a photo taken by an anonymous Thailander photographer, i have this hanging inside my roomcompany driver who missed his way to the airport twice finally dropped me off the
airport. A trip to Bangkok, Thailand for the second time around, I was excited. First trip was few months ago but I wasn’t able to embrace the place, I was busy hanging out in my hotel waiting for my date, yes I went there to have a dinner date, he flew me to Thailand just to have dinner…but that’s another story. This time around, it’s actually for work, a 3 day marketing session with my colleagues from other Asian countries, and then I decided to extend my stay for 2 more days to be able to go around and to shop more this time.
Armed with my sparkling personality, a super old laptop, one huge luggage, tons of paperwork, communication materials, my Schu alligator earth toned hand bag that contains only passport, ticket, lipgloss, ipod, and a James Frey book. I entered the airport, checked my flight, it was already open for check in. The airline staff was friendly and polite which is a good thing to start my day. She found me a window seat in the most accessible spot of the airplane. After all the brouhaha to get in, I finally settled on a chair with my book, my ipod and a really bad coffee. Few more hours, my German friend/emergency date/margarita partner of the hour finally text me, for the next few minutes we text tennis before I went onboard, it was pleasant, made me smile.
On board, I found a man chatting on his cellphone sitting beside my seat. As I approach him, a stewardess reminded the guy about his mobile phone. The usual pinoy–ere style, he was speaking the native tongue (no not tagalog but the taglish with the twang accent). I rolled my eyes…3 hours of this?
But after few pages reading the book, I put the headphones on and watched a little.
Lunch came and I had chicken over fish and an orange juice that was so bad.
Arrived in Suvarbhumi Airport in Bangkok, Thailand at 1:45 in the afternoon of August 6. I went directly to change my US dollar to Baht and got myself out of the airport to taxi counter. My regional manager reminded us not to get a local taxi for it is not safe. She wanted us to all get a hotel car! too expensive! It’s my second time around in Thailand and I thought the place is safer than Philippines…I took the local taxi…even chatted with the driver. I'm sorry but its called taking a risk and being cheap!
We stayed at Centre Point in Salaadeng, it’s a serviced apartment, not really a 5 star hotel, but it looks like one…a 5 star mini. The place was perfect because it was just across our Thailand office. I checked in and just about my luck, the standard room are fully booked so they upgraded my reservation to one bedroom (yey!). I entered my room and I immediately felt at home. I have my own bathroom, kitchen, living and dining room.
As I settled everything in the closet and kikay stuff in the bathroom, I checked thai massage and room service. I wasn’t that hungry, but when I saw the menu with pictures of thai food…I couldn’t help it. I ordered a Cocoa smoothie and Thai rice with prawns and fresh basil and chili (just thinking of that first thai meal makes me water my mouth).
After my first thai meal, I was told at the front desk that the nearest shopping haven around the area was just 10 minutes walk. I feel blessed.
I took a quick shower and changed into my best walking outfit. I still have few more hours all by myself before I meet the rest of AMN team (Asia Marketing Network) for dinner.
Once I got at the corner of the hotel street, I followed the directions they gave me. I’m really with good directions, I don’t have problem remembering street names, and I am not afraid to get lost. Maybe 10 minutes or so of walking along, I found the gates of shopping haven…the Suan Lum Night Bazaar, I checked my watch, 4:00pm, but it says the other stores are already open. I stepped inside and they were right, a lot of people are already going around some shops though most are still closed.
I was able to take pictures, shop a little, haggled a lot until I can’t feel my legs anymore. It was already 6:30, I decided to go back to the hotel, freshen up before I meet the ladies for dinner.
Shirlyn Lim from Malaysia called up my room to check on me. Her room was just across the hall. We went to the lobby of the hotel and Mandy Fung from Hong Kong joined us in. Three of us went back to Suan Lum Bazaar, though my foot needs rest, I was still on the go to join the two. We had dinner in one of the Thai restaurants inside Suan Lum. I wasn’t that happy with my meal and the place.
More shopping happened after dinner and finally the girls wanted to head back to the hotel…while I was happy with all the shopping, I can’t wait to hop in to my beautiful bathroom and bathtub.
1am I finally went to bed, I love hotel beds (but 5 star hotels only), cause they’re huge, soft, nice pillows and I have the bed all by myself.
The next day, I was up by 6:30am, met the girls in the hotel restaurant for breakfast. Our manager, Cindy Loh from Singapore joined us and we all went to work after that. We used the board room of our Thailand office for 3 days, there was an over flowing coffee and tea and lots of pastries all through out our session for 3 days. I love it! I wouldn’t mind to have marketing meetings like that every year!
