Day 21: 29/6/13
I'd a nice day today wandering around Bangkok. I didn't sleep as long as I thought so I had took my time having a shower and sorting myself out! I woke at 4am and kept waking after that so obviously my body is still in Australian time!
It's amazing how much you appreciate the things in a hotel though, after living in a hostel for so long! The double bed was really wide- when I lay in the middle and put my hands out, I couldn't reach either of the sides! My legs were near the end though so it's obviously for short people- if you were six foot you'd be sticking out over the edge! I reckon the bed would fit about four Thais easily!! There was air conditioning And free water, as well as free wifi. Obviously I had my own bathroom and I got very excited when I saw they had shampoo and shower gel!
I went for a wander then. I intended to find Khao San road which is the main tourist area and maybe see the grand palace. There were loads of stalls all the way down the street, mostly selling food- everything from fried chicken, rice, pineapples, nuts, spring rolls and lots of unidentified objects! There was a supermarket aswell and I bought stuff like sun cream, insect repellent, toothpast and deoderant that I needed. I walked a bit further and saw Khoa San road and I walked along it. There were loads of guys offering me tuc-tuc rides and trying to sell me clothes, food, jewellery- anything that was on their stall!!
One guy stopped me and said I looked like some queen that he named because I have a moon shaped face. I kept walking but then he sounded a bit cross so I stopped. He said I had a moon face but he could see on my forehead that I was always thinking. He said there were three main happinesses in my life and mentioned something in September. He said I wasn't satisfied in my love life and he could tell me why. He said that he was a yogi and I obviously didn't know him so he could prove that he was telling the truth by telling me my name. He said to come over here which I thought was just to step aside and then he started heading towards an alley, saying his temple was there so I said no thanks and off I went! I wonder what's going to happen in September though!!
Khao San road was pretty cool though with every kind of a stall you could imagine as well as pubs, restaurants, hotels, hostels, etc.I walked to the end of Khao San road and then decided to do a loop and go to the grand palace. But I was walking along a big main road and I somehow missed the pedestrian crossing and couldn't see how I would get over to the grand palace so I decided to go back to the hotel again for a little while. At this stage, the sweat was out through me anyway! I was absolutely roasting!! On the way back I finally found a hat that fit my head! He charged me 180 bhat for it which is about $6. I tried to barter but he was having none of it so I just paid him as it's the first hat that has fitted me in a long time!! I had all my bhat spent at this stage as well and I was freaking out a bit about how much I spent but when I got back to the hotel I realised I'd only spent €21 today and gotten a hat, sun cream, insect repellent, a tooth brush and I don't know what else- so it was still cheap!!
After a cool down in the room, I headed for the palace again. A guy stopped me and asked where I was going and that he'd give me directions. When I said the grand palace he said it was closed until 3 and that it was Buddhas day so that I should go to see all these temples that were free in the mean time. He could organise a tuc-tuc to bring me around to all these temples and they'd wait for me and then bring me back to the palace. He wrote it all down for me and I was to go to the next tuc-tuc a little further up the road, but I didn't want to go in a tuc-tuc on my own so I kept walking past them and said Maybe later. I don't think he was impressed!
Because he said the palace wasn't open I walked a little in the other direction just to see what the city was like and I passed cool temples and things. There's a temple beside the palace anyway so I went in there. The guy had said temples were free today but I had to pay to go in there! It was Wat Pho temple and I think it may be te biggest in Bangkok? It was like a whole village with loads of different buildings inside it. They were white but the roofs were tiled with green, red, orange and yellow and there was lots of gold decoration. There were some statue type designs aswell that were really intricate. Inside some of the buildings were Buddhas. I saw a sitting Buddha first. Then there was a reclining Buddha. This one seemed to be huge- maybe 10 metres long? It was all gold and the building had self had loads of detailed paintings and gold frames and things. Even the sole of the Buddhas feet had opal set in it, in lots of different patterns. It had to have cost a fortune!! So it's not only Catholics that have expensive buildings and lots of poor people outside them!
There was a good luck Buddha that was standing up tall and another sitting Buddha aswell. For all of these you had to take off your shoes and hat and cover your shoulders and knees. There were lots of people around aswell and lots of Asian people giving donations where he Buddhas were.
Afterwards I went to the grand palace. It took me ages to walk around it and find the entrance and then I saw the sign said it was closed at 3:30 and it was now 3:35. I was annoyed with myself for having believed the tuc-tuc guy! I had been thinking how nice it was of him to have saved me a wasted journey at 1 o'clock! There were loads of people coming out of the grand palace but they weren't letting anyone in- so I'll have to go back another time! Oh well!!
It was probably a blessing in disguise really as I hadn't had enough water and it was really hot! I had been walking for a good few hours at this stage so by the time I got to Khao San road I was under a bit of pressure! I went to a restaurant and had lots to drink and then ate some curry and I recovered, but I sat there for a good while before I headed off again!!
I thought I wouldn't like the place and I'd find it quite scary but I really like the place, apart from the smell! There's a dirty water smell everywhere and then the mixes of food being cooked everywhere is strange too! The people aren't as pushy as I thought they'd be though and it's cleaner than I expected so I'm well impressed! The temples make it look really pretty aswell. I think some of the cites in South America were worse than Bangkok!
In the evening I spent ages on the laptop on YouTube and other websites just arsing around- I haven't had unlimited wifi in a long time! So, after all that surfing the net it's late and I'm tired so I'll rewrite the blog properly tomorrow. I have a lot of blogs to fix now!