29th September 2014

I would have stayed longer in Cambodia but I was due to meet Stewart who was flying out for a ten day holiday.
First of all we stayed in the Sukhumvit area, and hit a few of the Bangkok bars in the local area.  The fact that the first one was called ‘Shag Bar’ should have enlightened us as to what kind of bar it was, yes it really was that literal!  Several old white guys with young Thai girls clinging onto them, sitting on their laps etc etc!  It was amusing anyway.  We left this bar and went to another, only to be met with the same ‘staff’ and clientelle, but what the hell, they were playing good music, the drinks were flowing and we were chatting to some people at the bar anyhow.  We were in Bangkok after all, what would your trip be if you weren’t sat in a bar full of prostitutes?!!  Pretty sure these were all of the female variety though! 

One evening when we were walking down the street there were a couple of ladyboys sat at a bus stop, who were giggling and pointing at Stewart and were obviously eyeing him up!  I think he was secretly flattered 😉

Staying in this area we were near China Town, and so one evening we found an entire street full of food stalls, and so we did a tour of all the street food, eating as we went.  We had little pots of corn, potato balls, spicy chicken sticks, but by far the best were the chilli and lemongrass sausages – lush! (Not sure how classically Chinese these are though?!!)  We finished the evening off by opting for a very Chinese dish, crispy duck and rice, mmmmm.

The next stop in Bangkok was near The Asiatique Centre, a new complex of bars and restaurants, and home to Bangkok’s big wheel.  It was a good spot for one night, but I wouldn’t recommend any longer as there is nothing else in the immediate area, and once you’ve been there once, you probably wouldn’t need to go again. 

The problem with Bangkok, is it is huge!  Huge, sprawling, a bit dirty, and a lot drab in places!  I was struggling to like it.  Everything was just so far apart, and walking everywhere was impossible. 

A few pics from around the city

The third place we stayed was the Khao San Road backpacker tourist area.  It was a large collection of lots of boozy joints with lots of shopping and good food options.  It was great for going out for a few drinks in the evening, although we tended to go one street down from Khao San Road which wasn’t so ‘clubby’, and had a more laid back vibe with a lot of live music. 

Here we ate scorpions!

Other stuff was on offer too but I really couldn’t bring myself to crunch on a cockroach or bite into the fat body of a tarantula, I have my limits!

We also met a great Australian guy called Terry, and spent an evening on the beers with him.

Partaking in a bit of Guinness drinking

We did also partake in some cultural activity whilst in Bangkok, rather than just consuming alcohol!

Wat Arun

A day in any town is never complete without local cat pics!

And a token husky in a sidecar!

We also did a cooking lesson in Bangkok,  which was slightly spoiled by the previous night’s consumption of a little too much alcohol in the prostitute bars!

Stewart couldn’t even eat what he’d cooked he felt so rough.  It didn’t help that at the start of our lesson we went to a stinking local market, the smell was indescribable but was certainly not a pleasant one.  I, however, was determined to try to enjoy it, and the Thai Green curry I cooked was pretty good 🙂

I guess the smell was a mixture of all the following:

Painted pink eggs

Mmm chicken feet. A whole mountain of them!

A bowl of, er, worms?

The orange things are how chicken eggs start out!

More dead things…

Trust me when I say these fish absolutely stank!

A fish getting battered (not in the coated sense!)

More poor little tortoise type creatures

Bigger worms!

Tongues ‘n’ ears

And Stewart’s face says it all…..this market was not the place to be hungover!!!

The cooking class

It took a while to like Bangkok, and I did begin to in the end, but not sure I’d jump at the chance to go back though……