On our second dinner all together was at this Thai restaurant called Café Chilli: Northeastern Thai Dining. It was inside Siam Paragon, I think it’s their biggest mall in the city. I was hoping to eat just a local restaurant to be able to try authentic Thai food, but then…company was paying for the dinner. Good thing, the food turned out great, ordered my favorite tom yung soup and lots of red curry.
After 3 days of brainstorming about brochures, color palettes, ad design, policy wordings format and more art layouts, it was our final day. We finish up early and agreed to meet for dinner for the last time. We passed by Jim Thompson restaurant, it was just 5 minutes away from our hotel, plus I read about the place in so many travel magazines so I was dying to try their food. We all agreed to meet there, while the girls decided to go to the mall, I backed out since I am not really a mall person when traveling, I was more interested in bazaars, night markets, and thrift shops.
I went back to Jim Thompson restaurant only to have dinner all by myself. The girls never showed up, I wasn’t worried at all. I ordered my favorite tom yung soup, pork garlic rice with mushroom and shrimp and my all time beer…Heineken.
having the best of everything: my Heineken and Tom Yung Gung soup
Honestly, it felt great. I was dining all alone in a nice looking restaurant and never mind if they always mistaken me as a local. It’s fun to surprise them with my English, when I start talking they’d immediately asked me where I’m from.
Back in the hotel that night, I learned that the girls were trying to text me but I guess my phone doesn’t work the same way as theirs.
I finally said goodbye to the girls in the morning and went separate ways. The girls all went home while I prepared for my Thailand tour all by myself.
I decided to go to The Grand Palace first. I saw some pictures on travel websites and they looked stunning. I was hoping to take tons of pictures…and its going to be a hard work.
I got in the palace just as about to open. I was able to watch the Palace guards as they march to welcome the tourist. I got inside and the place was huge!!!!
I paid for my ticket which was about 300baht (almost the same in peso) and excited as any tourist around me.
My favorite spot inside the Grand Palace was The Upper Terrace. There are four main monuments found on this terrace: a reliquary in the shape of a golden chedi; the Mondop, a repository for Buddhist sacred scriptures inscribed on palm leaves contained within a beautiful mother-of-pearl inlaid cabinet; a miniature Angkor Wat crafted by the order of King Mongkut (Rama lV); and the Royal Pantheon. Scattered around the terrace are statues of elephants and mythical beings.
Another favorite was the Chakri Maha Prasat Hall and Hor Phra Dhart Monthian. The Chakri group consists of the Central Throne Hall and the two wings.
Also, inside Grand Palace was The Royal Monastery of the Emerald Budhha. I heard about it but was a bit disappointed to see the famous Budhha so far at the top of their altar. It was so small and so far that all you can see was a small green colored budhha. I couldn’t appreciate it that much. But there were a lot of Buddhist praying so I went out immediately to pay some respect to those who were praying.
After few more minutes, I found a spot where I can just sit for a while. There were tons of Chinese tourist around, White/Caucasians were next, and I was guessing I was the only Filipina there…although I look like a Thailander. I sat there, wishing my parents and Enzo was there with me, he would enjoy seeing all the statues around, and my parents would be amazed with the Grand Palace structures. Every monuments and buildings looked like they were built on gold and crystals.
I took one last look around before I decided to head the exit gate.
Outside the Grand Palace, there was a mini park, not even sure if it was a park, the place was surrounded by trees and there were park benches. I sat down and I saw an old man feeding all these pigeons around him. There were like maybe hundreds of them…some were on the trees, and some were just flying around.
I found a tuktuk that brought me to my next stop. Every tourist was afraid to take the tuktuk, they think its dangerous, but since I’m from Philippines, it was just like riding a tricycle. I went to visit a Buddhist Monastery. It was almost lunch and it will be closed for their prayers. One of the men who are managing the Monastery allowed me to go inside and take a look for a moment and take a picture with a young monk but not allowed to touch him, so I stood 10 inch away from him and the man took our picture.
After that, I was already tired, hungry, it was so hot outside, and I just wanted to go back to my hotel and hit the shower. But I still have time to look for more. The tuktuk took me to Bangkok Wat Sutat (Great Swing).
There were still few places I wanted to go but I need to return to my hotel and transfer to another hotel I booked for my last day.
Went back to Centre Point and got my bags from the concierge and took a cab to another hotel The Twin Towers. I got there and was greeted by a bell boy who I thought was a Filipino. He greeted me and thought I was a local, when I answered him in English, he was again surprised. He then greeted me in tagalog that made me give him a look wondering if he was a Filipino. He said he’s Thai but he is married to a Filipina.
