River Boats and Ladyboys

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Geo: 13.7308, 100.521

Bangkok has so much stigma attached to it... the pressure to experience it truly and sincerely is overwhelming. From 'The Beach' to 'Hangover part II' to 'Bridget Jones' and every backpacker that has ever been this way in all history has a story to tell and an image to lodge in your head.The border crossing was an interesting yet very sweaty affair. The coach on the Cambodia side did not cross the border with us. So everything was carried across the border. The queue to leave was filled with backpackers with their huge sacks on and locals wanting to pedal their wears in Thailand. This was all in a space no larger than a covent garden lift! No mans land was covered with casinos, making the walk to the Thai archway even longer. It was then queue time as we awaited our stamp from Mr grump... minibus time! Fml. We were piled onto minibus/mob's for the remaining 4 hrs to the nations capital. Not much fun with long legs and big bags.<br style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; line-height: normal; ">On arrival in Bangkok, we found we were only 2 seconds away from Khaosan road, the most traveller famous rd in the city, lined with hostels, bars, restaurants, internet cafes and market stalls selling t-shirts, dresses, Jewellery and horrendous foods including deep fried insect.Joe's seemed like a typical hostel type Guesthouse ... not alot of love and attention to the prison block rooms, more of a what can we get away with feel. My mattress was like sleeping on bare springs if I am honest... but after unpacking all of my kit, I really couldn't be bothered with the hassle iPod swapping!Our first venture out into the chaos was to try and get some money changed as you are charged £5 this end if you use an ATM. Once 12 of us had managed that one, it was dinner time. And as Dan had found somewhere he wanted to eat, we all went there. I wanted to eat Thai on my first night in Thailand ... so decided to try something different to the usual colour coded curry and padthai... so I went for Raad da??? A thick noodle soup. It is what I would call flavorsome but not distinctive. It was just Asian tasting... with soy, fish sauce and stock of some description in it. I ate it all so couldn't have been all that bad!The following morning, we were off to the floating market about a 2 hr drive from central city. Again a famous site among photographers, which used to sell fruit, veg and flowers but has now become a tourism gimmick really. All the stalls selling the same stuff at extortionate prices. I did not have the want to buy anything... what the hell is wrong with me! once off the water, we had an he to wander the remaining ' same same' stalls and eat some grub. I went for beef in red soup! Didn't want to ask what made it red but it was tasty! Esp for the 80p it cost me! Nothing else was purchased apart from some weird looking fruit, but I guess it was more the experience I was after rather than shopping!After a snooze and some food.... sundried fried beef.. good day for the weird and wonderful! ... we prepared for our night down ##$%@#$#@ Rd.... not sure what you would class it as, but numerous ping pong shows, gay bars and drag acts.... ladyboy street?? We all wanted to go to a classic drag show, however, on arrival at 7.30 we had 4 hrs to kill until one started! The girls had done some research through friends and found the names of a few places, of which 'telephone' was one. The stunning bar staff persuaded us to stay and do karaoke for a few hrs, which we didn't mind as it wasted some time and it meant we could admire the clearly gay, but beautiful barmen a little longer! Once we had sang all we wanted to, we still had some time to kill and many of the boys were intrigued as to what a 'ping pong' show was, and so bartering a grp discount we all went. we only stayed about 45mins, but that was 40mins to much! It was gross to say the least, pulling anything and everything out of their hoo haas including fairy lights and a string of razor blades (apparently where periods come from!) and then firing ping pong balls at men with bats ready to hit the balls back again! Lovely! I was so happy when it was time to leave and go to the drag show. It only lasted 30mins, with 3 dif acts singing, dressed in sparkles with incredible makeup! At the end, they dragged unexpected audience members up, basically to make a spectical of them. Unfortunately for dan, he had just had a shave, so looked a little baby faced and was spotted a mile of. Up he went, got asked if he was gay and then a ladyboy.... they didn;t 'believe' him and so dragged him up on stage, undid his trousers and then with dan helpless with his arms in the air proceeded to put their hands down his boxers! Poor boy, but excellent sport!!!

The following day was walking tour day, we started out with 10 people, but by the end of the 6hrs we were down to 3! We saw a variety of things including the royal palace and Wat (from the outside, as covering legs and arms, wearing non open toed shoes and paying £14 for the privilege seemed a little extreme!) the memorial bridge, fruit and flower markets, china town, the riverside mall and the sky tower (where hangover 2 was filmed!) it was a great day, esp ended by a river taxi back up the water to our area for less than 20p - well would have been 20p if we had gotten off at the right stop... so 40p as we had to jump back on again! ooooops!

A thai green curry finished off the few days in the capital... a little too hot for me, but still managed to eat it with the help of a sprite and coconut milkshake! I will def be back to Bangkok, but maybe not for a long time. Considering it was an Asian city though, it wasnt all that bad 😊

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