Entranceway

After our boat ride down the Chao Phraya River, we went to this restaurant to eat, which restaurant was possibly the D’jit Pochana Restaurant. But I do know I definitely took these photos after the boat ride (don’t you just love EXIF data).

The food was okay, nothing too memorable. I think I was avoiding dishes that seemed a bit too mafan to pick through, like crabs or fish. Just wasn’t in the mood I guess.

Actually the restaurant seems to be a pretty popular/famous one. Hmm.

While waiting for everyone to finish lunch, I wandered around the outside garden area. It was surprisingly full of creepy animal statues.

After lunch we hopped onto the tour buses again to go somewhere a bit further away from the city centre to this shop which sold only honey products. This place had a bee farm somewhere in Thailand. They sold royal jelly, bee pollen and of course honey. I think this sort of healthfood products are very popular with Malaysians also because it has anti-ageing properties too. The place received tour groups often - they have smaller rooms where one of the shop people would give an entertaining introduction to what bee pollen/royal jelly was, the beneficial properties, etc etc. There was a Taiwanese tour group that was there at the same time as us, and they had a Mandarin speaking presenter all ready too. Oh and it’s meant to be cheaper and just as good as bee products from Australia/NZ. Meh.

The royal jelly is surprisingly not sweeet at all. It is sour and has a mildly spicy flavour. The bee pollen was akin to honey-flavoured crunchy bits of dust. -_-

Anyway I bought a jar royal jelly for my granny since she likes this sort of stuff. It was pretty pricey too. I think I used up my last bits of baht on it too (subsequently had to borrow money off my aunt, egad).

On Day 3 in Bangkok we went off to the Chao Phraya Floating Market in the morning. From memory, because of the delay on the first day, the tour itinery had to be reshuffled and possibly because of that we didn’t get to go to the “proper” floating market.

Thailand has alot of waterways and alot of commerce is conducted on them. The locals who live next to/ on the waterways buy household goods, groceries, etc, from vendors on little boats passing through their stretch of the river. Pretty convenient eh? During the peak market hours the whole river is jammed so full with little boats that one can “browse” the marketplace by stepping from boat to boat.

Unfortunately due to the traditional way of life being replaced by people moving to more modern housing like apartment blocks (I think) demand for these sorts of markets have decreased, and the markets themselves have gotten smaller n smaller until only the boats catering to tourists are left.

The markets still exist and are busier the farther away you get from the city centre of Bangkok though.

The initial plan was to wake up reaaally early and to bus it all the way up to these still-flourishing markets. But we didn’t have enough time and just visited the one that was in the middle of Bangkok.

There were only a few boats, all selling stuff for tourists only. Quite uninteresting, but I feel sorry for the vendors because no one really wanted to buy their crappy souvenirs…

The scenary on the banks was reasonable. Actually it looked a bit dull because it was a cloudy day. the most exciting part of the boat ride though were the GIGANTIC catfish in the river. Many of them easily reached up to 1m in length. You could pay for loaves of bread to feed the fish. I love feeding fish :3

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Bangkok - Jewellry centre

After our tour of the Grand Palace, we dropped by quickly at this jewellry centre in Bangkok, then we had a buffet lunch at SD Avenue Hotel. Actually I don’t really remember since it’s been about a year since, and our tour itinery got shuffled around so I can’t rely on the tour schedule pamphlet either. However! EXIF data has come to the rescue! What is EXIF data?

Almost all new digital cameras save JPEG (jpg) files with EXIF (Exchangeable Image File) data. Camera settings and scene information are recorded by the camera into the image file. Examples of stored information are shutter speed, date and time, focal length, exposure compensation, metering pattern and if a flash was used.

- from Digicam help

Very helpful information for getting my timelines right.

The jewellry centre had a section where you could see the Thai jewellers at work. Tried to take some photos but was told not to, resulting in only one blurry shot. Thailand is rich in sapphires, if I remember correctly. At the back, past the jewellers was a large room filled with display cases of Thai-manufactured jewellry. Very sparkly.

We had a late lunch after that. The buffet wasn’t too bad. There was a girl playing a traditional Thai instrument while wearing some traditional Thai clothes. Quite nice.

I liked the salady type foods the best.

The servers would make the crepes (middle photo below) in front of you (IIRC), and they would spoon in some shredded vegetables which had been tossed together with a spicy and sour dressing. Great mix of textures, great flavour, yum. Should have eaten another one >.<

The other thing that stood out was the Thai-style salad in the bottom right photo. Don't know what it's called again. The server was mixing up the salad dressing fresh in a big mortar and pestle. There were lots of chillies and peanuts and what not in the mixture. At the end of the smashing she spooned the dressing over the prepared shredded vegetables. It was very spicy but so refreshing. And I am a sucker for peanuts in food.

The photo on the left is a dessert I had. It's a mixture of chendol (sweetened green dropped starch), grass jelly with sweet potato and basil seeds. It was in a possibly pandan-flavoured syrup. Not too bad.

