27 Oct
We arrived in Bangkok. It was a brand new airport and quite impressive. After getting information at the TAT office (Thailand Authority for Tourism), we took the bus downtown. It was about a 1.5 hour bus ride. We got off at Khao San Road. It is the backpacker’s area of the city. It was full of cheap hotels (though clean), street food, and knockoff clothes. We spent the rest of the day exploring the area, eating dinner (pad thai on the street for about 50 cents), and having a few drinks. It was nice to get to Bangkok. It was much cleaner than Africa and not as much hassle.
28 Oct
Today we headed downtown to start to book our travels in SE Asia. We took a cab to (what we thought) was a TAT office. As we found out later, it was a travel agent calling themselves TAT. We used representative to book transportation and lodging throughout Thailand for approx. the next 15 days. It was under budget, so we took the package. After that we went to a tailor to get suits made. We went to Golden Wool, a reputable tailor…not one that advertised $90 suits. I got one suit, Tamara 2, and Conor 3. We selected fabrics and got measured. The fabrics were quite nice. Armani label fabric was the low end. I went upstairs and checked out the working conditions. They were a little rough by US standards. Lots of people working in a close area and no AC. We took the river ferry back to the Khao San area and had a relaxing area. The ferry went by multiple temples along the river.
29 Oct
We hit the tourist spots in full force today. First we went to the Grand Palace/Emerald Budda. It was really ornate with lots of gold and vibrant colors. After that we went to the Reclining Budda. The last Wat (temple) of the day was across the river. That was enough Wat’s. They are quite amazing, but I did not know enough to fully appreciate them. Next stop was Chinatown for lunch. I had some mushroom soup on the street. It was quite good. In the evening, we attended Muy Thai (thai kick boxing). It was pretty exciting. We walked through the red light district on the way back to the hotel. It was quite sad.
30 Oct
Before we got on the night train to Chang Mai, we attended our suit fitting. Mine fit quite well. We had lunch, shopped and picked up our train tickets. It was a slow day. In the evening we got on our train. We were in a 2nd class sleeper car. They served dinner. It was quite comfortable. It was the best train so far.
31 Oct
When we woke up, we were just outside of Chang Mai. It was a country landscape and quite green. Very different from he modern Bangkok. Upon arrival, we checked into our hostel. We walked into town and found a northern Thai/Burmese restaurant. It was good and different. A different flavor set than thai food in the west and even in Bangkok. We explored the town and the Wat’s for the rest of the day. The highlight was a Wat on the top of a local hill/mountain. We took a truck up to it and then climbed over 300 steps. It was very ornate and had great views of the city and surrounding valley. I used the internet and for the first (but definitely not the last) used the internet side by side monks. I was uneducated on monks, but many are teenagers there for a few years of schooling and use technology like everyone else. Chang Mai is a nice city surrounded by a moat. After dinner, Conor and I got massages ($8 USN per hour).
# posted by Adam @ 9:14 PM
