fortune in this kingdom, they were clearly professionals! We don't know how this happened, maybe we somehow lost our traveller savvy travelling through NZ and Oz after we left South America?!
Next we went back on the tuk-tuk to some of the local sites. We visited the huge standing Buddha, then the Lucky Buddha, then probably for commission reasons the driver took us to a fine-suit tailor. We played along looking at their brochures and asking about prices. He would make a fully fitted suit in top quality cashmere for 17,500 baht (355 euro). Dave was almost tempted before he thought about how little he would actually use a suit. Before we left he was almost on his knees saying that he could do one up for 2000 baht (40 euro). That's more like it but what part of "I don't need a suit do you not understand?". The tuk-tuk driver finally dropped us off at a water ferry pier where we took a ferry to downtown Bangkok. The ferry was a speedy, low-to-the-water, longboat fitting about 5 people per bench (all facing forward). The canal on which we travelled was disgusting in the extreme. Raw sewage seemed to pour into it from pipes on either side. You learn quickly when you see locals ensuring that they don't get splashed.
What we hadn't realised is that in Banglamphu no building is allowed to be higher than the Royal Palace. This is clearly not the case in downtown Bangkok. It was modenr, vibrant, and wall to wall with ultra hip shopping complexes. We checked out a few of them and let me tell you, anyone of them would have been considered plush if located in a European capital city.
After the cold of Melbourne Bangkok felt hot and sticky and that's because it was. We were staying very close to Khao San Road so we decided to go check it out. It was now 11pm and the road was hopping. I was reminded of that early scene (maybe it was the opening scene) from "The Beach" where Leonardo Di Caprio is walking along Khao San and it's just crazy with people and madness. That's how it feels. Lots of bright lights, ladies touting massages, others holding placards stating that they sell cheap drinks and "we don't check id cards". There was no shortage of gringo's either...eh sorry, over here they are called farangs. It didn't feel unsafe, it felt more like a crazy theme park for adults. Knowing that I'd have to bare my legs the following day I decided to have a leg wax, that's where the fun began. The tiny Thai lady led me to a a private room at the back of the busy salon and proceeded to de fuzz the legs, all was well until she asked me to remove my knickers. I refused & informed her I didn't mind if she got wax on them but she was having none of it. Whilst wrestling me to remove my knickers she told me not to fear because she sees "it" every day! She may have been tiny but she was a strong and feisty lady. Jeepers, I was exhausted by the end of the struggle never mind the incident involving the hot wax on regions that, let's just say, had never seen hot wax before. Aghh.
The next day was a write-off as the heat, the jet lag, and the travel caught up with us. After some early reconnaissance we slept for the remainder of the day (it helped that our room was really nice). Having bought a Lonely Planet from a street vendor "a funny thing happened" on our way to the tourist information office. A local spotted us looking at our map and to cut a long story short before we knew it we were in a tuk tuk (motorbike with carriage for 2 people in the back) en route to what we thought was a government TAT office (Tourist Authority of Thailand). No sooner had we entered the office but they managed to swipe our credit card for what would be considered a small fortune in this kingdom, they were clearly professionals! We don't know how this happened, maybe we somehow lost our traveller savvy travelling through NZ and Oz after we left South America?!
Next we went back on the tuk-tuk to some of the local sites. We visited the huge standing Buddha, then the Lucky Buddha, then probably for commission reasons the driver took us to a fine-suit tailor. We played along looking at their brochures and asking about prices. He would make a fully fitted suit in top quality cashmere for 17,500 baht (355 euro). Dave was almost tempted before he thought about how little he would actually use a suit. Before we left he was almost on his knees saying that he could do one up for 2000 baht (40 euro). That's more like it but what part of "I don't need a suit do you not understand?". The tuk-tuk driver finally dropped us off at a water ferry pier where we took a ferry to downtown Bangkok. The ferry was a speedy, low-to-the-water, longboat fitting about 5 people per bench (all facing forward). The canal on which we travelled was disgusting in the extreme. Raw sewage seemed to pour into it from pipes on either side. You learn quickly when you see locals ensuring that they don't get splashed.What we hadn't realised is that in Banglamphu no building is allowed to be higher than the Royal Palace. This is clearly not the case in downtown Bangkok. It was modenr, vibrant, and wall to wall with ultra hip shopping complexes. We checked out a few of them and let me tell you, anyone of them would have been considered plush if located in a European capital city.