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These photos were taken on the way to the exit of the palace complex. It’s prettyinteresting to see the mix of western style buildings and traditional thai buildings here. I think these buildings contained some administrative/governmental arms. Or at least they used to? I wish the Grand Palace had more explanatory signs. Like title of building, what it was used for, etc. Like in the Forbidden City or the various gungs in Seoul. If I can understand what it’s used for, it will have more of an impact. As it was, I just saw some pretty looking buildings.

Actually I didn’t really like the buildings here. A lot of them were undergoing renovation. I think they were mostly western (which was fine. It looked elegant), but then they started adding Thai-styled rooftops to the buildings (3rd pic). It looks terrible. You’re either one or the other!

In other news, Exams are coming up soon. Eek.

Mousover for captions.

The Grand Palace in Thailand again. Write up of the Palace was in a previous post here.

Anyway, one week after I cut my fringe, I got another haircut. Will post up photos later. It’s really short now though >.<

I've been spending many hours of work/uni. I need a holiday >.<

Today will be a lazy post since I’m too tired to do anything else. Hooray for drafts!
Drafts>> When you feel like blogging but don’t want to flood your blog with 10 posts in one day. And then when you don’t feel like blogging you already have a selection of drafts to pick from and publish!

I had a heaps busy day at work today. After dinner I met up with James, and somehow I ended up at a radio station. So anyway, I’ve made my debut (:P) on a community radio station programme called J-talk.

Basically it’s a weekly 1 hour program sponsored by the Australia Japan Association. One hour goes by heaps quickly though! Normally they play maybe 3 songs, have a Guest’s corner where they interview someone, and also talk about upcoming Japan-related events.

So James and I were in the Guest’s corner this week. They talked about his film making and I talked about my favourite Japanese foods. Like otoro >:D

It was a bit embarassing, bit strange, but all good fun.

Today’s photos were taken at the Grand Palace in Bangkok, Thailand. Mouseover the images for captions.

   

Save for a handful of dishes, I reckon now that I’ve had better Thai food in little ol’ Adelaide though. Banzai Star of Siam (Gouger Street)! 

Oh, Mu’s (or was it Nu’s?) on Gouger Street is pretty good too.

And now I’m reeeaally hungry.

It’s lunch time now and I haven’t had anything to eat since lunch time yesterterday. I guess this means I’ll lose weight. Since I’ve gained 2 kg over the last year that’s a good thing, right?

Feeling incredibly sleepy too since I woke up at 6 am today to finish an assignment. Definitely looking forward to some tucker.

Phra siratana chedi

Temple of the Emerald Buddha

Chedi and Mondop

Temple of the Emerald Buddha

Thai coca cola

Well, the next day we got up bright and early and bussed off to the Grand Palace. Even though it’s the main palace of the Thai royal family, they don’t stay there. The place they stay looks more like a farm. That’s because the king likes to experiment with farming methods, to try to come up with better methods to help out his people. He really does a lot to try to help his people, travelling around the countryside (which isn’t easy - bad roads) for much of his time, etc etc. Anyway, he is very much respected and loved by the Thais. Now that’s a nice change. A monarch who is actively serving the people. It is unfortunate that that is the exception rather than the rule.

I mean, I’m sure quite a lot of monarchs help out charities, and visit sick people in hospitals, and ummm….what else do they do, really? Whatever good they may bring by bringing publicity to whatever issue/organisation/cause, or bringing in tourism, or developing culture…well I don’t think the difference between that and the money they’re sucking up from the tax payers is much different, really.

With the amount of money/respect/adoration they get, it’s should be natural that they would try a bit harder ~.~
(I don’t care if you have a busy schedule opening events/giving speeches. That’s just window dressing and doesn’t really do much of itself. Do as the Thai king does >.>)

Well some say the monarchy gives them a warm fuzzy feeling. But calculate how much of your paycheck is going to it - is the fuzzy feeling really worth that much? Monarchy - the opiate of the masses!

Anyway. The Grand Palace. Mweh. It was horribly hot and sunny. I had to change the camera settings (otherwise nothing would be seen) so maybe the sky looks a bit dark? It was absolutely packed with tourists. And the buildings were really tighly packed together. It just felt really cramped. It was shiny too. Urgh…glaring sun >.<

And I couldn't hear the tour guide at all...man, he really should have used a megaphone like most of the other tour guides around >.<

It was actually completely unimpressive, especially coming so soon from after my China trip :/

But most of the photos I took during my 4 day (so that translates to 2 days in reality, due to arriving late on the first day, and going early on the last day) stay in Bangkok would have been in the Grand Palace. Really good photo op place, if not for the bazillions of tourists around. And the fact that it's really hard to get a clear shot of anything because there will always be other buildings in the way/in the background.

It was also really hard to title these photos! I was walking around in an annoyed heated up daze, so I didn't take note of what building was called what. It would have helped if there were signs with the building name and a bit of history about the building, because normally I take photos of the blurb, to peruse later when I actually blog. What, you think I really remembered the names of all the buildings, and their history?

Or, if there were signs in the Grand Palace, they were too small to notice >.>

So I had this little map of the Grand Palace, and I had to pore over this not-very-detailed map, and to compare the bird’s eye view with the little sketches on the back of the map with my photos, to try to figure out which building was what. I also had to sort of reconstruct my tour route around the Palace - “no, this building can’t be [x], I took the photo too early, and we were nowhere in the vicinity at that time, so by reference to the identifiable buildings that I took photos of at around the same time as I took the photo of the building sthe subject of this pondering, it must be [y]“.

