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Five flavours: Day 13 Bangkok to Chiang Mai
Soundtrack: “Young and Beautiful”, Lana del Rey It probably says something about the last few days that I slept almost okay the night before a flight. I woke up once or twice too often, and certainly didn’t feel refreshed and bouncing by the time the alarm went off, but I’ve definitely had worst nights this (and other) trips. It wasn’t the most organised and elegant packing job, but everything fit okay. It’s just over an hour to fly from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, so while I packed essentials into hand luggage, I wasn’t too fussed about making sure I had a book to read and stuff like that. There’s also…
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Five flavours: Day 11 Bangkok
Soundtrack: “Reptile” The Church Thanks to my disciplined routine of only having two beers and getting to bed before 2am, I was at least able to be upright with a can of coffee in my hand before 8am. I spent a bunch of time scouring all the shiny influencer travel blogs, the ones totally unlike this one as for one they have shiny photos and links to make commissions from random businesses, and for two clicking anywhere on them has a better than even chance of being unable to actually read anything due to pop-ups and redirects to booking sites. Sometimes it’s a case of finding out the information in…
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Five flavours: Day 11 Bangkok
Soundtrack: “Pink Pony Club”, Chappell Roan “Bangkok, oriental setting, and the city don’t know that the city is getting … I’d let you watch, I would invite you but the queens we use would not excite you.” So go the lyrics by Tim Rice and Bjorn Ulvaeous, and in the context of the Chess musical fair enough. But I can tell you that Bangkok queens should excite you. Just don’t get too excited. I woke up after too few hours sleep, too little water, and possibly one too many drinks the night before. Bangkok is a noisy city, and my generic hotel room’s airconditioner is possibly overpowered for the space:…
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Five flavours: Day 10 Hoi An to Bangkok
Soundtrack: “England 2 Colombia 0”, Kirsty MacColl Our last breakfast in Hoi An was mi quang, wonderful rice noodles, pork, quail eggs, and shrimp, in a salty broth full of flavour. I did a better job of making the ca phe sua da, being more patient in my water pouring. The hotel dining room television has generally been off during out stay, but today the Mexico vs England men’s world cup football game was on, so as I ate I watched the second half. The Vietnamese commentator was getting very excited when goals were scored or came close to being scored. I haven’t been paying the hugest amount of attention…
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7NNT25 Day 16: Chiang Mai > Bangkok > Ho Chi Minh City
Soundtrack: “Khe Sanh”, Cold Chisel Having left day 15 on a cliff hanger, I can reveal that I was able to get up in time to head out and get my laundry just after 9am, so I won’t have to buy any new clothes anytime soon. While I’m travelling with a few treasured items, my green The Clouds t-shirt that I got at a gig the night before I last came to Thailand, which has travelled a bunch since, was recognised by a friend of the band in Fort William, and was also photographed in the main court of the Rijksmuseum (two of us have now done this, so it’s…
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Thailand Day 1: one night in Bangkok
I get my kicks around the waistline sunshine. Especially when laughing a lot and being thoroughly entertained by the amazing and fabulous queens at Pangina’s House of Heals. The queens they use definitely excite, and we were treated to a fabulous show by Meanie Minaj, Zandy Cyanide, Gimhuay, Zebee, and the sublime Angele Anang. If in Bangkok just go, be amazed and entertained, and tip lots. In this world where foljs get hung up on hate, places like House of Heals are wanted, needed, and welcomed. How good was the show? L and I stayed out until after midnight, not leaving until the last queen finished. 10 fabulous glittering stars…
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Day 13: Kanchanburi-Bangkok-Hanoi
Today was a long day. As Mick Thomas wrote, “There’s no point writing postcards on your bad days”, so I’ll try to keep it short. L and I got almost no sleep last night. The combination of hard bed and threat of sleeping through alarms and missing the 7.20am train kept us restless. We made it to the train with plenty of time, thanks to a moped taxi with bolted on side seating, but when we boarded we ended up in the car with all the locals. Not a problem in the company, but this car just has two long bench seats with absolutely no padding, as in even less…
