I don’t want to take the time to write a long picture post but we just uploaded a ton of new pics to flickr. Just click the flickr feed on the left to see them. They include our day-trek around Chiang Mai, our visit to the Sukhothai historical park, the view from the top of the tallest building in Bangkok, and some New Years Eve pictures.
Bangkok is better with friends
January 1, 2008 at 11:26 am (Uncategorized)
So, we’ve spent the past two nights with people from Couchsurfing.com and have had a really fun time. Each night massive groups of people from all over the world were led around Bangkok by our very gracious and awesome Thai natives 
We’ve made some good buddies here and are hanging out with them again tonight – a Thai take on Mexican anyone? Actually, the restaurant is apparently run by a Brit and an Aussie so we’ll see what they manage to accomplish. After that, we’ll be hanging out at Patpong which is right around the corner from our hotel. Um, we hear there is a good night market to check out there . . . Dad, you might be amused or grossed out if you clicked that link. ‘
Oh, and today while walking around we found splatty animals!!!!!! Josh just added all of those exclamation points No pigs but we did get a clear egg, a chicken (that presumably came from it), and a tomato. Best.souvenirs.ever.
New Year’s dinner at Cabbages and Condoms was nice – good food (although we spent a lot of money) and a really long table of friends. After that segments of the group went to various clubs near RCA. Most of them had pretty steep covers so we opted to sit at an outdoor bar and watch the spectacle from the sidelines. Most of the Thais were dressed to the nines and I observed that Thai women are more sedate when queuing up in the bathroom when they have a few rounds of drinks in them. This worked in my benefit. Taxis were tough to come by but after two rides and 140 baht we made it back to the Baiyoke. We’re glad to be at Take A Nap now and have booked it for the last few days of the trip as well. It is right on both the subway and skytrain routes – excellent luck for meeting up with the water taxis and other forms of transport.
Despite all of our new friends, we’re making a beeline for the South in a few days and getting in a little bit of beach time before the vacation wraps up. I bought two new swimsuits for this trip and I’ve only used one for a dissapointing trip to a hotel pool that turned out to be closed and a death-defying ride on a bamboo raft in Chiang Mai. White sand is a must at this point and we think that Libong will be just our speed.
Hotel hopping
December 30, 2007 at 11:14 am (Uncategorized)
We are back in BKK and don’t plan to leave for a few more days. The past few we’ve been hotel hopping. We started at REFILL NOW – a flashpacker hostel that is tall on style but ages from the Skytrain. We might have stayed because the staff was nice, the room was beautiful, and the food was good. But the location, high price, and expensive internet access weren’t our cup of tea. Then we moved to Big John’s Backpacker hostel. GREAT NEIGHBORHOOD but disgusting little hostel – I’m not cut out for the level of roughing it – shared bathrooms are fine but not when they smell like raw sewage. So now we’re in the Pratunam area of town (not as nice as Thonglor but plenty of action) at the Baiyoke Boutique. We have access to the amenities of the Baiyoke Sky for a fraction of the price and it is hip and modern (but not nearly as clean, airy, and brand spanking new as REFILL NOW). Incidentally we could only get two nights there, so after that we’re moving again to Take A Nap in Silom – we have high hopes for it as well. All of this hotel moving has taken a lot of time but we’ve also managed some quality people-watching and daydreaming about luxury high rise condos in BKK. Tomorrow we’re going to make the tourist pilgrimage to the Grand Palace and then we’re meeting some Couchsurfing members for dinner at Cabbages and Condoms.
Last night we headed to the top floor of MBK to play Guitar Hero, eat noodles and sing karaoke. We hope to go back and make a record of the bizarre montages they play in place of Western music videos – I can’t even accurately describe how weird these videos were.
Sick
December 27, 2007 at 9:45 am (Uncategorized)
Josh and I both got sick over the last few days. Nothing terrible but enough to knock us down and keep us in bed. We did it one at a time so we were able to take care of each other but it also means we lost the most time possible. We’ve been in Sukhothai the last few days and it is a pretty slow place – we saw the historical park today and are going to head onto Bangkok tonight on an overnight train. I still haven’t had the chance to write postcards but that is on the agenda for while we’re hanging around at the train station.
Loose Ends
December 23, 2007 at 5:59 am (Automobiles, Chiang Mai, Cooking, Food, Thailand, Trains)
Today is my birthday and we’re having a slow day and relaxing. Later today I have an appointment at a nice spa to get the works and then we plan to wander the night market and have a good dinner together. Here are some videos and things that we didn’t post before. Some of the posts below are all out of order but don’t worry about it.
