After spending our last two days in Africa relaxing in Kigali and sending out some goat photos (still many more to be sent out), we flew to Bangkok from Rwanda on Kenya Airways via Nairobi. The Nairobi airport is a massive hub in Eastern Africa and was littered with plenty of Europeans (as was the safari and the gorilla trek). It might have been the most depressing major airport I had ever been to. Drab lighting in a dilapidated building without any good food options. Two memories for me are 1) The men’s stall in the bathroom…I summoned my inner-gymnast to extract myself from the stall as the door swings inward and effectively pins you against the toilet bowl. 2) When it was time to go to the gate, they do the ticket and security check..and everyone waits in this stifling room with crappy plastic seats. We notice some people angling towards the front and since we had carry-on bags that we wanted to ensure got into the overhead bins above us, we discreetly jostled our way close to pole position as well. Finally the doors open and it’s a stampede through the tunnel to the airplane ! No orderly line whatsoever. It was a goldmine of new material for Russell Peters as our flight was a full of Africans/SE Asians/Indians..none of whom have sterling reputations for their etiquette on public transportation.
The flight itself was uneventful (thankfully) and 9 hours later, we were in Bangkok. Bangkok’s airport was incredibly efficient (as most of the Asian airports we’ve been to thus far) and we were out in about 20 minutes and took a taxi downtown to our hotel.
Bangkok itself can be described as commercial and culinary craziness surrounded by majestic history and beauty. We ate, we drank, we bought and then we ate some more. Here are some of our Bangkok highlights
Patpong market : Patpong Market is one Bangkok’s famous night markets bustling with stalls hawking real and knockoffs clothes, watches, jewellery, DVD’s and art. It’s also known as Bangkok’s Red Light district as evidenced by the numerous approaches I received (with Dal standing next to me) to come see “nice ping-pong show” by men holding menus of various sexual acts that could be performed at ‘best price’. As a sidebar – what does it say about Bangkok’s tourist clientele if the lead pitch is the ping-pong show. Really???? That’s the tried-and-tested hook that gets the most people to enter their club ?? What ever happened to the classics such as “Come see pretty girls” or “Five dollahs...girls love you long time”. We responded that we preferred badminton..and got zero laughs from the pitchmen.
Negotiating: As a strong believer that most things can be negotiated, Thailand’s markets are a magical playground. After our first couple of purchases where we got fleeced (we paid a combined $25 for items we discovered later we could have got for $15), we mastered the art of “hear the starting price – react with incredulous facial expressions without saying a word – allow the vendor to drop the price by 40% on their own - then make an offer at 10-15% of the original asking price - come up to 20-30% of their asking price if we really like it - walk away - get called back - agree at around 25%.”
Massages : Dal and I had been really looking forward to asian massages, but we may have gone overboard. We wound up getting 3 massages each during our 4 days there. My first one was a thai massage where the masseuse essentially twisted me into a pretzel while expertly stomping all over me. Ironically, I wound up getting a hamstring cramp during one of the twists..but the masseuse standing on my back was able to fix that quite promptly. We also got a massage at 12:30am after shopping at Patpong market….60 minutes of bliss included a foot massage, then head, neck and shoulders followed by tea..for $8 each.
Food : Good God the food is incredible in Thailand. Several times, we OD’d on the soups, the pad thai, the curries etc.. so fresh and so cheap. One of our favourite joints was the food court in Robinson’s supermarket because we knew it was incredibly clean and we could both eat well for about $4 and it was a nice 10 minute stroll from our hotel. Dal was also hooked on the mango and the baby coconut water that we bought on the street for less than $1.
Taxi Tricks : Thanks to reading Lonely Planet and a few blogs, we were prepared for a common scam that unscrupulous taxi drivers pull on unsuspecting tourists. The rule of thumb is to ensure they use the meter before you get in the taxi. One time, we forgot this rule and entered the cab of an overly-friendly chap. About two minutes into our ride (which I knew would be about 120 baht) I asked about the price. The taxi driver smiled gleefully and said “don’t worry..good price”. I asked “how much ?”. He grinned widely again and said “20 baht”. Right away, I knew why and said forcefully “No stops”. He responded “only 1 stop..I take you to nice tailor shop”. The cabbie gets a sweet commission for bringing tourists to the shop, which is often not even on the route to the original destination. We threaten to get out of the taxi and his disposition quickly changes from cheery to pouty and we have a bit of a debate (Thais don’t like loud brash arguments). Silence then ensues and we enjoy a quiet although tense ride the rest of the way for 100 baht.
Lee Min Ho : We decided to check out some of the malls near Siam subway station when we started to notice around 3:30pm a bit of a crowd forming consisting of teenage girls near a makeshift stage. We continued our shopping and at 4:30pm, the crowd had swelled to at least 1,000 people on the ground floor with lots of people watching from other floors. Some asian star named Lee Min Ho was making an appearance. Of course we had no idea who he was but we decided to join the hordes and wait for his arrival. Without the benefit of Google, we were left to guess at his relevance and we settled on recent Asian Idol winner as our best bet. At 5:30pm, the crowd was now massive (and yes..there were a LOT of Hello Kitty paraphernalia) spanning 7 floors. We had already waited for an hour for his arrival so bailing now seemed stupid. So we waited..and waited some more..played Angry Birds on the iPhone..made lots of jokes at our predicament..and finally at 6:15, we saw him from our 5th floor perch. Pandemonium ensued as teenage asian girls shrieked in delight. Of course we joined in, professing our love for Lee Min Ho quite loudly which only drew a few stares. When we got to our hotel, we googled him and he’s apparently a South Korean heartthrob actor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Min_Ho . Whoopee.
Embarrassingly, we didn't see any temples since we knew we'd be seeing a tonne in Laos and Cambodia. However we're in Bangkok again for a couple of days prior to flying to Mumbai and have plans to visit the Royal Palace a couple of other sacred areas.
-DP
-DP
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