One [day] in Bangkok and the worlds's your oyster
The bars are temples but the pearls ain't free
You'll find a god in every golden cloister
And if you're lucky then the god's a she
I can feel an angel sliding up to me
- 'One Night in Bangkok' by Murray Head (amongst others)

So we left Brisbane a little after midnight on the 9th and arrived in Bangkok 9 hours later. The flight was ok apart from crap movies ('The Last Mimsy' is, implausibly, worse than it sounds) and two drunks behind us who proceeded to chat each other up at full volume while everyone else is trying to sleep.

Because Thai Airways moved our flight forward after we booked and left us with an 18hr lay-over in bangkok, they gave us a hotel room at the Novotel right by the airport (or should i say 'inside the airport'). Very swanky place. It took a while to get checked in, and then when we got to our room on the top floor, an Indian man was already in it! He didn't seem too surprised, and said it took him 3 goes that morning to get an unoccupied room. So we rocked back downstairs and told the guy at reception the room was already taken and he was apologetic but also unsurprised. Second go lucky and our new room was empty when we got to it and had no further disruptions of that sort.

We slept for a couple of hours on the King size bed (it felt bigger than kingsize but I'm not sure if such a size exists... Emperor size?), then took a taxi into Bangkok proper (the airport's about 25kms from the city). Was very cool to be somewhere so different to what we're used to. Bangkok has a lot of beautiful things, but a lot of not so beautiful things and they all get mashed up together... which I liked.

En route our taxi driver, Supachai, revealed he 1) spoke pretty good English, 2) loved "his king" 3) fancied himself as a tour guide, and 4) would give us a good deal and be our driver for the afternoon. After doing some sums, it seemed like a good idea, and Supachai assured us, "I don't lie."

First up, he dropped us off at Wat Phra Kaew and the Grand Palace (all one big complex) and said 1 hour is usually enough and he'd pick us up then. He even lent us an umbrella to shade the sun coz it was a sultry 33 degrees and we had to dress respectable (ie impractical) for the temples. The whole place was amazing (see photo album).

Supachai picked us up as agreed an hour later (we hadn't paid him anything yet so he had a good incentive to return) and took us down the road to Wat Pho, which has the reclining buddha. I'd heard it was big, but man... think of a giant lying down inside a school hall.

After this Supachai took us across the river to see Wat Arun (another temple, but in the khmer style, with prangs and stuff). He came on the boat with us coz he said he could get us on for 3baht each, and that they usually charge tourists 1000 baht plus (maybe if you chose the wrong boat... or were just stupid...), but I think he did save us some money.

After this we were pretty much templed out, and Supachai suggested he take us shopping. We envisaged a market of some sort, but instead we ended up at the world largest jewellery store. It was kind of interesting (and not seedy like those scams you hear about where they offer you bags of gems to sell back in your country), but not quite the thai shopping experience we were after. Still, my man Supachai was a great asset and our afternoon in Bangkok would have been a lot different without him.

We went back to the hotel after that, ate there (again, not ultra authentic but it was "thai" food and we were tired) and went to the airport for our flight to Johannesburg...