Hmm, I was just looking over the entries I have planned for Thailand, and I don’t think they will be very accurate at all. I know I went to x places, but were they on day 2 or day 3? I didn’t keep notes like in China/Korea, because I had the tour itinery. But the tour itinery was jumbled up because of the delayed flight on day 1 ~.~

Oooh well…

All photos in this entry were taken during my tour of the Grand Palace in Bangkok.

Part of roof of Vieseschaisri gate

Passageway to the ticketing booths

Lawn next to Vieseschaisri gate entrance

Chedi structure in the background

Roof eaves detail

Travelling
After my extremely memorable trip to China with Ray, Alice, David and Kate, I went off to Bangers (ie Bangkok). Actually I had to make sure we got back to Hong Kong in time for me to get to Bangkok. Pity though, a few more days and we could have gone to the (potentially dodgy) amusement park in Shenzhen.

I was in Bangkok for only a few days; 23-26 June 2005. Actually it was a private tour my aunt, who works as a travel agent, was organising for a company. The tour group had maybe 50+ people, and we took up 2 bus loads.

I arrived quite early on the 23rd (departure 8:55, arrival 10:30). Airplane fare from Hong Kong to Bangkok was HKD$2242 via Cathay Pacific. It was really expensive, but given the timings and limited seat availability, I had no choice >.<

This is really annoying considering how cheap it is to fly form Singapore to Bangkok!! And Hong Kong is nearer! Gah!

Small comfort that I somehow found my way to the hotel (Twin Tower, Room #917) without spending gazillions on taxi fare.

Tip #1: Grab any maps you see. Always be on the lookout for free maps! Ironically pretty everywhere EXCEPT CHINA will give out maps for free. Free maps vary in detail and amount of advertising chucked in, so you may have to filter off your bundle of free maps.

Tip #2: Ask airport stuff the cheapest way to get to x location. Save yourself the trouble of guessing the best way.

I took the airport shuttle and stopped off at the point of the route nearest to my hotel. Then I caught a cab from there. The bus was only 100 Baht and the taxi probably only a few hundred.

Oh yeah, the baht is a totally confusing form of currency. It's not like yen or won where you just take away zeroes and roughly approximate it to USD. Somehow I could never remember the exchange rate...(Which is currently about 1AUD = 28.68 THB). I think I had too many exchange rates in my head - HKD/RMB, SGD, AUD, USD.

I was continually short of cash (story of my life, really), so I had to borrow Bahts off my aunt. It was so embarrassing >.<

Flight delays
Anyway, on the first day the tour group’s flight (from Kuala Lumpur) was supposed to come in at 17:10. So after lunch and a nap/cable TV at the hotel room, we went off to the airport. Unfortunately the flight was terribly delayed because of bad weather. They ended up getting in near midnight. After a few hours of waiting I got so bored that I actually went to buy a rather over-priced book from the airport bookstore o.o. I bought Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code. I guess after hearing Alice and David talk about it in such glowing terms I had to see for myself :/

The late arrival meant we could not go to the Djit Pochana Restaurant as planned (and because of the pre-booking, they would still have to pay for the food bought?!). Basically the late arrival threw most of the tour itinery out of whack…

Guided tours vs dangerous mayhem
At least I still got to eat dinner…the tour guides had to make last minute arrangements with the hotel restaurant. It was okay I suppose. Somehow I wasn’t too impressed by the food I ate in Bangkok. Maybe it’s the atmosphere? I was so used to roughing it out by then that a proper guided tour, though rather relaxing for a change, seemed sterile and a bit boring. There is just no sense of adventure. Eating hotel food? Pshaw!

Actually I marvelled at how comfortable I was this time round compared to in China. The bathroom was nice and clean…nice fluffy bath towels…airconditioning…safety…
And then being driven round in the bus all day had its pleasant aspects. I only ever looked at my map when I was bored. I could just not think about anything and sleep on the bus. It’s very different to the full-on alertness and awareness of directions that we were in in China. Even though it is exhausting, it is so much more rewarding going on your own though. You really get to learn about the city that way.

So in conclusion, give me an unguided tour any day. The guided tours can be for when I’m old and feeble. Comfort is already available at home. I prefer wandering around, observing how the locals live and eating where the locals eat (very important point). I don’t want to be in a protected bubble. Seems like a bit of waste of an opportunity to really feel the city.

All photos in this entry were taken during my tour of the Grand Palace in Bangkok.

Food is okay so far…nothing mind blowingly fantastic yet though. I think travelling in big groups puts the cooks understress to serve the same thing at the same time…thus, food tends to be a bit overcooked or has gone cold. So far, comparing all the tom yum soups I’ve tried with my mom’s…well…hers is better i think XDD

Well today I had some fish and some fish cakes and they were pretty good though. Oh yeah and the chilli crab yesterday wasn’t too bad I guess. The crabs were full of gou. The roe stuff. Nice.