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Published: November 11th 2009
Never having been to Thailand before Iv only ever had a perception of what its like. Based on what i had read and what people had told me, before i landded in Bangkok the image im my head was that it was a very muggy, hot, stinking, dirty city with everyone after your cash so i wasnt surprised when a young lady in an orange jacket offered us a taxi before wed even made it through airport customs. We gave in and followed her to the paying desk. I dished up my fair share of the money and handed it to her. "What is this?" she asked. "Thai baht?" i offered. "This isnt thai baht." she replied. She played ignorant for a minute and said "This is a souveneir for me?" then folded it up and went to put it in her pocket. "No, no, no" i calmly said and took it back off her. Only then did she admit that she knew it was Taiwanese cash. (The man at the hostel in Hong Kong had either misheard me or had scammed me out of a few quid...im pretty sure it was the latter). Anyway, she offered to exchange what i
had into baht, the rate wasnt the best but i needed the cash, so i did. So with some real money in my wallet we got our lift to the hotel. After staying in that cheap and nasty sardine tin in Hong Kong we thought wed treat ourselves to 4 nights in a hotel with inclusive breakfast (which we made the absolute most of. Cereal, fruit, toast all the cooked stuff and a banana for the road). The rooms were big and cool and somebody opens the front door every time you go to pass through it. This was more like it!
We dropped our bags off and headed for the main tourist area of Kohsan Road for a wander and some food. To get there all 5 of us crammed into the back of a tuk-tuk. Now for those of u who are aware of what a tuk-tuk is you will appreciate what a task this is, for those of you who dont its basically a 3 wheeled scooter with a seat barely big enough for 2 on the back. Google it or something to get a mental image. So for each short journey for the next 4
days our lives were in the (hopfully) capable hands of the driver as he dodges taxis and squeezes between slowert moving busses. The first journey was absolutely petrifying but after a few they do become good fun...even if a 5 minute journey is probably the equvalent of smoking 40 fags while playing Russiasn roulette with a loaded pistol.
I was expecting Kohsan road to be dirty, noisy, full of drunken stag parties and pick pockets with everyone in your face trying to sell you some piece of counterfeit trash. However i was very pleasantly surprised with the almost relaxed feel about the place. Tourists of all ages (bar kids) wandered round only engaging in negotiations with stall owners if they were looking to actually buy something. The stalls were selling ur usual touristy things: t-shirts, swords, souveniers , bags and even driving licences and degrees for a fiver a pop! We sat down to 5 cold chang beers, had some grub and plotted our attack on the stalls. With full stomachs and partially full wallets we unleashed on the clothes stalls. Every price is negotiable and due to the vast amounts of stalls selling exactly the same thing, buyer
power is very high. Highlight of the might for me was when Craig and I were haggling down the price of 6 t-shirts priced at 260B each. We were adamant we were gonna get them for 180 a piece. It took us about 5 minutes to get him down from 1100 to 1080 for the lot. He finally gave in. We handed him 1100 and told him to keep the change. We are cruel cruel people.
At the end of the night the 5 of us had a total haul of 21 t-shirts, 5 pairs of shorts, 5 shades, 2 pairs of flip flops, 2 pairs of boxers, a belt and a few keyrings. The Harvard 1st class law degree was on the list but the seller just wouldnt let the price drop enough. After a supper of banana pancakes smothered on condensed milk and sugar made infront of us at one of the dozens of snack carts up and down the strip we once again piled into aa tuk-tuk (now with baggage) and headed for the hotel for the best nights sleep ever. It was so good infact that after breakfast, we all went back to bed for
some more.
In the afternoon craig, luke and i headed for the grand temple. I had read that tuk-tuk drivers will often say ur destinationi is closed and will offer to take you elswhere via shops, and outlets where they will gain a commission if they bring custom. So it was no surprise when after 200m he stopped and said "the Grand Temple is closed today. I will take u here, here and here" he said pointing to our map. I also read that you should just be persistant and they will eventually take you. So it came as a surprise when he got so fed up of us saying "grand palace now" that he refused to take us and hailed another driver to take us. The 2nd driver took us straight there and guess what...it was closed. We took a walk around the perimiter wall until we came to another opening where peopole were being let in and out of. We hired trousers off some random guy on the street as no shorts were allowed inside and headed in. Apparently it was just the main temple area that was closed. The temples we saw were very nice and
theres obviously a lot of history behind them but once youve been in for 10 mins or so you kind of get a bit bored. Thats how i felt anyway, they all look the same to me. Lots of sparkly mosaic and gold statues.
In the evening we rattled back to Kohsan road for another good feed.
On the Wednesday (4th) we had nothing planned so we spent the afternoon lounging about the hotel pool and soaking up some scortching rays, the occassional cloud providing some much needed respite.
After reading through the travel book given yo me by my ever-loving parents i was desperate to see some bona fide Muai Thai kickboxing. As it was quite pricey i was the only one who coughed up the cash for a ticket...and a ringside one at that! The bill of 10 fights started at half 6. I arrived after 7 leaving me with 3 hours to watch woung thai men get kicked in the face and kneed in the ribs. It was most enjoyable, i just wish i had a video camera, the lights were too dark to get good photos and the atmoshere was electric. As well as the
fights themselves, watching the crouds in the stands above me was just as entertaining. Hundreds of Thai men frantilally gesturing to each other between rounds, putting money on who will win and when they will do it. I saw one knockout. It came in the 8th fight i think. One of the fighters was pinned in the corner, the other one throwing puches to the face and kneeing him in the ribs. Then he took a step back and whipped his leg up to his head and made a sweet connection with the side of his face. The poor guy just crumpled into a heap while his team ran on to see if he was ok. The stretcher was on standby but he managed to get to his feet, hug his attacker and walk out the ring, i imagine in search if a couple of asprin and an ice pack. During the last 2 fights after the main ones had been a lady came over to me and asked if i would like my picture taken with one of the fighters. "Is he gonna smack me?" "No" "Alrighty then". She led me off and i joined another couple who were
getting their snaps taken too. He looked pretty mean, i looked meaner.
