Bangkok and Khaosan Orientation

When we arrived from Sukhothai at Bangkok Northern Bus Station, our guidebook told us which local buses would take us to Khaosan Road, which we had decided to stay near, but no on. However, where we alighted, there was no sign of any local buses and no obvious way of getting information: tuktuk and taxi drivers were happy to tell us that the local bus station was two kilometres away or that we had missed the last bus, and when we eventually spotted the information kiosk, the girl working there did not seem to stop chatting on the phone long enough to serve anyone. After I failed to get anything useful from her, Joanne had a go and we found out that the local buses and just through a walkway at one end of the bus station, not two kilometres away! On the local bus they were very helpful and let us know when we were passing Khaosan Road. It wasn't quite the way I remembered it: it seems to have got shorter and much more busy since I was last there. Actually I didn't really recognise it at all. I looked for my hotel from last time, and then a bar I might recognise, but I think they have both gone. Apparently it has been developing upmarket, so the cheapest places have probably all gone. I sat in a bar an ordered a surprisingly expensive beer while Joanne looked for places to stay. Usually I go looking because you are pestered by touts constantly if you walk around with your big bag, and it's much more effort anyway. I was feeling a bit lazy, so I persuaded Joanne it was her turn! After a while she came back. She had found somewhere back from Khaosan Road, where we hoped to find somewhere fairly quiet but would be close enough to the nightlife. Joanne led me one street back from Khaosan where the place seemed nice enough and it was quite reasonably priced, although not in the bargain range that used to be available there. When we left again to explore, I pointed out that the front entrance to the hotel was in fact on Khaosan Road. Joanne didn't see the funny side I did, and told me that I should go looking in future.

Khaosan Road

Dreadlocks

Outside, Khaosan was more closely beginning to resemble what I hazily remembered. Stalls selling food and clothes everywhere, music blasting out, and people throwing “poi” or long fluorescent sticks around to the music. Several places on the street were putting in dreadlocks or giving people dreadlock extensions. Mine had been becoming progressively unravelled and Joanne thought I should get them tightened up again while we were somewhere with that service on offer. Everywhere there were people with dreadlocks and tattoos, but at least I now realised the people I'd envied with too-good-to-be-true perfect dreadlocks we'd seen in Chiang Mai were almost certainly sporting falsies.

The choice is practically non-existent

Another new feature on Khaosan Road, as far as I'm concerned, is the prevalence of places selling “buckets”. I didn't see them anywhere in Thailand last time, but everyone I knew who had been to Thailand since said they were ubiquitous. Yes, you could buy a 300ml bottle of Sangsom with a bucket of ice and a bottle of Coke, but these premixed drinks in the bucket, with Coke and Redbull were not here last time. I'm sure of it! The custom had since spread across South East Asia apparently, but the buckets we'd had in Cambodia and Laos had not taught us to avoid them, although Joanne always said “never again” the next day. So we celebrated our arrival in Khaosan by ordering a bucket.

Oh oh!

Holey car!

The next morning, we were woken early by a child wandering around the guesthouse screeching, and the other members of the family, who ran the guesthouse, shouting back at the child and to each other. We eventually gave up trying to sleep and crawled out of our beds. We were in Bangkok to get things done, and one of the things we were here to do was buy some books. We thought that there are enough English-speaking tourists and ex-pats that there should be a decent selection. Well, we were right about the selection being good, but the secondhand bookshops seemed to be selling their stock for almost as much as they cost new, in some cases more, and they did not seem amenable to much bartering.

Sweet (really?) durian

One of the other tasks for Bangkok was to catch up a bit on the blogging, so Joanne treated herself to a massage while I slaved away over a hot keyboard, before picking up some nice coconut pudding street snacks. A bit later we wandered down to the bottom of Khaosan where you were met with the rather unnerving sight of a very thoroughly shot up car just outside the police station. At first I thought it was maybe the car belonging to the leader of the yellow-shirts, whose car had recently been opened fire on, but I can't understand what it was doing there several days later. After a couple of hours we walked past again and the car had been covered up, suggesting to me that this had maybe happened there last night. We looked in the online news and could see no suggestion of anything like that happening the night before, and Joanne found the story about the assassination attempt, confirming that we had seen the same car as featured in the photos accompanying that story (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8003531.stm).

Just a wee cocktail

So that was a relief. That night we found a cheap food stall at the top of Rumbuttri, one street along from Khaosan, where the food was delicious and I was pleased that they had some genuinely spicy options. While we were sitting there eating, a guy drove past on his moped, sharing his bike with a golden retriever wearing sunglasses and a big floppy hat, looking very happy. Unfortunately I was too slow with my camera. Stupidly, that evening, we ended up drinking a bucket again. It's just so much cheaper than drinking anything else, it's very hard to resist. On the way home I bought some durian from a street vendor, but Joanne insisted that I sit outside our room and eat it all before she would let me in. I still can't make my mind up about it. It is so unusual tasting: partly sweet, partly rancid, partly savoury.

Easternized Ronald Mc

written by

The Happy Couple on April 19, 2009 from Bangkok, Thailand

from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon

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That is some interesting outing in Thailand with memorable experiences of the culinary kind. Quite an engaging narrative.....

written by

gertrudeyoung58 on May 18, 2009

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