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Published: March 16th 2007
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There were so many highlights. The hotel in Bangkok (the Marriott Resort and Spa) was just fantastic (hey and being upgraded to a Junior Suite sure was nice) and the huge swimming pool was deep, cool and a tropical oasis. The food choices at the hotel were overwhelming especially the breakfasts where the choices ranged from Japanese soup, asian stir-fry, pancakes and scones to massive fruit displays and the good old hearty bacon and eggs. The bed was the most comfortable I've ever slept on, and the freshly picked orchid placed on the pillow each night was a lovely touch. The Marriott is, in itself, worthy of a visit to Bangkok.
Bangkok was like unlike any other city.... it was a mish-mash of different sights and sounds and definately smells. It was humid and dirty with a solid haze of pollution, and it was loud and lary which never stopped. But at the same time there were little pockets of peace and beauty to be found. We became savvy at using Bangkoks new 'sky rail' system which quickly whizzed you high over all the traffic. Gazing down at the hectic street life below, we would sometimes see little shrines to
Buddah, usually wedged between derelict buildings and which provided our widened eyes with some temporary visual relief.
The chasm between rich and poor is huge. We visited shopping malls where only those with real wealth could do more than just window-shop in, and we saw shanty towns under massive overhead freeways where dozens of families would live. Squallor was everywhere as were the large number of stray 'street' dogs who at times, you had to step over whilst they slept on oblivous to all. The traffic chaos simply had to be seen to be believed. Road rules aren't observed for the most part - it's each to their own and it was both strangely amusing to observe and downright scary to have to be a part of.
Another confronting contrast to our safe and ordered way of life, was the apparent disregard to health and safety. Litigation isn't even on the radar over there, so there is no sense of due care and responsibility for others. We would see massive holes in the roads (at times big enough for a car to easily drive into) and not a warning sign in sight. The same for the footpaths, holes
and cracks everywhere. The pavements in the city were always crammed with people passing each other shoulder to shoulder and sharing the same pavements were many hastily set up food stalls.
Again the differences were striking when it came to the food preparation and hygience that we are used too and we were never game to buy any food from these stalls. On one very busy and crowded street corner a vendor had set up her kitchen, complete with portable gas stove on which sat a very large cooking pot which was boiling away. There was no safety barrier of any kind between the people walking past and the boiling pot nor the little lady sitting there stirring away at the pots contents. I just couldn't help but imagine what would happen to her if the pot was nudged by a passerby. This scene was repeated many times and made us vigilant to every step we took and who and what we were passing.
Bangkok is great for shopping. There are malls everywhere as well as street vendors jostling for space on the pavements. The MBK Centre is downmarket and caters more to the tourist wanting to blow
their cash on touristy stuff (lots of fashion and music knock-offs). It was 7 floors with one floor devoted entirely to mobile phones. It was disorientating to navigate around as it was just so big and we certainly earnt our blisters on a number of occassions by visiting there.
Another shopping centre we visited (The Paramount) had newly opened and was very upmarket. Unlike the madly crowded MBK centre, this one was so exclusive there were not many shoppers, so there was lots of space and it was cool, so it was a nice respite for us just to look in the shop windows. There was an Astin Martin on display (apparently this car is something to get excited about?) and Paul certainly approached it like he'd just spied the Holy Grail! Again it was huge and we got hoplessly lost trying to find our way out again (more blisters).
The Thai's love noise and colour, and the louder/brighter the better. We'd walk along the streets and everywhere it would seem there would be ampliphied pop music blaring, sometimes all you could hear (above the traffic) was different radio stations coming from different directions. Even in the more
Bangkok Marriott and Spa Resort
An Ashtray - or a work of art ? open public spaces, there was the uncomfortably loud music coming over the public address system. It was relentless but only added to the flavour of the city.
Apart from exploring the city and walking for miles in some mighty big shopping malls, we thought we also needed to experience some culture so we bought a pass for the river boats and we spent the morning visiting the Grand Palace. It really is grand too with lots of intricate temples adourned with gold. They have the most intricate murals (more gold leaf) depicting timelines of historical events. They were beautiful.
One potentially nasty experience we had was after we'd visited the Grand Palace, we were evicted from a tuk-tuk by it's irate driver when we wouldn't agree for him to divert our trip to visit a 'must see' gem shop (a total scam - there are warnings everywhere about these rip-off places who prey on unwary tourists). I must say I thought it was odd when we left the main road and he proceeded to drive us to the end of a very unsavoury looking dead end laneway at the end of which he switched off the engine and
Marriott Resort and Spa
Bamboo feature in the atrium of our hotel wing. turned to us asking to take us to this 'must see' shop. After a few moments of him trying different methods of persuasion, he gave up on us and ordered us to leave (from memory we were mid stride alighting anyway).
Of course the problem then was that we had absolutely no idea where we were (we knew we were a good few kilometres from where we wanted to be) and also no idea which direction we needed to head it. We weren't too alarmed because Bangkok is full of taxi cars and tuk-tuks and finding another one wasn't going to be a problem. The problem was however getting one who was prepared to drive us into the city (I think there is a congestion tax that they'd be charged for) and in the end we had no choice but to walk.
I think we clocked up about 7 kilometres and as luck would have it - in the right direction (and with comfortable footwear!).
Even more disturbing than not being able to get transport, was being followed by a guy who was talking to our irate driver just after we'd vacated. He tailed us for most
View from our hotel room
Having a river view was not a great selling point. The river odour was rank and very strong. of the way and Paul kept telling me to hold on tight to my shoulder bag (I sure was!). As if being lost, having to watch for our lives crossing busy roads, stepping over mangy dogs (mindful of rabies) and trying to find someone who could understand basic english and give us directions (very hard to find) wasn't bad enough, we were being stalked!
It all ended OK. We got back to where we'd started and made our way back to the serenity of our beautiful hotel and of course the soothing pool.
After 5 days experiencing the many sights and sounds of Bangkok, and with our senses feeling somewhat overloaded, we returned to the brand new Bangkok airport and commenced our short flight to Krabi in Southern Thailand.
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