Thailand Part III: One—er, Two (more) Nights in Bangkok

Thailand: August 14-21, 2009

So, for our last full day in Bangkok we had a hearty breakfast of beloved porkers, and headed out to see the Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho. We decided to take a boat taxi, rather than work off our breakfast by walking, or by haggling with a tuk-tuk or taxi driver. The boat taxis—or ferries, or whatever they call them—are cheap and run on a pretty regular basis. Although some only stop at certain stops, and we had to catch one back to our stop.

Big toes of the reclining Buddha

I had no idea how big this Reclining Buddha was—it filled a couple of rooms and was at least 2 stories high. It was awesome! I enjoyed all the Thai schoolchildren who were visiting—each one in a faded red top, matching black shoes for girls and brown shoes and socks for boys. A few said “hello” and waved—for the first time on my trip, I felt like I was getting a lot of attention—I felt like I was back at home!

Kat and I headed down to Chinatown where we found a huge area with stores selling lots of things we didn’t need. Then we headed to the Royal Barge Museum. That took a while—ok, about an hour—to find. We couldn’t figure out our ferry stop, then we followed a sign for “museum,” but it turned out to be for a hospital museum. We finally hailed a taxi—metered, to be sure—and he knew where to take us. He was pulled over after an illegal U-turn. He continued haggling with the traffic cop after offering him 20 baht ($0.75). A matter of principal, Katrina and I mused—the cop won’t take bribes! Not so—50 baht did the trick and we drove on. It still took a while to follow a winding, narrow path route to finally find this big building with royal long boats.

One highlight involved food, of course. I walked by a street vendor selling what appeared to be fuzzy bean pods. When this sigh registered in my brain, I asked outloud “Edamame?” and went back to inspect. The vendor gave me a sample. No, it was not edamame, but it was the closest I had come to it in 2 ½ months. So I bought a baggie of it and had a nice, healthy snack. Kat also bought a bottle of coke, but the vendor wouldn’t let her walk away with it. She gestured to a tiny plastic bag, Kat nodded, and dumped the drink in with some ice and a straw. Truly “take away!”

Close encounters of the edamame kind...

"You want that to go?"

Our last supper in Bangkok involved entering a restaurant/hotel from the back: walking down a dark alley, up a set of metal stairs, walking through a second floor lobby--and arriving at a swank spot. The food was fantastic: cucumber and tomato salad, falafel, hummus and chick peas, and baba ganoush. I was happy breaking away from the paad thai...but sad to break away from our Thai vacation the next day.

Fabulous Middle Eastern in...Thailand!

Photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/summerbclewis/ThailandAugust21282009#