In other news, we can’t get train tickets in the International Express to get to Malaysia and Singapore so we’ve had to cancel that whole part of our trip. We’re sad about it but it will mean seeing a few more places in Thailand as well as more time to investigate Bangkok and the beach.
Oh, and Dad asked if all we have been doing is eating? Well, we have been eating a lot but mostly we just like taking pictures of our food and sharing it. The day that we ate the most was the day of cooking class. Here is a video of Josh cooking with high heat and flames!
Here is a video view from our train window on the way to Lopburi.
Here is a wild ride in a tuk-tuk in Bangkok (?)
Chiang Rai and the Golden Triangle
December 23, 2007 at 5:58 am (Automobiles, Chiang Rai, Sights, Thailand)
The camera pans in slowly across the scene. Quiet and unhappy people are crammed in a bus. A British man on a visa run wretches (and being British, apologizes to everyone for being sick) while two Americans scowl at the Indian couple in front of them for being rude enough to recline their seats.
On the way back to Chiang Mai from Chiang Rai, Josh turned to me and said that this was just the sort of low-key drama that could drive the conflict in an existential comedy. We booked a tour to see Chiang Rai and the Golden Triangle. I am usually hesitant about package tours and didn’t put together the fact that it was nearly 4 hours to Chiang Rai from Chiang Mai. This meant that we would spend most of our tour in a pretty stuffy van. And eat a terrible buffet lunch. Here are some picture:
Yep, that is right, the Golden Triangle is a sandbar. That is about all that it can be. But that sandbar is an international no-man’s land as it doesn’t belong to Thailand, Laos, or Myanmar. So, there is no rule of law on that sandbar – luckily it floods pretty regularly.
Some of the people on our trip got on a longtail boat to go to Laos. They were only going to have a half hour to walk around and it would have cost us 650 baht to go, so we skipped out on that.
Instead we walked around a bit and ran into some children. Aren’t they cute?
Well, a few moments before this picture was taken, they all rushed us demanding money so we could take thier picture. Here is the video. It is both cute and creepy. They are saying “1 person 5 baht”.
Here we are in a very pretty temple, you can see in the photo that my ankles are already swollen from being cramped up in a tiny van and this was only 2 hours in! They still look bad today.
So that was Chiang Rai and the Golden Triangle. Don’t take these one day package tours! We hardly got to see anything and were mostly dropped off at places to shop.
Properly getting down to monkey business
December 23, 2007 at 5:57 am (Animals, Lopburi, Shopping, Sights, Thailand, Trains)
You monkeys you! You give me back my purse!
After meandering through Lopburi for most of the day and waiting for it to cool down, we finally made our way over to the monkeys’ stomping grounds. There are monkeys all over the city but they are especially concentrated around the Phra Prang Sam Yot ruins and the Phra Kan Shrine across the street.
This town is so grateful to the monkeys that they actually have a shrine especially for them. When we visited the shrine we were lucky that the attendant there took the time to show us exactly what to do.
We bought flower offerings to leave and he taught us the protocol for leaving them, it was more elaborate than I realized. First we lit candles and then use the candles to light incense. Then the incense was placed before the altar and we proceeded up to the Buddha statue and placed our flower garlands around it. Then we added gold leaf to the Buddha statue in three places to represent our own spiritual connection: his heart, his body, and his neck. The guide was very sweet but the explanation he gave of each sounded identical: “So that you can do what you need to do.” And something about auras. I wish I spoke Thai. Next, we stepped off of the altar and rang the bell three times to signal to the “fairies” (we think he meant spirits). Then we added oil to the flame that was burning. Finally, we shook ___ and he gave us a fortune. Josh pulled on that specifically said he would have no children. I pulled one that said I would have a boy. The man read our fortunes, looked embarassed about the discrepancy and grabbed a more appropriate one for each of us!
We spent the rest of the evening wandering through the night market and waiting for our train to Chiang Mai.
Thai Cooking School
December 21, 2007 at 12:00 pm (Chiang Mai, Cooking, Food, Shopping, Thailand)
Here’s a load of pictures… we want to get a massage tonight before everything closes
*click over to the flickr page for the full sized image*
It was wonderful metting all of you! Have safe travels. Laa kawn.
