Mo Chit in Bangkok!

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Well we are both feeling much better since our last blog, although still kicking the last of whatever bug got us. We've spent the past few days touring/shopping our way around Bangkok, although mainly shopping and just walking around. It took a couple days of searching but I found someone to make my wedding dress (Yay!) and Trevor and I both are having suits made (work type suits). Talking to tailors is pretty exhausting...trying to figure out when they are bullshitting you and when they are giving you a good deal. Trevor is a great negotiator though so we've been able to get fair prices. It's funny though when we initially started shopping around we didn't know much about the different fabrics and asked similar questions to each of the tailors and got totally different answers each time...then we did our research and could see who was being honest and who was just feeding us you know what.

The other thing we have learned a lot about is the various forms of transportation in the city. Of course everywhere you turn there are Tuk-Tuks, little open-air three wheeled vehicles that make a loud "tuk-tuk-tuk" sound when they go - the trick with these is that you have to negotiate your fare first and being a "farang" (foreigner) the price is jacked way up to start so you have to be really persistent and willing to walk away. The other trick with the tuk-tuks is just to close your eyes and hang on tight because the drivers zip in and out of traffic in their own invisible lanes (between the other lanes) and go super fast. Then there's the bus system, which requires a lot of patience waiting for the buses, but has a cheap fixed fare so it's a decent way to get around. The down side is that the free bus map is a bit hard to follow, not fully up to date, and I think all the drivers used to be Tuk-tuk drivers, or at least drive like they are in tuk-tuks (fast and crazy). Getting on the bus the other day, I got wacked in the face by some lady's bag as the bus jerked forward and she (and the bag) flew. A very nice transport option is the skytrain, with air conditioning, high frequency, fixed rates, and very clean (also very new)...the only downside is relatively high fares for a short distance, and it only covers the east side of town. We've also tried the express river boats which are actually quite nice, relatively cheap and easy, but only gets you to points along the river (which really does cover a lot). Last but certainly not least are the taxis. They actually have meters, will use them if you ask, are comfortable, not so crazy, and pretty inexpensive compared to tuk-tuks and the sky train. Oh, and the taxis are EVERYWHERE so there is always one nearby whether you need it or not!

Now to explain our blog title. As we mentioned, we've used the Sky train to get around a bit...we noticed that one of the stops (where we had to go for the market we're about to talk about) the station name is "Mo Chit". This was even funnier when we saw that a station on the way was called "Phloen Chit"...among many other names that if read with our pronounciation turn out really funny. Some of the spellings of translated words is pretty funny too, even on T-shirts and official things (like menus, instructions, etc). Yesterday we braved the Chatchukat (sp?) market which is an insane weekend market where there are literally thousands of vendors and they even give you a map to help navigate (although it's wasn't that much help). We spent most of the day there, bargained with ruthess vendors, and got some nice souvenirs and good deals. Very exhausting though!

Our other favorite hangout is the Siam Discovery Center, a huge upscale super-mall with neon bowling, theatre, I-max, a zillian stores, a floor dedicated to food that has any kind of food you can imagine, FREE bathrooms with TP and papertowels, and a free bag check to drop your junk while you walk around. It's by far the fanciest mall and theater either of us has ever been to...they have security guards at the doors, 3-D Plasma and LCD screens (for ads) everywhere even in the supermarket aisles...it's on the same scale as some of vegas' restaurants and boutiques but all under one roof. Yes, the A/C is nice too. We're not normally mall goers so those of you who know us well are probably very confused, but it's such a stark contrast to the rest of the city and maybe it makes us feel closer to home, although we have nothing like this in Alaska. We watched two movies in the I-max theater, Jumpers and Beowolf (the latter in 3-D). The theater is no regular theater....they have the Nokia UltraScreen where you pay $20 per person and get a private booth with two recliners and a table between, pretty plush but a little bit much for us so we went for the cheaper option ($16 for two) which was still way nicer than the theater at home. The waiting lobby in the theater was full of couches and comfy places to sit and hang out.

We will actually be doing some more touristy sightseeing in the next couple of days but we had some time to kill as we have fittings (for our suits and my dress) on Wednesday and then again on Friday. Then we'll leave for a bit, probably to tour around Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos for a few weeks, and come back to pick everything up.

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