Day 10 in Thailand - Can't Get Enough of Jatujak

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Day 2 in Bangkok

< I must have woke up on the wrong side of the bed today. I took too long to dress up and got ticked off by Vivi again. >

Feeling that we have not seen enough of Jatujak (okay, okay, we haven't shopped enough), we went to the sweltering weekend market once more. Halfway browsing through some stuff, I lost sight of Vivi (*Sob, sob 😞 ). There was no way I could find her in this crowd, so I went ahead and shopped on my own.
I overdid my shopping and ran out of Thai Baht midway through. I tried to find a currency exchange agency to no avail, so I popped into the tourist police office to ask for directions. Unfortunately, the tourist police doesn't understand any English and I had some trouble explaining to him about what I want. Thank God he understood the word "money", took out a map and showed me where to go.

< I didn't see any currency exchange agency, but there were banks instead and I'm glad they opened on Sundays! >

< It is quite common that foreigners come to Thailand to look for wholesalers for all kinds of local produce. A lady at the market shoved me her business card in case I'm interested. >

Securing my bagful of goodies, I decided to get back to West Bang Lamphu by myself, after failing to see Vivi at the designated place which we were supposed to meet in case we got separated. Stopped at the pancake vendor in Bang Lamphu and spotted Vivi walking towards me. What a coincidence!

*Now, the pancake vendor is a must-try if you have a sweet tooth. It is more a 'prata' than a pancake though. Well, if you insist, it's an Indian pancake then. I loved the banana pancake with lots of chocolate sauce. Yummy!
*Oooh! And I adored the mobile bars here. Sitting on or near the streets, enjoying your drinks or cocktails. Utterly quirky!

Moseying about Bang Lamphu, we ran into the Finnish backpacker, Yamick(?) (at least that's how I thought it is spelled) from yesterday (the group of travellers we sat down with). We invited him for some drinks later and got back to our guesthouse first to freshen up. Met up with him at Pits Bull Blues Bar and spent some time there lounging around.

*Pits Bull Blues Bar - a little place somewhere at the alley of the back of Merry V guesthouse. It's a small cosy place where you can just hang out, play some pool (one pool table actually) and listen to Gabriel - the solo singer/guitarist there (a very chatty Californian).

After there, we moved off to the Shamrock - an Irish pub and restaurant along Khao San Road. Yamick is great guy to talk to. He is spending some time travelling at the moment and has plans to work in Koh Phi Phi later. Like most good backpackers will do, he loves taking photographs and showed us some of his takes. He told us he makes it a point to visit the local zoo of any places/countries he travels to. And about the stories of his travels and things back home in Finland - funny stories about how most Finnish people are always getting drunk and how it's never safe to cross the roads at night with all the drunk drivers around.

< It's easy to feel that other people have lives that are always much more interesting than mine. I sounded like a complete bore compared to all these adventurous youngsters (yes, they do make me feel old in comparison). >

Feeling hungry, we got some food and sat down at the side of the streets, meeting up with the other backpackers from yesterday. We had drinks, exchanged stories and had fun chatting till about 5 in the morning. We bid farewell to Yamick, who was heading to Ayuthaya and Chiang Mai later in the day. Had a blast talking to everybody.

< You know, I never thought I would be able to do this. Sitting on the damp, dirty pavement without a care in the world. Talking to a bunch of strangers, enjoying their company and having fun! Wow.... >

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