Monkey business
December 19, 2007 at 8:18 am (Automobiles, Bangkok, Food, Hotels, Lopburi, Shopping, Sights, Thailand, Trains)
Yesterday morning we got a very early start and after a breakfast at the guesthouse took the Skytrain to Siam Square. We were looking for MBK Center and almost fell for a classic tuk tuk scam (“it is closed”, “I have a friend in America!”). But we made it anyway. The guidebook recommends this mall food court as an awesome place to eat. It actually is. After eating at one food court that was sort of fancy, we realized we had been at the wrong one and all of the Thai people were in the crowded bustling one upstairs. We’ll have to go back but the first one was quite delicious anyway. We probably paid twice as much and still had a huge spread of food for about 500 baht. Chinese roasted duck, Vietnamese pork sausage pho, pineapple fried rice, Chinese custard buns, and green papaya salad.
We passed up the opportunity to eat this:
After leaving MBK we went to Th Sukhumvit and looked at a small Lanna house museum. There were some very interesting videos about traditional Lanna architecture and cooking. The house was actually moved from Chiang Mai and reconstructed in the middle of Bangkok. While we were there, they were setting up for a wedding in the court yard. These must be some big spenders!After the museum we headed to the train station to pick up our train tickets for today. This required our very first tuk tuk ride. It was hair-raising and fun. Like a rollercoaster where you might actually die! Seriously, though, this is an awesome way to travel because the tuk tuks can get through traffic much easier than cars (but not as well as a motorcycle – the lines on the road are basically extra motorcycle lanes).
We were quite exhausted at this point after a day of eating and being lost and headed back to the the guesthouse. We met some nice Canadians and a Finnish woman while soaking our feet in the hotel pool and they recommended a place to get a massage.
Well, we couldn’t find the one she recommended but after wandering into a beauty salon, were directed to another one. We both received a wonderful two hour thai-style massage. I shouldn’t even tell you what it cost because you will be jealous. But I’m going to tell you anyway – 600 baht (that is about 20 bucks for both of us if you’re keeping score at home – thanks Marty and Mike, that was your Christmas gift ) Thai massage is basically a combination of shiatsu and forced yoga. You change into comfy pajama-type clothing and the masseuse very agressively kneads and stretches your body. Painful at times but ultimately very relaxing and nice. We both almost fell asleep by the end. I’m looking forward to enjoying some spa treatments soon as well.
After our massages we were basically ready for dinner and bed even though it was only 8pm. We decided to eat at the guesthouse and got an early bedtime as we had to be up quite early for the train this morning.
Today we woke up to catch an early train to Lopburi. The train ride was really lovely. We had 2nd class fan seats so the windows were open, it was pleasantly warm, and a nice breeze came in constantly. Also, the train was like a rolling buffet as food vendors came through constantly selling different treats and snacks. We had larb and rice, grilled chicken skewers, and fresh pineapple (some of the best I’ve ever tasted!). Yummy.
A view from the train:
Immediately after you walk out of the Lopburi train station, there are ancient ruins of Wat Changlon at the Sri Satchanalai Historical Park. According to my ticket stub, “The style of the main stupa at Wat Changlon derived from Singhalese art at the time as Singhalese Therevada Buddhism; as seen in the changing development from high relief figures of elephants surrounded the pedestal to three dimensional ones and the making of stucco images of walking disciples surrounded the tiers.”
Whatever, we’re here for the monkeys.
After the ruins we stopped at the tourist info center and got some handy maps. We went to the ancient temple and looked at the museum there for a bit then found a dim sum restaurant to eat at. We’ve realized that Lopburi isn’t all that exciting but it is a good place to relax and get a few things done (like blogging). After lunch we walked throught the market and I bought a fake Anna Sui wallet (!) and we looking at really silly Engrish on t-shirts. Finally, we found a mobile shop and purchased a used phone (once we realized that our phones wouldn’t take a Thai SIM card.) We now have a phone number, if you think you need it, email me
So, that brings you to this moment, we’ve been sitting in an internet cafe for a bit chewing on Pocky and checking up on emails. We’re about to head to the shrine where the monkeys live. The reason we are in Lopburi at all is that there is a native troupe of monkeys that runs all over the city. We’ve already seen them just chilling out on telephone lines and on shop signs. They are like squirrels or pigeons here!
Tonight, we’ll catch a night train to Chiang Mai where we’ll be for most of a week before starting our long trek South to Singapore.
There will be pictures added to this entry very very soon! Very soon is now but there are more, just click on the photostream to the left and enjoy the show.
We are here!
December 18, 2007 at 12:55 am (Bangkok, Food, Hotels, Planes, Thailand)
If anyone tells you that 24 hours of plane travel is a piece of cake, they are lying. But we can already tell that it is worth it. For the record, JAL has better in-flight food than Delta. However, we are off to see some of Bangkok and find a meal that will beat both of them. More impressions and some pictures when I hook my lappy up to the wireless at the hotel.
This is Josh being sleepy on a shuttle bus:
