Monday, March 13, 2006

Bangkok... day 2

Sorry guys for the late update. Been busy depressing myself. Haha.

Anyway, let me continue on. Our second day of Bangkok coincide with a Sunday. This means, if you ever visit Bangkok on a weekend and not visit their famous Chatuchak Weekend Market, you can't say you have visited Bangkok. Wow. That place is not huge, it is GIGANTIC! You can get lost in there and not find a way out until the time where all the shops have closed. I think it is around the size of 10 football fields and there are a lot(to the power of infinity minus one) stores selling all kinds of things. Luckily the market is organised and divided into different section catering to different needs. Quite interested in the handicrafts section but decided to skip it cause just shopping around the clothes section is enough to kill you and time. The worse part is that as we walk, the clothes section seems to get larger...

Travel Tips: Chatuchak Market is huge and all the stalls are closely packed and there is always a lot of people in the market at any given time. Just imagine you are a sardine in a sardine can as the area is rather enclosed too. Furthermore, there is no air-con in the market and it means you can get a heatstroke easily. When visiting there, be armed with two water bottles and a mini-fan to get cool yourself and if you have those Nike Dri-Fit tees or adidas ClimaCool tees, wear them. They will come in useful.

But... before we can move on, we need to fill up our stomach right? Also to store up some energy. =)


Now you see them...


Now you don't.

Here are some pictures at Chatuchak Market. Didn't take much as i was too engrossed in bargaining. =p


Look at the crowd man! And this is just the border...




Inside Chatuchak Market... Wow! Look at the crowd!


Soft drinks in glass bottles! Don't they remind you of Singapore in the past?


The entrance/exit of Chatuchak Market.

Oh ya, before we left for Chatuchak Market, we treated ourself to a sauna and foot massage session. It was a rather refreshing session but after the session we were kind of sleepy. But the thought of bargaining and filling up shopping bags perk us up. Hee.


The place where we had our sauna and foot massage session.


Wei Yang inside the sauna room. Trust me, even before the heater is turned on, the room is already like a oven.

Some random pictures of the streets of Bangkok...


On the way back to the hotel from Chatuchak Market, the taxi driver went the wrong way and not only that, he stopped along a road and went to take a leak. What the...
In the end, the cab fare was 200 bahts and we were rather unhappy as the driver wasted our time. Luckily he is kind enough to tell us that the fare is only 100 bahts. Oh well, just take it as a ride around Bangkok ba. As Wei Yang said, "the experience is more important". Although i was kind of angry and fed up, my anger immediately vanished when the driver say the fare is only 100 bahts. I can't help but feel that the Thais are really a bunch of friendly people...

After resting for a while, we hit the roads again. This time it is destination Pratunam Night Market. I wanted to go to the Central World Plaza as i heard that authentic Levi's jeans are selling at half the price you would find here. But... the shop 倒闭 liao. -.-" So we went to shop around Pratunam Night Market but found out that they are just replicas of the shops at Chatuchak Market. Didn't get anything as nothing caught my fancy but Wei Yang returned with some watches. Wah, the watches there quite nice and cheap leh. Haha. No pictures too... haha. No mood after finding out that the Levis jean shop has 倒闭.

The most interesting thing from our night trip is that we experience eating beside a road, literally. We were thinking of where to settle our dinner and Wei Jie suggested eating at a roadside stall. There are objections initially due to concerns of hygiene but heck la. At most lao sai nia. The experience is definitely once-in-a-lifetime. I mean, this kind of roadside stalls are a common feature in the 60s but that they have since moved into hawker centres. So to the younger generation we never know what is meant by eating beside the road as experienced by our grandparents. Now we understand and i must say it is rather fun. We had difficulty understang the menu as it is in broken English and Thai! But somehow, after a while of 比手划脚 we finally ordered something sensible. Here are what we ate. No lao sai was reported. Haha.



This day was a rather tiring one. Just walking around Chatuchak Market is enough to kill us. I swear our legs are threatening to give way and we barely walk(make it struggle) out of the market. The eating-beside-a-road experience is wonderful too and we were rather full after our meal. Wow. Really lived like a king there man...

[The empty space are for pictures. Will post them later. Lazy... haha]