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Enjoy your stay

(Do forgive me for this extremely late post, but there were a lot of photos to upload and I was getting lazy. Blogger's sluggish uploading widget never fails to get on my nerves as well.)


Right, I do have to admit that this overseas trip to Bangkok was not all fun and games, maybe a little bit more on the side of bile and pile? But I'll get to that later, let's check out the plane.

If you do remember a previous post, something about my fascination with planes did pop up. Here's the plane I took to Thailand in the middle of its refueling and inspection process. Cathay Pacific ftw.


We went as a tour group, and over here at a hotel lobby, the tour guide helped my family and I snap a picture. This hotel wasn't the one which I bunked in, it's another couple's who are also in the same tour group, which brings to mind why we even took this picture here at all.

Speaking of my own accommodation, the first thing I noticed about my hotel room was the breathtaking view it provided. To me, at least.

Big, wide windows overlooking a busy city, just right beside the bed.

And when you look down, spectacular glimmering blue.


The first night. We look at Singapore's roads, sigh and say, "How congested." But look at this, it's hellish Armageddon for the drivers. The beautiful lights belonging to nightlife does help to lessen the eyesore.

Another reason why it was so congested could be because that day was the Thai Emperor's birthday, the 5th of December. Cool, first day I arrive and I'm greeted by celebrations.

Night life is bustling in Bangkok. A considerable amount of roadside diners on the left.


Skilled, bro. Now go serve up those... what, squid? Chicken?

The next day we went for a boat ride at one of the rivers... Shit, I forgot to take note of the river name. But anyway, Bangkok has 2 floating markets, this is one of them. However, this one is relatively quiet compared to the latter. Throughout this whole boat ride, I only managed to see 2 sampans. A floating market and only 2 sampans... The other one is the more well-known one, but it is also the one which we did not have to fortune to visit as it was too far away from the city centre.

Just in case you're wondering, Google brings up the other one which I didn't visit:


One thing you should know about Thailand, they have a freaking huge amount of temples, and you think of overkill... They're a largely Buddhist community, and almost everywhere I go it's temples, temples, and... ok, let's be fair, sometimes they just erect a small shrine.



During the 1998 Asian Financial Crisis, Thailand was hit hard. You might find it hard to believe, but the building under construction on the right has been left in that state for quite a few years already. See the contrast?


A while back, there were news reports of Bangkok possibly being flooded in a few more decades' time. I could see how that could happen.

And then, the tour group went straight to - you guessed it, a temple. It's a good tourist attraction, with staggering architectural structures.


Our tour guide figured a family photo here would be too good a chance to be passed up, so there you go.


See what I meant by architectural wonders? No, no sarcasm here, just fascination on my part. After all, this was built in A.D 1400. Next up, the climb.


I wonder if people of the past then had longer legs than we did, the flight of stairs leading to the peak of this tower was 3 or 4 times the height of a normal step.


My mother... a native Thai yet never had the chance to try out the nation's traditional costume. They offered a costume renting service there, and so off we went on a photo-taking spree.

Do I exude a uncomfortable-and-wanna-get-the-hell-outta-here body language? I hope not.


The next picture may look a bit carnal, I apologise, but I just thought you might be interested in seeing something not often seen in Singapore.


The usage and maintainence of this device is self-explanatory, no user manual required.
What I'm getting at is, c'mon, no piping?


We went to a sparkling stop at our next venue. Bangkok's Gemstone Exhibition. A little bit of background... Thailand does have their own mining caves, in fact, ancient royal jewelery of Siam are often saturated with rubies and other gemstones like emerald, but mostly rubies. That's because the country has a lot of ruby mines. That, plus some of silver and gold. For many gemstone collectors, Thailand does have a reputation for valuable gems.

Now for the photos, I risked my life to get these, and I mean it somewhat literally. No one inside is supposed to take photos, security reasons. Moreover, they've got a guard at the entrance holding a gigantic automatic rifle. But now that I come to think of it, one big exhibition crammed full of valuables and only one guard? They'd better have more, because one guard is really...underestimating the situation.





Even then, the pictures are still blurred, couldn't wait long enough for the focus to kick in. If I were to stand there with the camera held up high waiting for the damn focus, I'd be a sitting duck for rifle target practice. Well anyway, you can see the glass casings. Those contain the highly-coveted gems.



Up on the agenda comes Bangkok's Cultural Centre. Yes, they do pay attention to National Education as well.

At the entrance we see a miniature floating market (Great, more sampans.) whose purpose was to give visitors a simulation of the real thing.


Inside we got to see some of the traditional arts of pottery.



And here is the making of flower accessories by three Thai girls. Did anyone say CBA? I thought so. (High-fives for the I.T club guys.)

I'm not sure what to call this. But it's chiseling of some sort to carve out appealing patterns on cups and other crockery.


Not forgetting, Thailand's sacred animal. What a heartwarming mother and child photo. The elephants you see here are ferrying around tourists for a small fee, and these elephants will be participating in this little show you see here...


That's two elephants dancing in the background. Yup, dancing.



Located right beside a busy intersection, this is the Four-Faced Buddha which receives many visitors a day. Known to be the bringer of wealth, I even saw a man who got traditional dancers and musicians to the site for a thank-you ritual. Probably struck it rich after praying here, I guess. Hm, might as well upload the photo:

That's the procession on the left side. See the man in white kneeling down? That's the rich fellow, I think. I mean, such a celebration does have to cost quite a bit of dough.