On our 4th and final day in Bangkok we thought wed have to make the most of it so we hired a taxi for the day for a tenner each which would take us round some of the must see locations. Our driver was an absolute legend. He kept us well fed with mini bananas and something called "jackfruit" (i think) and watered all day. He was generously tipped. Our first stop was a floating market. We thought it was going to be free to see but when we got there we had to pay 500 baht each at a very unofficial looking ticket stand (basically a plastic table with 3.5 legs and a fat guy sitting behind it with a notepad and pen) to be taken round the waterways on a motorised canoe type vessel. After a couple of extremely awkward stops at canal side stalls, where the women claiming to be relations of the driver tried desperately hard to sell us all sorts of souvenirs and postcards, all of which we quitly said "no thank you" to, we headed for the central water passage. It
was pretty chaotic. Dozens of long thin canoes squeezed past each other. Some were selling hats, some were selling fruit veg, spices and herbs, others even had little hot plates on them to cook meat skewers top order. The banks were lined with more souvenir shops and places to eat. It was quite clear the place had lost a fair bit of its authenticity and now relied heavily on tourism to sustain itself, and the water and banks looked quite polluted as the traditional paddle power had been replaced with diesel engines. After this when we thought we were heading back to the taxi we pulled up at another canal-side ledge where a lady in traditional costume greeted us and offered us a free 10 minute dance demonstration. Why not? We all unloaded and took our seats in the empty hut and watched 4 women perform a local thai dance for us. It was all very surreal and completely random. After they finished. After they had finished we posed for a few pictures with them, gave them a few baht tip and left, this time we were going back to the taxi.
Next on the to do list was
feed elephants. We rolled up to the park , swiftly refused the expensive elephant ride experience, bought a bssked of bananas for a couple of quid and damn near bricked ourselves dodging hungry, flailing, slobber covered trunks.
Next stop was for food in a big shopping centre. This was where we probably recieved the most attention on our trip so far. As we walked through looking for a place to eat, the majority of folks eyes just locked onto us. People wandered over to shop windows as we walked past them and a lady even picked up her toddler son and turned him to face us. After a delicious honey duck and crispy pork feed, we waved goodbye to a table of giggling young girls and left for Tiger Temple. This place is basically an open area run by monks where the animals roam free with the visitors. If the sleeping panda from Hong Kong was here i could have simply walked up to it and slapped it round the face a bit. After walking past a coupleof large horned antelope-esque creatures we headed for the tiger canyon. As you would probably expect (and to our releif) these animals WERE
chained up, albeit rather loosely. There were about 15 or so of them lying about in the shade digesting the large feed they had been given an hour or so earlier. We joined the short line to be taken round. When my turn came one of the workers grabbed by hand while another grabbed my camera and i was taken round a few of them to get my pic taken. The tigers were really tame and didnt mind being stroked on their bellys and sides. It was superb. We then headed round the corner to the 7month old cubs to cive them a clap too. There was one foreign lady who got a bit too friendly with one of them and went in for the hug. The cub didnt seem to enjoy it too much and she was told to back off. We saw the same dafty try and walk through a few cows to get to its calf. We all stood a safe distance back and watched, hoping she would get a deserved hoof to the gut. Unfortunately, however, she walked away unharmed. She headed off in the opposite direction, possibly to ride a water buffalo.
After watching the
tigers get fed milk and a big herd of cows (and one random, possibly species-confused camel) get fed bags of what looked like yams we went back to our taxi, awoke our sleeping driver and headed off for the bridge over the river Kwai. After reading the plaque describing its significance, and ignoring a few more street sellers (a skill wev all pretty much mastered) we took a wander across. One word of advice, if ur drunk or just have a tendency to veer off to one side while walking dont walk across this bridge. The centre track has metal sheets laid down but at either side theres nothing but a sizeable fall to a murky river. There were lots of tourists about. We were caught on the video of a couple from Kazakstan and one lady looked at Craig, made the motion of wiping a tear away from her eye and said softly "beautiful". She must have forgotten her specs that day. Either that or she was looking at me 10 metres behing him. When we were about to leave a school teacher who was with her class on a trip asked to take our picture with some of
the pupils. We thought Tokyo was where we were going to get all the attention but in Thailand people seem to love us. We get treated like a boy band, its great. After a long day we headed back to the hotel and hit the hay. Flying to Phnom Penh the following afternoon.
Unfortunately so far no computer has let me upload pics to these blogs but i will post a few as soon as i can.
Other points: wer all getting on really well, nobodys been burnt yet and were all constantly sweaty. Were in cambodia just now, so the next entry will be describing the amazing sights and especially the tastes of the Khmer.
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mam
non-member comment
good to hear your news
Hi andrew Good to hear your news. Well done with the detail. Had a good giggle at some of the mental images created. keep it up. Take care-Mam