Nilesh's Posterous

Bangkok

9/12/2008 - 13/12/2008 : So, after the last blog entry, I just did not have the time or internet access to continue writing up the trip.. but now that I am back home, I'll try to recap it and put some notes and pics for the remaining days.
---
Day 2, Bangkok : We don't have much time in bangkok (3 days) and I know my mom and sister want to do most of their shopping here. We had to try to do a little bit of the touristy things and then leave the other day for shopping mostly. So today, decided to go and see some of bangkok's famous wats (temples).

We took the Bangkok Skytrain to the end of the line, where we boarded a boat taxi (Chao Phraya Express) to go to the Wat Pho, home of the largest reclining buddha in the world. Boat Taxi as with other means of public transportation has a section reserved for monks on the boat, rather than handicapped and pregnant women as in the western world. We jumped off the boat at our stop and walked our way to Wat Pho.

Impresive temple with many sattelite smaller temples on the surroundings of the temple.  The main temple had a giant reclining golden buddha.. impressive display. The reclining Buddha has many carvings on its feet made of cut out mother of pearls. Many other great temples and buddha displays withtin Wat Pho. Very spiritual and impressive size of the temples. Mom and sis prayed and made offerings at a couple of the buddhist displays.

After Wat Pho, we decided to walk to the Grand Palace (Wat Phra Kaew) to see the Emerald Buddha. As explained in the lonely planet guidebook, some touts did approach us and told us that the temple was closed and they'll take us to a better temple to see the black buddha. We ignored them and continued our way to the grand palace. The grand palace is very strict for admissions - absolutely no shorts, no sandals, no tshirts etc.. allowed. One has to be well dressed and one has to be pay around 450Baht to enter. We decided to skip it and rather go have lunch instead.

We decided to go to Pahurat, Bangkok's little India for lunch. We took a tuk-tuk there and on the way, stopped by another wat, Wat Rajaburana which had great outer decorations. After visiting the temple, we found a punjabi place in Little India which had vegetarian food. Had lunch there and then visited the surrounding street fairs to do some shopping.

While visiting around there, we found a huge statue of Ganesh on the streets of Pahurat. Apparently, many thai people pray to Ganesh. Seems like Hinduism is present in many facets of thai society. I was talking to a local and she was telling me that they worship Ganesh as Vinayaka and those that pray to Vinayaka don't eat beef (same as in Hindu) and fast and do rituals on same days as Hindus. Throughout bangkok, we saw many displays of Hindu culture and gods - such as statues of Brahma, Vishnu, Hanuman etc.. for public worship. We had initially planned to go to another temple - Wat Arun, the temple of dawn, but sis and mom had enough of already of temples. We took the boat taxi and skytrain back to the hotel. I looked after Sid while mom and ashveena went for some more shopping at the Pratunam market, another market known for its many goods and wholesale prices.

The next day was solely was shopping. Went to Pratunam market and mom and sis spent the entire day shopping. After shopping, me and Ashveena went to get massages at one of the so many masage parlors all over the city. I think we paid like 300Baht (less than $10) for 2 hours thai massage. The next day was our departure to Kuala Lumpur around noon. Did not have much time to do anything much. We took a taxi to the airport and had lunch there itself, before taking our Air Asia flight to Kuala Lumpur.

Pic 1 : Largest Reclining Buddha in the world at Wat Pho
Pic 2 : Stuphas at Wat Pho
Pic 3 : One of the buddhas in the sattelite temples
Pic 4 : Mom and Sis praying at Wat Pho
Pic 5 : Ashveena and Sid in Tuk Tuk
Pic 6 : Grilled Ripe Bananas
Pic 7 : From the Boat Taxi at Sunset
Pic 8 : River Houses on the bank of the Chao Phraya River
Pic 9 : Mom, Sis and Sid in front of Giant Ganesh in the middle of town for public worship
Pic 10 : Wat Arun, the Temple of Dawn
Pic 11 : Bangkok's colorful Taxis
Pic 12 : Street Vendors
Pic 13 : Bangkok Street

Last Day in Singapore, First day in Bangkok..

So, today is already our last day in Singapore. Our flight departs in the afternoon for Bangkok, but we have to check out at noon. Rather than waiting for noon, we checked out around 10:00 and asked the hotel to keep our bags and we took a taxi for last bit of touring. Went to the Bugis market and strolled around checking out the various stalls and foods. After that, went to the famous Mustapha Center - a multi storey multi purpose mall that sells basically everything. Navigated through the maze of the shopping center in the little time that we had. I managed to try on a few things in the mega tiny changing rooms and bought something. We had a south indian vegetarian set meal close to Mustapha and then took a taxi back to the hotel to pick our luggage, then take the MRT to the airport.

We flew Tiger Airways (http://www.tigerairways.com) out of Singapore. I had bought the tickets a couple of months and I got them for SGD $ 0.01.. Yes you read right.. 1 cent singapore, but then with taxes and surchages, it came to $40 SGD, but still a great deal. Changi Airport is very nice and all terminals are accessible by the skytrain in the airport Except for the Budget Terminal. I guess being budget, these airlines can't afford the prices to afford skytrain charges or other fancy stuff. So, we had to go to the basement of terminal 2 by skytrain, then wait for a bus to go to the budget terminal. We checked in there after waiting in a long line and then walked our way to the plane, up the stairs of the old school plane stairs (just like the old days) rather than the automated longnecks.

Flight was good and we reached Bangkok on time in the dark. Did immigration formalities easily and got out and changed some dollars to thai baht and then started looking for Taxis inside the airport itself rather than go out and face the many touts and private taxis waiting. They have the Aiport of Thailand (AOT) official limosine service that one can book from inside. I asked one side and they quoted me 1300 Baht and then asked another counter of same company and it was 950Baht to Sukumvit Soi 15. Took the latter and we got a nice BMW suv to take us to our hotel.

Reached hotel, checked in and went for a walk on Sukhumvit avenue. We reached a night and little did we know, Sukumvit is the heart of Bangkok's red light district. As we walked around on Sukumvit, many girls dressed in skanky dresses standing on the side of the road waving at single guys and many fat old white guys walking hand in hands with young thai girls - sad scene. I knew the scene was such, but did not know the hotel was so close to it. I picked the hotel to be very close to the BTS (skytrain) Asoke Station. Well, anyways, its always good to experience a bit of all kinds of sceneries. So, we walked about from Soi 15 to Soi2 then back to our hotel. Mom, sis and Sid went to sleep and I ventured out again and walked the opposite way from soi 15 to soi 27 or so and had some pad thai on one of street food sellers. Met a french backpacker and had some good late night dinner conversation over the pad thai.

Pic 1 : View from our hotel room in singapore
Pic 2 : Mum Drinking coconut from street vendor
Pic 3 : Laksa that I had for breakfast
Pic 4 : Rickhaw Drivers waiting for customers at Bugis
Pic 5 : Dragon Fruit
Pic 6 : Bangkok Street Food (where I had dinner)