Assorted Bangkok shots

A typical Bangkok street

Grabbing a snack (satay) on the go

They have crowded open-aired markets and then they have this.

Bangkok apartments across the most luxurious mall

A frequent design on the temples' roofs

Tuk-tuks may lack air-conditioning and don't offer a lot of protection from the fumes, but they compensate that with a lot of personality.

One of Bangkok's signatures is the chaotic traffic. The king says hi.

Shopping and dropping

On Sunday morning we took the subway to the Chatuchat weekend market. After seeing the streets, were very surprised that the subway was extremely clean and new – it felt like we were back in Singapore!

The market is huge. It took us a while just to find the information center. The guide book said it was located on section 25, but we couldn’t find that section, even though we could see sections 23, 24 and 26. We even asked some people and no-one was sure. The truth is Chatuchat is a giant maze encompassing more than 800 stalls. When we finally found the information center, we were given a map. The people also warned us against pickpockets and showed us a bunch of wallets that had turned up empty.

I’d like to take the opportunity to mention that everywhere you go in Bangkok you find nice people willing to go out of their way to help you. If they don’t speak English, they’ll find you someone who does.

At Chatuchat you can find almost anything, from stylish clothes and accessories, handicrafts and household items, to furniture, artworks, and even puppies. And everything is so cheap, especially by western standards! (bargaining is expected) I honestly rarely give in to the shopping spree temptation, but if it weren’t for the limited time and how much we were able to carry back (we bought a bag for that purpose) I could have made a serious dent in the wallet…

On the way back we took the Skytrain (a sort of subway that runs above the city streets) to Siam square, for an altogether different kind of shopping. The malls at Siam square are even bigger and nicer than the ones in Singapore, and that’s saying a lot. One of them had the biggest supermarket I’ve ever seen, and everything there was gourmet. I wonder who shops there, considering that just across the street there are very modest houses and beggars on the sidewalk. It’s a very shocking contrast.

Tired of walking and shopping in Bangkok’s oppressive heat (it’s worse than Singapore) we made our way back to the hotel, repacked (we had to fit our market finds somehow) and left to the airport, hoping to be able to at least nap on the way back home. If only we had had time for another massage!

Calypso Cabaret

At the entrance

The show had plenty of beautiful ladies

No, this isn't a ugly woman. It's a guy cross-dressing as a Japanese lady. This part was really funny.

Who says bikinis are just for girls?

A relaxing evening

After touring the temples and the river all day, we though it was time for a traditional Thai massage. They pulled our limbs, cracked our fingers, twisted us into weird positions and it felt so good! We only had time for a quick dinner before we got our guide to take us to the Calypso Cabaret. It's a show where all performers are or were men at a point in their lives. The room was full with Westerners (men and women.) It's actually a pretty good show, with plenty of musical numbers and some funny parts too. And some of the girls are so gorgeous that it's hard to believe they weren't always female. We ended the night at the hotel bar, a hip new place mostly filled (not suprisingly) with Western men and their Thai girlfriends. Nancy swears she saw plenty of wedding bands on the guys' hands.

Lunch on the river

Eating alfresco

A view of the "restaurant"

Forget Malaysia; this is the real fresh fish, right out of the river

Cooking Phat Thai

We bought some cherry lookalikes from this lady

Local food, international drink

The ice-cream man

This floating market takes place on land

It's hard not to buy everything you see

Up the canal to the old capital

It wasn’t planned, but our guide suggested we take a boat tour along the Chao Phraya River. We got our own traditional boat and went down the river before we got into one of the canals, the Khlong Bangkok Noi, which flows into the Chao Phraya from the old capital, Thonburi. This was by far the most unique and exhilarating experience of the whole trip.

The canal is long and there are wooden houses built all along it. You can see gila monsters, big catfish, soup merchants on their little rowboats, children taking a dip, and monks looking out from their temples. The not-so-clean water splashes around, the floating vegetation covers the water and some people wave as you pass by. There are all sorts of houses, from the very humble to the extremely luxurious.

