I thought Bangkok from crazy at night time but its even more crazy during the day time!!! From the moment we stepped outside our nicely conditioned hotel we get hassled by taxi drivers and tuk tuk drivers. Tuk tuk drivers are very pushy!!! They see a white person and lunge!!! Day tours, shopping blah blah blah.
Simon and I went for a wee stroll in the morning and nothing was really open at 8/9am am. We did however get hassled by tuk tuk drivers saying "too early, we take you somewhere!!!". As if I’m going to believe ANYTHING a tuk tuk driver says.
After breaky we walked around the streets, they are soooooooooo many stalls and little side shops. We met some guy who told us where to book our train (another guy mentioned the same place) so we thought it would be ok to go there. He told a tuk tuk driver not to rip us off when we going to travel there. It was a hair-rising driver. The tuk tuk asked if we wanted to stop at shops but we said no. Luckily he didn’t take us to any gem stone rip offs or tailors. We got there and booked our train + accommodation and trek and it wasn’t til getting back to our hotel and reading Lonely Planet that we got ripped off- well overpriced. Oh Well we’ve learned our lesson. Here are some things we’ve learnt from day 1.
DON’T TRUST THAIS, even if they seem nice. WHO CARES if they have "family" in NZ or AUSTRALIA. They only think of themselves.
Learn the word "NO" (mai ao) and say it to everyone!!!
Say you’ve been in Bangkok for like 3 weeks, Thais LOVE newbys to the city.
After our ‘bargain’ booking we got an AWESOME Thai leg massage in some shop off the street. It was soooooooooooooooo nice it’s so much cheaper than home. I never get massages!!! After our legs were energized we hopped in a tuk tuk and offered him a set price 50 baht, which we thought was good because the other one was only 20!!!. The guy was an absolute IDIOT. We were supposed to go to MBK (the MAJOR shopping mall) but ended up going to an intense gemstone place with guards with guns, just so he could get his petrol, GRRRRRRRRRRR. We hopped back in was like ‘MBK, MBK!!!!!!’. He was so annoying and said "ONE MORE SHOP!!!". We were fed up and jumped out at the lights and got an overpriced Taxi there. USE THE METER!!!! MBK was quite overwhelming. The shops are cramped, more like 8 stories of hundreds of small markets. There were so many rip offs of labels, a shame that I’m not ‘petite’ enough to fit their "XL" which is a size 10 in NZ.
After our mucking about with the tuk tuk we decided to walk a couple k back to the hotel. Unfortunately Si got his bearings mixed up and we totally walked the wrong way and had to walk sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo far to get to our hotel.
As soon as we finished walking back to our hotel (I was soaked in sweat after walking so far in high temperatures) we had a free dinner and Thai performance. It was a nice meal and awesome Thai dance show, we got lots of photos. It was the only thing ‘free’ we’ve had on this trip and it was great to talk to an Australian family about their experiences in Thailand.
Righteo enough sitting around in this air-conditioned net cafe – We’re off to find some yummy pineapple, have a swim and visit some temples.
Look forward to the next update!!!
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