The next day, we were engrossed with rollercoasters, thrill rides, and the likes. Yup, a theme park.




As seen in the background, 'Dream World'. Not really the dream place for me though, I'll get to that soon.

Ok, I took 2 rollercoasters, one of which none of my family members wanted to go onto, they chickened out. A 4D Theatre, got my hair messed up by the wind simulation. A few thrill rides, lotsa G forces swinging around. There was my favourite, Go Karts. Sigh, can't believe that me, a true blue auto enthusiast, is trying out Go Karts for the first time.

Alright... this bucket spins at terrifying speeds to turn its riders' stomachs into spin dryers. That's me in the bucket, the one looking backwards, while my Mum fires the camera. Poor people at the front... Camera flash baby!


This was the batch of Go Kart racers before me. Now, the reason why I said I regretted only trying out Go Karts so late in my life was because... goddamnit, this thing is exhilarating! Words are not enough to describe it.
Extra bonus, managed to snatch a 1st place out of 8 racers.


After the pedal to the metal, we went for a show. Not just any show, Dream World has its own Hollywood Live Theatre.





A counter-terrorism act. Pretty cool, explosions were real. And realistic environments. Did I mention the fighting?

Couldn't resist the sight of another rollercoaster after the show so...



Here I am in queue waiting for my turn, as I watch fear quickly register on the many riders' faces.


I had lunch at a buffet restaurant at Dream World... Again, it wasn't exactly dream-like. Because, food-poisoning followed afterwards...

That night's dinner buffet was still buffet. But I was more looking forward to this because it's not everytime I get to have dinner whilst being 83 storeys up in the sky.


Baiyoke Sky Hotel, tallest building in Thailand, a total of 85 storeys.

This photo was taken at the very top, the hotel's very own rotating observatory.

Again, our tour guide-cum-photographer...


Dazzling, isn't it? Under the shroud of the evening mist, the city emits a mysterious calling.


Right, over here we were enjoying our meal. I think, around this time my stomach was already churning.

Given the price of that night's buffet dinner, to actually pour it all away into the toilet via my mouth later on wasn't exactly what I had in mind. But vomited I did. Vomited a total of 3 times in one night. That's a first. One in Baiyoke Sky Hotel's toilet, another in the hospital, and the third time on the... ugh, the third time in public. Everyone has their uglier sides come out one way or another, purposely or not. Had diarrhea for the following 2 days, must've lost quite a bit of weight there...


Alright, nothing much happened for the next few days before I returned because the tour had finished and the remaining days were mostly left for shopping. Just a little bit of trivia here and there.


Went to Bangkok's Chinatown for a little quick look of our own.
A narrow street already filled with roadside stalls, one might think that this place is too small for people to walk through...

And whoa-la! Out comes a pick-up truck! Good ol' traffic conveniences.

Refreshments in a Chinese restaurant after tiresome walking and shopping.


Decided to have bird nest since the ones in Singapore would most likely blast our pockets to hell and beyond.


Caught this traffic offender who drives Thailand's traditional taxis on camera while on my way back to the hotel. See the clamp on the front wheel? And all these unfolds while a disgruntled taxi driver stands on the right...



While on a daily night hunt for food, I passed a bridge stretching over a canal. Yup, that's a boat you see on the canal. Just so you know, some people there use the canal boats as a form of transport to get home after work. Despite the stink of the water, people still queue up to ride the boats because it is their quickest and cheapest way home.


High-class cuisine the day before, and roadside delicacies the day after. Look people, the chef's secrets are for all to see!


That's about it, this dinner was the last one I had before leaving for home again.

This photo was taken at Suvarnabhumi International Airport while waiting for my flight.


I've played my share, bought a fair share of clothes and other stuff, vomited my share as well. One thing I like about going over to other countries... The acquiring of cultural knowledge belonging to different people living in conditions swaying away from our own. Sure, the hygiene there is far from perfect, but the people there are nice. Now, Mister Edward may tell you in mundane repetition that the word 'nice' cannot be used as it is too shallow a word. But that's what I can say about the City of Smiles, the people there are really nice. I can't even remembered the number of times we rescued by kind Thais who pulled us out of several obstacles. There was even one lady who offered help on her own will when she saw us standing at the MRT Route Map, staring at the board in confusion.

As I've hoped I'd shown in this post, the different social practices I saw in their country. For instance, their shopping, their roads and transport, or even their geographical data.

"I do have to admit that this overseas trip was not all fun and games"... Yea, I really hope I won't have to puke like that ever again, it was horrible, intense jeopardy of my digestive health... 3 times of vomiting in one night, will was the only thing that kept me from buckling in the streets.

Which brings me... While I was lying on the hospital bed that night, I had 2 injections, both administered by a somewhat decent-looking female doctor. Was it because I felt that she was my saviour and thus was an angelic being in my mind's eye, or was it something else? She wasn't hands-on beautiful, but decent-looking. For that moment, I felt that she looked perfect, really like an angel...

Not that I should pay too much mind to it, that time I was drifting in and out of consciousness, perhaps some wires in my head came loose or something. Besides, I've read in psychology books before about how patients could fall in love with their doctors, but also about how these things are often just short-term. Let me do some more revision and research and I'll get back to you on the next post...