February 21, 2007

• Thailand Travels-One Night in Bangkok

  So back from not just a night, but an entire week in thailand, and in an attempt to not repeat the china debacle (which i still haven't finished posting about), I am going to be trying to come at you hard and fast with what i got to see and do while i still remember it all

  albums of all the trips can be found here, as i post them. However, only the best of the best makes it into the albums as i literally took 941 pictures and video over the duration of a week, and there is no way in heck they will ever all make it online
  
  
  
  Associated Album: Bangkok

  Anyway after a wonderful 20 hours cumulative flight (and 15 hour time difference from los angeles), Koh, Ward and I made it to bangkok around 11pm at night, checked into our hotel by 1am and wandered the city for a bit before turning in. These photos begin from our first full day 2/12.

  The first hotel we checked into was the New World Lodge, a 3 star in the banglamphu district, in old bangkok, about a 10 minute walk from Khao San, the expat road. Although to be fair, everything in old bangkok is relatively close to each other and walkable

  

  This is a shot of the banglampu canal outside our hotel
  not for nothing is bangkok called "The Venice of the East"

  

  The rama VIII bridge (the current king is Rama IX) which spans the chao praya river, a major thoroughfare of bangkoks waterways. First thing we did was hop a boatbus down the river to check out the sights

  

  Not sure wat this is (haha i made a pun-wat means temple in thai), but nonetheless a nifty looking one on the banks of chao praya

  

  Wat Arun: Temple of the dawn: more of this to come later

  

  This is me on the grounds of Wat Pho, Temple of the reclining buddha.

  

  And here is the reclining buddha himself. Although it can be tough to get an accurate idea of the immensity of the buddha with no people around, but fear not...

  

  

  

  Reclining buddha up close

  

  Ward at the buddha's sole. Fancy foot tattoos, no? And no people, Ward is not jackie chan, though he has been confused for him before.

  

  more wat pho

  

  me being goofy

  

  Stupas, or possibly chedis i am not really sure on the grounds of wat pho

  

  ward and Koh, my traveling companions

  

  yoga position, or offensive statue? hey, whatsamatta u?

  

  Finaly we all got tired of looking at the wat (and if you saw all the pics, i didnt post, you would too ) and decided to move on to the next location. But how to get there?

  

  perhaps a tuk tuk? no, not quite yet, not least because the grand palace was merely across the street

  Sharing the grounds with the grand palace was wat pha kraew, the temple of the emerald buddha. Sadly no pictures of the buddha itself were allowed, but i assure you it was quite an awe inspiring sight. Each asian country i have been too has had unique styles to their temples- japan has a naturalistic simplicity and economy of design, china a majestic grandness, but thai people definetily know how to put a razzle dazzle on their places of worship

  

  like this golden chedi here on the grounds of wat pha kraew

  

  and me in front of it

  

  then it was time to find a little inner peace before continuing on our tour

  

  

  

  

  when in bangkok, do as the guardian demons do

  

  a pretty grand palace indeed

  

  Then we hopped back on the boat bus

  

  

  one of the ferry's to cross the river, instead of just traveling down it

  After a brief lunch of pad see ew and pad thai (pictured in the food album along with food from many other places) we walked up and down some of the alleways for a bit

  

  And then because it was time for me to get a little of my nerd on, it was on to the museum of forensic medicine, pathology, and parasitology. Since the majority of you would not be interested in those pictures, i shall not post them, but it was quite an educational experience for me. As i mentioned earlier, the bodies of several of thailands serial killers are preserved and mummfied, just chilling in the museum. Here is a link to pics of the forensic museum if you are still so inclined. The museum of parasitology only further reinforced my intention not to go swimming in bangkoks rivers.

  

  koh and ward on the riverbus
  

  

  After another joyride down the river we wandered around on the opposite shore for a while until we came across a small wat and fish market. Thai people were just hanging out feeding the pigeons and fish in the river by throwing them bread crumbs, corn, smaller fish, whatever was available. The best part was at the end of the day, a number of the vendors took their unsold fish down to these steps and just dumped them in the river, presumably to recatch the next day

  Getting so late we decided to grab a bite to eat and stopped at a thai indian fusion restauraunt

  

  who could refuse that face?

  

  and then a detour over to khao san road where we had a few drinks and then got thai massages. The place was a fairly reputable massage parlor however, so the only happy ending we wanted or walked away with was the relaxed soreness of our muscles after a long day of walking around.

  

  because the next morning, we would be setting off for the countryside of thailand to see sites of wwII, tigers, and monkeys, and elephants (oh my)...

  to be continued...

  • 12:24 am
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