Nancy and Joe hadn’t had breakfast, so halfway through the tour they were starving. This was a lucky strike, since our guide knew just the place to eat around there. On the weekends, there is a floating market and the locals come to eat on this huge barge where you can find phat thai, shellfish, noodle soups and fresh-out-of-the-river catfish. We sat at a low table on the floor and ordered from almost every stand. Towards the end of lunch, the ice-cream man came by on his boat and we bought some coconut sorbet with peanuts. It was the cheapest and most delicious meal we had during our trip. Needless to say, we were the only non-Thai people on the barge…

Wat Benchamabophit

The temple's entrance

The temple's façade

The main altar in the temple, with a picture of the current king as a monk on the right

An unusual depiction of a fasting Buddha, in the Ghandara style

A Buddha in the traditional Sukothai style

Wat Pho

A guard at the entrance of the temple

Now that's a huge Buddha

The Buddha's head

One of many paintings on the interior walls of Wat Pho

One of the Buddha's soles, decorated with mother-of-pearl

Dropping pennies in a long row of pots

Wat Traimit

The 5.5 ton gold Buddha


Offerings for the Buddha

Three Buddhas covered in gold leaf

We got pretty lucky with our fortune, I guess

The Thai flag with the temple's roof in the background

Young monks eating their meals

Monks, touts and golden Buddhas

After getting some good sleep, we met our tour guide at the lobby around 10am and crossed the city to the old part of town. Our first stop was at Wat Traimit, the temple of the gold Buddha. Inside it there is a 5.5 ton statue of Buddha in solid gold. While a lot of Thai temples and statues are covered in gold leaf, this is the real thing. Outside, there are machines with little Buddha statues (one for each day of the week) in which you can insert a coin and get your fortune. Steve and I got a pretty good one, but not all of them are so uplifting. Before getting on the van to go to the next temple, we saw the young monks eating their meals.

Next we stopped at Wat Pho. This temple has a few statues outside, depicting guards and demons. It must be a pretty popular place since there were a lot of touts trying to get us to buy their stuff. It’s all pretty cheap, but still a rip-off compared to the prices you can find at the markets. Inside the temple there is a giant statue of a reclining Buddha. It’s very hard to take it all in without walking around the statue. The walls and ceilings are all finely decorated and the Buddha’s feet are incrusted with mother-of-pearl. Inside the temple there is also a long row of pots where you can drop pennies, giving the whole experience a funny background sound.

We went for a boat tour and had lunch before we saw one last temple. This one was called Wat Benchamabophit, or the Marble Temple. It’s not as impressive as the other two, but it’s quieter and nicer that way. If you’re looking for a place where you can actually meditate, this would be it. Outside, in the marble courtyard, there is a big collection of Buddha statues in bronze, covering different themes, periods and locations. Very interesting. I really wish we had had the time to see more temples. Bangkok has so many of them, and they’re all beautiful and unique in their own way. They’re a definitely a recommended sight, whether you are religious, an art lover or a history buff.

First night in Bangkok

Our hotel was linked directly to the sky train via a bridge above the road.

A stroll through Soi Cowboy

Flying on a budget to Soi Cowboy

This past weekend we took our first real trip to a neighboring country. We went to Bangkok, Thailand, with friends Nancy and Joe. We flew out of Changi Airport’s Budget Terminal on Tiger Airways, a local airline.

We arrived Friday night at the brand new international airport and were immediately lucky. The state’s travel agency was offering a promotional price on a 4 hour tour, with a private English-speaking guide and our own driver. We took a cab to our hotel and, after a much needed late dinner, went out. It turns out that our hotel, despite being in a so-called “nice” area, was actually very close to one of the infamous nightlife entertainment areas, Soi Cowboy.

The way Bangkok is organized is that there are main roads which have names (like Suhkumvit Road) and side streets, which are called Sois and numbered (Soi 1, 2, etc.) Well, this was Soi Cowboy. Taxi drivers wouldn’t understand the name of our hotel, but if we said “Soi Cowboy” and we’d be right on your way. Soi Cowboy is a small neon-lit street lined with strip clubs and pole-dancing bars on both sides. The passersby are almost all Western men, but we did see one or two couples (thankfully!) Men and girls sitting outside will call you to come in to their bar. Some of the girls inside look suspiciously young, although everyone will swear they’re all over 18. There are also a couple of regular bars. We had a couple of Singha’s (the local beer) and called it a night.