Eric & Laura's Dog, Scuba, & Travel Website
THAILAND & CAMBODIA
Bangkok 2/22, 2000
This Looks WAY too long, just show me pictures!
I had no intention of spending any time in Bangkok. I went there in June of 1986 and found it to be an incredibly hot, busy, and polluted place. Nevertheless, every city has its charm and Bangkok is no exception. Since we had so little time, though, we decided to see other things and only go to Bangkok if we had some time left over. As it turns out...we did. We left Phuket at around 8 a.m. and didn't have to take a flight out of the country until 1 a.m. This gave us a day and part of a night in Bangkok. We had to leave Khao Lak early in the morning to be able to make the flight to Bangkok. This gave us a great view of monks walking around with their alms bowls collecting their daily food around sunrise. We had to run a few errands at the Bangkok airport and did not make it into the city until 1 p.m. Bangkok is legendary for its traffic jams and it will take you at least an hour to get downtown from the airport. If you have no intention of staying in Bangkok (i.e. you are just "in transit"), then you are probably better off staying at a lodging place near the airport. This is what we did when we first arrived from overseas (we got in at night and had a morning flight). We stayed at the We-Train International Hotel for about 500 baht. Profits from the hotel go to helping battered women become self-sufficient (so you'll be helping out a good cause!). The rooms were spartan but perfectly okay. A ride back to the airport is included in the price. The taxi system in Bangkok is a well oiled machine and you will be sitting in a cab in no time. The problem is trying to communicate with the cabbie. They generally can't read Roman script or understand English and they generally can't understand your Thai! We were at a communication standstill for a while until we found someone who spoke English. The moral of the story: When you want to go somewhere specific in Thailand, have someone write it down in Thai. (BTW - Remember to click on the thumbnails to see the larger pictures with explanatory text).
We started our walk near the palace at the place that had the "city pillar", a stone commemorating the foundation of the city. I don't remember the name but it was not special. From here we walked to the nearby Wat Pho which is a very large wat complex. It is quite ornate and it definitely appears that it has never hurt for money in its entire history. It is famous for two things: 1) The Reclining Buddha and 2) The massage school. Both are worth going to. As a matter of fact, Wat Pho deserves some investigation, despite the large number of tourists. You will generally find that most tourists come to see the Reclining Buddha and to get a massage and do little else. There is an entrance fee of a few dollars so be prepared.
We started by walking to the Reclining Buddha in the stifling heat of Bangkok. You have to get in a pseudo-assembly line to drop your shoes off and go in. See the section on Chiang Mai for Wat-ettiquette. It was apparent to me that many tourists did no reading or did not care. They went in wearing hats, shorts, tank tops, and basically didn't treat the place like a place of worship. Despite these louts, the reclining Buddha is impressive. The soles of the feet are the crowning touch. Intricate inlaid mother of pearl scenes are depicted on a shiny black background. This is noteworthy since buddhists consider the soles of the feet as one of the most profane body parts. Seeing such beauty on the soles of the feet was quite impressive. The interesting correlary to this is that buddhists consider the head sacred. Don't pat anybody on the head (even a child). Don't sit on a pillow and don't throw books on the ground. All of these things are associated with the sacredness of the head. It might be okay to do these things in Bangkok since they are used to foreigners but try to keep them in mind when you go to the countryside.
We wandered to the Massage School from the Reclining Buddha (it was at the other side of the building). The wait can be long (we had to wait for 45 minutes) so you may want to consider signing up for a massage before you go to the Reclining Buddha. The massage, though, is worth it. These are students who pay a small fee to learn the art of Thai Massage. The rates are reasonable (less than 300 baht for an hour if memory serves) since they are "inexperienced". Take every opportunity to get a massage in Thailand...you will exit feeling amazingly refreshed. It was one of the most wonderful things in the world...second only to a Turkish bath/massage.
We exited Wat Pho and decided to walk up the road between Wat Pho and the river. The amulet market is nearby so I was jonesing for some shopping. It is illegal to take images of the Buddha outside of the country unless you have a special license. I don't know how fervently they check but I didn't really venture a try. I could. however, not resist buying a small Buddha amulet which the vendor assured me was "for good luck". The amulet market is very interesting and I wish that I understood it better. Amulets that seem remarkably similar to me were vastly different in price and there is a lively market in the buying and selling of them. We were pretty much melting when I finished buying my amulet and decided to head for the infamous Khao San Road for a drink. The place is everything that you have heard...filled with rows of cheap hotels, cheap souvenir places, travel agencies, tons of black market stuff (including a screening of a video at a bar of a movie that had barely been released 2 weeks before in theaters in the U.S.), and tons of tourists. Thais are definitely the minority here.
We bummed around Khao San for a while looking through the souvenir stalls until somebody in our group (who shall remain nameless) had the bright idea of going to a sex show. We got into a tuk-tuk and asked the man to take us to Patpong. Remarkably, he didn't know what we meant. This guy sees tons of tourists and tons of them ask him to take them to the same place. Nevertheless, he was glad to take us to a "very special show" featuring 9 different acts. We went and the place was seedy as you expect. For a small fee we were able to see the "very special show". I won't go into the details here but suffice it to say that it involved ping-pong balls, darts & balloons, razor blades (yuck!), ribbons, and un-opened Coke bottles. The whole thing was, frankly, a freak show and didn't have a scintilla of eroticism. It was a completely emotionless affair on the "actors" part and on the audience's part. Oh, well. It was interesting to see the weirdness but not really worth a reprise. We did have some amusing instances when we had to duck to avoid projectiles (I'm not going to go into great details but I'm sure that you can figure it out). We didn't stay very long and left to go somewhere for a drink and maybe a bite to eat before we left. We ate, said our goodbyes to our friends (Jeff and Susan) and headed back to the airport. If the cab driver asks you if you want to go on the "Express" then say "yes" if you are in a hurry. The "Express" is the toll-highway that connects the city to the airport. It is very quick.
Bangkok was okay but I'm glad that we decided to spend more time elsewhere. Thailand and Cambodia are great countries to travel in. My only regret was that I didn't have more time to explore them in more detail.