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Dave's Entry:
No trip to Bangkok would be complete without a trip to the Red Light District...right? There are a few different places where one can see the action but we decided to go to the most touristy spot - Patpong. We were immediately accosted by men trying to lure us into a "ping pong show". Claire, in her innocence thought this would be naked women playing a game of table tennis. Bless. I, because I had seen "Priscilla Queen of the Desert" years earlier knew a little better. We decided not to take in a show but felt we should at least have a drink in one of the many bars. We were first led to a seedy upstairs bar that didn't meet with our high standards before we settled on the safety of a street-side establishment where we could see the outside world at all times. We had a fear of being handed a bill for ten times the price of our drinks while a muscle bound bouncer moved to block our exit. Fortunately that didn't happen. I have to say though that I felt infinitely more uncomfortable in this place than Claire did. There weren't very many people in there and we had this rather unattractive, scantily clad woman wriggling her body at a pole on the stage right on front of us. As if this wasn't bad enough she then came down and sat with us. Aargh!! I just wanted to get out of there, the place was freaking me out. Claire insisted on sticking around long enough to take a photo with the phone (don't get too excited guys - see above). She was about as subtle as a kick to the back of the head. Next thing we knew there was another scantily clad woman (equally unattractive) racing over shouting "no photo, no photo". She then sat down and put her hand on my knee. Double aargh!! "Drink up Claire, we're outta here". Very stressful I gotta tell ya, very stressful.
For our last day in Bangkok we made our way to the Grand Palace and this was closely followed by Wat Pho. A Wat is another name for a temple monastery. Wat Pho is home to the country's largest reclining Buddha. He is huge at 46m long by 15m high. The heat and humidity were intense so we really couldn't bare to be out in it for too long. It was then a quick tuk-tuk ride back to our cool air conditioned room. Ah, that's better. With a television in our room we were able to keep up to date with current affairs. We were shocked by the volcanic eruption in Chaiten in Chile as we had stayed there for a couple of days when we visited Parque Pumilin. Next there was the cyclone that hit Myanmar and how slow the military government were to allow aid workers into the country. It was scandalous to watch the death toll sky rocket while counties fell over themselves to get aid into the affected areas. We had moved on from Bangkok by the time the earthquake hit China and so, as was most often the case, did not know anything about it until a waiter mentioned it some time after the event.
No trip to Bangkok would be complete without a trip to the Red Light District...right? There are a few different places where one can see the action but we decided to go to the most touristy spot - Patpong. We were immediately accosted by men trying to lure us into a "ping pong show". Claire, in her innocence thought this would be naked women playing a game of table tennis. Bless. I, because I had seen "Priscilla Queen of the Desert" years earlier knew a little better. We decided not to take in a show but felt we should at least have a drink in one of the many bars. We were first led to a seedy upstairs bar that didn't meet with our high standards before we settled on the safety of a street-side establishment where we could see the outside world at all times. We had a fear of being handed a bill for ten times the price of our drinks while a muscle bound bouncer moved to block our exit. Fortunately that didn't happen. I have to say though that I felt infinitely more uncomfortable in this place than Claire did. There weren't very many people in there and we had this rather unattractive, scantily clad woman wriggling her body at a pole on the stage right on front of us. As if this wasn't bad enough she then came down and sat with us. Aargh!! I just wanted to get out of there, the place was freaking me out. Claire insisted on sticking around long enough to take a photo with the phone (don't get too excited guys - see above). She was about as subtle as a kick to the back of the head. Next thing we knew there was another scantily clad woman (equally unattractive) racing over shouting "no photo, no photo". She then sat down and put her hand on my knee. Double aargh!! "Drink up Claire, we're outta here". Very stressful I gotta tell ya, very stressful.
For our last day in Bangkok we made our way to the Grand Palace and this was closely followed by Wat Pho. A Wat is another name for a temple monastery. Wat Pho is home to the country's largest reclining Buddha. He is huge at 46m long by 15m high. The heat and humidity were intense so we really couldn't bare to be out in it for too long. It was then a quick tuk-tuk ride back to our cool air conditioned room. Ah, that's better. With a television in our room we were able to keep up to date with current affairs. We were shocked by the volcanic eruption in Chaiten in Chile as we had stayed there for a couple of days when we visited Parque Pumilin. Next there was the cyclone that hit Myanmar and how slow the military government were to allow aid workers into the country. It was scandalous to watch the death toll sky rocket while counties fell over themselves to get aid into the affected areas. We had moved on from Bangkok by the time the earthquake hit China and so, as was most often the case, did not know anything about it until a waiter mentioned it some time after the event.
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