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Day 12: Chilling in Kanchanaburi
After 2 days in the jungle (well, not far from the main road, to be fair, but the accommodation was pretty basic) it was time for a relaxed, pampering day. We didn’t manage the sleep in, while our guest house has great, firm pillows, the firm bed is a bit too, well, firm, but we did manage to put off entering the outside world for a while. Then it was breakfast on the corner, steamed rice, crispy fried pork, and a fried egg, so kind of bacon and egg, local style (with a nice bowl of chili fish sauce). Our mission was to check out the various places on the…
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Day 11: Soi Yak/Kanchanburi, Mali and me
Elephants are amazing animals. A-maz-ing. Even to a cynical buffoon like me, elephants are something special. I’ve just had two of the most amazing days of my life, where from metaphorically dawn to dusk L and I were among 9 unchained, uncaged, free range elephants. Strictly speaking, we weren’t actually with them all of that time, it would be cruel and unusual to force almost any animal to spend that much time with me (the exception would be for cats, as I’m easily trained and put out a decent amount of body heat). L and I took the overnight option at the Thailand Elephant Sanctuary in Soi Yak, 40km from…
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Day 9: The slow and loud train to Kanchanaburi
We started the day in Bangkok, quite slowly as we’re both feeling a bit of the effects of unfamiliar beds, including pillows far too soft. Regardless of all the head and neck massages, these pillows provide all the support of your average conservative politician. I fought off the headache with paracetamol, caffeine, and some ordinary bacon and eggs from the hotel cafe breakfast, before feeling up to facing the day. Packing and checking out done, we were in a taxi and off to Thonburi station. For those not familiar with this place (including our driver, who had to use his GPS), this is the station where the third-class trains to…
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Day 8: And so this is a Bangkok xmas
Happy 25th December, however you choose to celebrate it! We chose to celebrate it with a quiet dinner cruise on the Chao Phraya River, thinking it would be a simple, relaxed option, given that Thailand is a Buddhist country and all that. Of course, you’ve probably worked out by now that Thailand loves a party, and any excuse will do. So, L and I, and thousands of complete strangers, took a river cruise, along with a DJ, a singer, two traditional Thai dancers, three cabaret performers, and a full complement of kitchen and waitstaff to manage about a ton of buffet. To clarify the exaggeration, I doubt it was actually…
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Day 7: Bangkok, market city
Today was all about the markets. In a possibly related note, it’s only 8pm and I am exhausted from wading through seas of thousands of people, avoiding trolleys and tuk-tuks and bigger vehicles, looking over millions of weird and wonderful items, all in 32+ degrees and a regular amount of humidity. I’m not sure there is a city in the world that is blessed with sensible market crowds. Maybe, once you pack a number of market stalls tightly together, leaving only narrow pathways to traverse the maze, and then dump enough people within, some switch gets flipped in the human psyche. For some, it manifests in the desire to stop…
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Day 6: One day in Bangkok
I believe I may have mentioned that Bangkok is quite busy. If not, Bangkok is quite busy. Especially at night. Saturday night. We may have got a budding Robert De Niro as our taxi driver this evening, he certainly seemed about ready to go postal after 30 minutes of taking us around the block and then dumping us a couple of streets away from where we started. No where near Chinatown, where L and I thought we were headed. The day started by experimenting with the hotel breakfast, at the Coffee Club which is kind of part of the hotel, but also its own thing. There’s some crazy thing with…
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Day 5: LPQ to BKK
Wrapped up our time in Laos this morning, with L choosing the chicken soup for breakfast and discovering why I’ve been sweating so early in the day (the chilli fish sauce packs quite a kick). Wrapped up with a stroll around the block and along the river, and finally bravely took the plunge and had a Laos coffee. FYI, Laos is one of the largest coffee producers. However, when left to their own devices, they, like many SE Asian countries that got refrigeration long after they got coffee, found their own path to making this beverage palatable to the populace. In Laos, this involves lots of sugar, sweetened condensed milk,…
