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Published: June 27th 2014
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DAY 2:
Still very bothered by the fact that we were elaborately scammed on day 1, we decided to take the hotel's free tuk tuk to the Grand Palace.
We relived Day 1's scam over and over and still cannot come up with a solid explanation. How were ALL of the people we spoke to in on the same scam!? They were all in different locations, but all saying the exact same thing! Our most recent theory is that it's like a drug smuggling ring and some how they coordinate it just perfectly. The funny part is we were aware of tuk tuk scams! There were even posters in our hotel warning us of these scams. The problem was, it didn't appear to be a scam until about half way through when Noi began begging us to stop at these places for him to get free gas and food.
I guess we will never know...
We arrived at the Grand palace and realized THIS is where all the tourists are. Yesterday we were at some off beat temples (some that existed and others that didn't *cough* Lucky Buddh *cough*). There were
SO many people at the Grand Palace, and boy was it grand! It's a huge complex, and the king currently lives in part of the complex.
As soon as we got inside we were wandering around and this Chinese woman was motioning to us with her camera. She didn't speak any English but handed her camera to her friend and was waving her hands by her sides as if she wanted us to stand next to her. I've heard about this ! Some people from small towns in Asia have never seen blonde people before and this woman wanted to take a photo WITH US !!! Lauren and I stood on either side of her as her friend took a photo of the three of us. I just wonder what she's going to tell her friends..."Look, I saw blonde people!!!! and I even got a PHOTO with them!"
It was a very funny start to the day.
We took a free English speaking tour with an adorable guide who had a very heavy Thai accent. We learned that the entire Grand Palace was built in only 3 years !
He
told us stories about the Thai culture and history, and explained to us many of the statues and their meanings.
After the Grand Palace we headed down the street to Wat Po or "Reclining Buddha". This is a HUGE golden Buddha in a reclining position. The 2nd largest reclining Buddha in Thailand. This is a nother huge temple complex. Each building so ornate, covered in colorful tiles, gold leif and gems.
Here at Wat Po there is a Thai Massage school, and this is where we experienced our first Thai Massage -- for about $5 ! It was a little different than your average American massage. They use many more pressure points, and crack your back and your knuckles to loosen you up !
The massage put us in a daze, and we headed towards the river for a nice lunch. We had a beautiful view of Wat Arun and watched as all the boats buzzed by.
We decided to take the ferry back up to our hotel. After paying 3 cents to the ticket lady, we accidently got on the wrong ferry. We scurried off and waited
for the correct one.
When it arrived we hopped on board and waited for pier 14 -- our stop. Unsure on the whole paying situation (no one gave us a ticket or asked us to pay after we paid for the wrong boat), we saw a woman walking around with a bag of coins, collecting the fare for the ferry. She clearly knew we were tourists and probably didn't want to deal with trying to communicate with us, so she just walked right by. Free fare !
We watched the ferry stop at pier 11...12...13...but uhoh, it seemed to have skipped 14 ! Of course, just our luck.
We got off at pier 15 and decided to walk. We checked our map and were definitely in the neighborhood of our hotel, so took a nice stroll past another flower market.
Still perhaps a bit jet lagged, we lounged at the hotel then headed for some shopping at Kho San Road. We've been harnessing our bartering skills with the tuk tuk drivers, and I've found myself getting really into it. If I say 20 Baht and they
saw no lower than 40, we just walk away ! It's funny how you get into character becuase looking back, I realized that we were arguing over about 50 cents...
We returned to our hotel, feeling sticky and hot, anticipating the overnight train to Chaing Mai. All the workers at the hotel sent us off with some snacks and a very cheerful good-bye. They called us a cab and off we went to the train station.
It started POURING rain 5 minutes after we arrived, so thankfully we got there when we did !
We have heard that the overnight trains are relatively nice and you either get 2nd class or 1st for an air conditioned room with a bed. We found a seemingly kind woman who seemed to know what was up, and she clarified that in 2nd class there are 4 beds, and in 1st class there are only 2...We decided to meet some new people and go with 2nd class, sharing a room with only 2 other people besides ourselves is not that bad !
While we waited for the train, we met a (part-time)
baggage carrier who worked for Delta and flew all the time for free. She only worked for Delta for the flying perks!
When the train finally arrived, we boarded 30 mins early just so we could get ourselves settled. The train folk kept telling us to go further and further to the front of the train -- I assumed this could only mean we were closer to first class. WRONG. We passed the 1st class cars which looked very luxurious. Then we started passing all the 2nd class cars that had 4 beds (and a door that closed to give you privacy). We finally reached car #2 and we were NOT pleasantly surprised to see a dorm-like train car. There were 25+ people in one car. There were NO beds set up.
Expecting a private 4 bedroom car, I started to have a semi-meltdown. The train was leaving in 10 minutes and none of the workers around us seemed to speak enough English so we took a quick sprint back to the ticket booth. I tried to explain to the guard what was going on but he had no idea what I was saying
but helped me push to the front of the line. The poor woman behind the ticket booth did not understand what we were trying to change -- We wanted a different train car, but it was not clear to her. At this point the train was leaving in 5 minutes and she basically told us that all the cars were the same (NOT TRUE). We headed back to the dorm car.
Surrounded by some cold Europeans and a rather pretentious San Francisco Local, Lauren and I decided to order a beer from the friendly beer-lady. We ordered 2, but she decided to bring us an entire bucket of beers (I think she could tell we were unhappy?).
Around 10pm some men came around and turned our seats into beds. I will admit the train was not as bad as I expected, though it was a very, very slow and rough ride. The train was extremely creaky and a few times it felt as if we were going to derail -- Lauren told me after the fact that she's read a few blogs in which the train did derail. Glad she told me this after
the fact.
We "slept", I woke up at least once an hour to the train feeling like it would tip over.
In the morning we checked out the dining car which was open air and full of the local workers.
We enjoyed the BEAUTIFUL Thai country side -- Bamboo forests and water lily gardens. We only were awake for a few hours before we reached Chiang Mai !
Pulling up to the station we knew we were no longer in Bangkok -- Thank goodness !!!
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