Bangkok and Ayuthaya

As I feared I am not able to get to blogging about my trip as much as I would like. I am already over one month into my travels and a day away from my one month excursion to Vietnam and I have only managed to write four entries and only one about my Asia trip. So much has happened and I am inclined to let my memory distinguish my adventures from one another and place them in a blog worthy hierarchy, but alas I will also write about the more mundane and less noteworthy adventures perhaps much to the dismay of the discriminating reader.

Last I wrote about my first day in Bangkok. It seems like months ago. I have countless mosquito bites, a much darker complexion, and a significantly drained bank account as proof.

After my first fun filled day we spent one additional day in Bangkok. We saw Bangkok’s main attractions the Grand Palace and various smaller wats (a Buddhist temple) like the giant standing Buddha, the slightly obese Buddha, and one of the countless “lucky Buddhas” much to the satisfaction of our tuk tuk driver. This tuk tuk driver agreed to take us to all these sights for a mere 70 Bath (less than 2 US dollars) if we agreed to see the local Thai production center. It may sound like quite an attraction, but the attraction is actually a jewelry store and in exchange of ten minutes of our time browsing through the overpriced sparkling objects our tuk tuk driver received a fuel coupon. We were happy to oblige seeing as we had a tour guide at a whopping 2 dollars for one and a half hours of driving around.
By the way for those people unfamiliar with the tuk tuk, the tuk tuk is a small open air taxi found all across Asia. Its not only fun to say and to write but it is also very fun to ride. The tuk tuk is found in various shapes and sizes depending on where you are. In Bangkok, for example, they consist of a moped like steering bar and an open air single seat for the driver and behind the driver a bench for 2 comfortably sitting or three uncomfortably sitting individuals. In Ayuthaya, north of Bangkok, the tuk tuk was bigger and the seat for the driver was covered. It actually reminded me a bit of an oversized power wheel that my friends used to drive around as kids. The seat for the passengers consisted of two benches across from one another and room for about three on each bench. In southern Thailand, Krabi had mopeds with little cages attached to them with room enough for about 3-4 individuals. Whatever the case though, should you ever venture to this part of the world, make sure to take the time for a tuk tuk ride.

The evening after our tuk tuk adventures we met some friends from Germany, Sina and Mellie, who had been traveling through Vietnam and Thailand for many weeks and headed for Khao Asan road for some food, drinks, and advice. Our Thailand experienced friends introduced us to the glory of the banana pancake, which they claimed accounted for their weight gain of 4 Kg each over the previous 6 weeks. After eating one piece I decided to avoid them as much as possible. The banana pancake is basically egg, flour-water, high fructose corn syrup, and bananas fried in boiling margerine and tastes like God, whatever that may taste like. In simpler terms it was dangerously good. We were given a crash course in bartering, which is central to Asian shopping, and agreed to meet them the following afternoon in Ayuthaya with the rest of our German friends presumably arriving the following morning in Bangkok from Berlin.

The next morning we headed north via minibus for Ayuthaya, the old imperial capital of Thailand. Ayuthaya is a city that has already seen its hay day but remains a popular destination for tourists eager to explore the countless Buddhist Wats that lay in ruins across the surrounding area. We checked into our hotel and decided to wait for our friends before we went off to explore. After a few hours Sina and Mellie arrived with only three of the expected 9 friends. The other six it turns out had been stranded in Moscow. Ironically the day before, my mother had made a joke to one of our fellow mini bus passengers who asked when our friends would be arriving. My mom responded that they were supposed to arrive today but probably would not arrive until tomorrow because they were flying with Aeroflot. In this case the joke became reality. Delays and miscommunications caused our friends to miss their connecting flight in Moscow and we would have to wait until the next day for their arrival. We decided to make the best of what day we had left and went off to explore some of the temple complexes around us. We saw a giant laying Buddha draped in beautiful orange cloth. Sina explained that the fashion in which they draped the cloth around the Buddha depended entirely on the time of the year. In this case it was the end of the rainy season and so the cloth draped over one shoulder. In the winter it would drape over both shoulders and in the summer it would only drape around the lower portion of the Buddha. The peaceful look on the laying Buddha’s face and his comfortable pose made us feel the weight of gravity and so we went back to hotel for a swim and a rest. In the evening we headed down the street to walk through the wet market, an experience for the senses and a test of strength for the stomach. The wet market was a series of tiny stalls with freshly butchered beef, chicken, pork, and fish. The smell was intrusive as we walked from one stall to the next. I was struck by the lack of refrigeration and the flies, which flew uninhibited from item to item. Stray dogs roamed along the narrow pathways, stopping every few minutes to scratch a flea that was trying for an evening snack. Other dogs stood on the food stands. It was clear the their idea of cleanliness was not the same as ours and I fell into a brief day dream about an experiment I had learned about in high school where a scientist took two jars with meat in them. One was covered with a cheese cloth and the other was not. The next day that without was found to have a large flourishing population of larva. I shuttered at the thought. Sunset was rapidly approaching and we embarked upon a quest to find a temple for which the sunset could act as a backdrop. There is nothing like a sunset over an ancient ruin.

The following day we woke up late and waited impatiently for our misfortunately delayed friends to arrive. When they finally did we listened to a detailed account of their Russian layover in which they were brought to a highly secure and isolated portion of a hotel and watched closely to ensure they would not abuse their lack of a visa. Finally though team 40th Birthday party was united. I may have mentioned before that the original reason for this trip was the celebration of some of our friends 40th birthday. We spent the day visiting further wats in one of which I managed to trip over a decayed stair and break my camera. Very very sad. The next morning we headed to BKK airport for our flight down to the beaches of southern Thailand where more adventures awaited us.