Bangkok (January 15-16)

OK guys, here we go, my first blog entry. I arrived yesterday morning at BKK airport. My seat neighbor in the aircraft from Dubai to Bangkok was Nyo, the kind of seat neighbor you wish to have, offering me some of her leg space in order to avoid that my knees get damaged on this 5h flight. As she was Thai, I was able to skip the long immigration queues for foreigners and pass with her through local’s immigration. That was cool!

I took the new skyrail train to somewhere in town. At the airport’s tourist office they told me where to get off and which bus I have to take from there in order to go to the centre. Thanks to my good travel preparations I didn’t know that they drive on the left here and almost got hit by a motorcycle because of the habit to look to the left when you cross the street. Anyway, I found the bus passing by but no bus station so took a taxi at the end. I walked around the backpacker’s quarter heading towards the street my sister told me I should go. Not a bad idea compared to Khao San Road, Bangkok’s most horrible tourist strip. As it’s high season, it was difficult to find a room. At the end I managed to get an overcharged room without window, only a bed and aircon (in the guest house my sister recommended, thanks Iris!). I didn’t even know where to put my stuff. But I had no choice because I needed to sleep in the afternoon. I was unable to walk around more with my entire luggage.

This morning my first action was to find a better room because I slept horribly during the night. Apart from having the sensation of being a prisoner it was noisy because of the people coming back from their drinking tours. I finally found a decent room in another guest house with outside window for 230 instead of 600 Baht. I have the impression that the hostels recommended in Lonely Planet can charge more for less...

Today in the afternoon I took a river boat to the south and walked all the way back crossing different quarters such as Chinatown and the “temple district”. I visited Wat Pho (temple with the reclining Buddha) and tomorrow I will go back to see Wat Phra Kaew. Walking around is really stressful because of the traffic and the habit to occupy every single cm of the sidewalk with mobile food stands and other types of commerce. It’s interesting to walk around because you see things like Buddhist monks buying lottery (unfortunately I didn’t take a photo).

Today the plan is to sleep early and stand up early tomorrow to see Wat Phra Kaew before the crowds do. The jetlag and the climate still make me feel tired although I have to say that heat is not unbearable.

With regard to what I wrote about Bangkok in my prologue… to be honest I doubt that the city will become one of my favorites. Anyway I still have two days left to discover more.