Bangkok

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We arrived at Bangkok (from Hong Kong) around 1:15pm on December 11, 2011. After checking in at the hotel and quickly freshening up, we headed out to JJ weekend market. It was like an open flea market where you could find practically everything. With more than 5,000 vendors and visitors amounting to over 200,000 per day, it is considered as one of the biggest in Bangkok. We tried squids with eggs and ice cap and shopped for few accessories. After the market, we went for a nice dinner at Cabbage and Condoms. The restaurant is run by PDA - a not for profit organization educating people of Thailand to practice safe sex. We had stir fry chicken with basil, stir fried sea food and fried rice. The food was delicious and super spicy. We went for a stroll around the night market to help digest the dinner we just had. And then we went for a great Thai massage at Lavana spa for an hour to relax our tired muscles and help in falling asleep. The next day we rented a cab to tour around the floating market which was an hour away from Bangkok. They take you on a canal boat ride and you can shop for various things from the vendors with their stalls located on either side of the canal. There were local vendors selling handicrafts, food, clothes, purses, accessories and souvenirs. The ride lasted for about 1.5 hours and then we headed out to see the crocodile show. It was amazing to see how the performers took their hands and face and put inside the crocodiles mouth. They would take it out just in time before crocodile would close its mouth. Pretty nerve wrecking show it was. After that we headed out to Breeze restaurant. It's located on 64th floor of the state tower. The view was spectacular and the bar/restaurant was on the terrace itself. The air was crisp and perfect. We were neither cold nor feeling hot. Just perfect. I had hangovertini - which was served to hangover 2 cast and crew and it was pretty good. After enjoying our drinks and soaking in the view, we looked for a nice restaurant. We ended our day by having dinner at Thanying restaurant. Pad Thai and green curry chicken was our order. And after having the first bite, I was in heaven. It was the best Thai food I've had and was great ending to our day. Our last day in Bangkok was very adventurous. We started off our day by visiting Wat Arun through a ferry ride as its located on the west side of the river. It's also known as the Temple of Dawn and is one of the important landmarks in Bangkok. We had to take the stairs to get to the top of the temple. The stairs were extremely narrow, high and difficult to climb up and even worse when you come back. Once at the top, we could see the view of the river and the city. After that we went to see Wat Pho - aka the Temple of reclining Buddha. The Buddha statue was 50 feet hight and 143 feet wide in reclining position. Behind the statue there were copper pots where people were putting coins for good luck and donation for the monks. This place is also the oldest educational institution that teaches the traditional Thai massage. Our last stop was The Grand Palace, where king used to reside in the past. Within the palace there were number of buildings including the temple of Emerald Buddha. The king changes the robes of Buddha every season. The cost of these robes is over $120million usd. Some of the buildings were inspired by French, Indian or British architecture and had Thai touch to them. We were hungry and tired after the tour and decided to check out couple of malls and have some American junk food. So we reached Siam Paragon. The food court was huge and had most of the American franchises. We settled with burger king and walked around the mall. We ended the day with enjoying an hour massage and dinner at the Indian host. The food was ok. We've had much better food in Toronto. After a nice stroll we were ready to hit the bed as we had our flight next day for Phuket.

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