The Twin Towers was a bit old, the elevators and the hallways smelled like an old house, it was a bit creepy that I’ll be staying there alone, even for just a night, I wished someone was there with me. The room was okay, but I swear everything in that room scared me, the bathroom particularly. You could feel that the bathroom floor was not flat, it was like it was inclined. The room was too quiet so I decided to turn on the tv, but whenever I went to the bathroom, I could feel that it was so quiet like someone was staring at me. The closet was just right across the bathroom and there was no light for the closet (I didn’t dare to use though I took some hanger to hang my clothes near my bed). At the corner of my eye there’s an image of a guy standing inside the closet and I can only now talk about it, back then I try to erase all the images in my head. I didn’t even took pictures of the room, scared someone or something might appear on my camera!
I went downstairs as soon as I settled in, changed into my swimsuit and found the swimming pool at the second floor. There were 2 American teens playing by the pool. It was around 2:30 in the afternoon. I pulled the lounge chair out on the sun and tried to enjoy it for a bit. The screaming teens finally left and I was alone, I swam for a while before I went upstairs back to my creepy room and showered for 5 minutes. I couldn’t stand it, the room was freaking me out!
I left again the room, this time to do my last minute shopping, it was at MBK mall. The hotel receptionist gave me a business card with the little direction at the back. It says it was about 10 minutes walk. In ordinary days and if it was somewhere in Manila, I could curse that walk. The walk took me about 15-20 minutes, and I tell you I am not a slow walker. Finally I saw the sign of the mall. It was small compared to our very own Glorieta in Ayala, Makati, but the shops looked neat! So i went on for hours.
I knew it was time to go home when I felt my hunger, my feet couldn’t take it anymore and I was just too tired to appreciate Bangkok’s cheap shopping spree. I got everyone in the family their “pasalubong” I think I’m ready to go back to my hotel. Shirt for my dad, bag for my mom, a gameboy game for my LIV, clothes for me and gifts for friends…I even had this urge to buy an Ipod! (it was cheap! But I was worried about the warranty and what if it doesn’t work when I get home?!)
I was almost out of the shopping spree state when I saw some nice pictures of Bangkok scenery for sale. The owner’s shop is a professional photographer, all the pictures looked amazing! I wanted to buy at least 5 pictures but I don’t have baht anymore, I was tempted to hit another atm machine but I took control of my budget. I remember the guy who made me smile before I boarded the plane. I got one and planned to re-print the picture to have one for me too.
When I got out of the mall, I went to the nearest cheap restaurant (like carinderia in the Philippines) and ordered pork and mushroom rice, tom yung soup and coke in can. I paid for my last cheap Thai dinner and realized I have to walk again…I couldn’t, I saw the tuktuk ride and got into one.
The tuktuk ride took less than 10 minutes, I went straight to my room and set the table for my dinner, I was too hungry to be scared in my own room. I watched HBO on tv and enjoyed my tom yung soup.
After dinner, I thought I’d go for a swim, went downstairs but the pool was about to close. But I stayed, took pictures and enjoyed my time alone by the pool. It was almost midnight when I decided to go up to my room and rest.
I slept with the tv on, the aircon was full blast and I was under the covers, all I prayed that night was to wake up safely the next day so I could go home to my dear son. It took some time before I really went to sleep, my mind was playing on me, too much horror flicks, murder stories I read…sweet jeez…
The next morning, I woke up and alive! i was excited for breakfast (I am a morning person, I’m little miss sunshine!) I was up by 7am, got into my swimsuit and Morgan tunic and gladiator sandals, I went downstairs to the poolside restaurant where they serve the buffet breakfast. A lot of couples, families, group of friends surrounded me, I was the only one…the single person without any partner or kids or friends, I was the only one sitting alone on one table by the pool, and yes people were looking at me.
I thought I’d swim for a couple of minutes, go hit the shower and check out. Maybe I could even stop for one more scenery before I head straight to the airport.
The bellboy who helped me out with my bags got me a cab to take me to the Golden Mount temple. One temple stop before I go home.
The taxi driver who told the bellboy from the hotel he could speak English, lied. He couldn’t. We were doing sign language from hotel to the airport.
We went to Golden Mount. It was beautiful. A temple located at the top of a hill, there were huge bells along the way that you have to gong for good luck. Inside the temple the cab driver took pictures of me, it was easy, I just pulled out my digicam from my bag and he knew.
2 hours before my flight, we left Golden Mount. Gave him 50baht tip and got an airport cart for my luggage and bags. Thought I was late, but found out that the system was down and they were fixing it so they have to do the check in manually…and man…it took soooo long!
Finally I was in, but still have time to go around some shops. I went around for chocolates…nothing really special, just the usual milk chocolates with macadamia. It cost about 200baht.
After few minutes, they called up for our flight and we’re ready to board. Finally, on my way home...couldnt wait to see my kid, upload my pictures and plan another trip! wuhooo!!!!
hotel info, click on here : http://www.centrepointsaladaeng.com/
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