the bangkok trip photolog

Sawadee ka! Welcome to the long-overdue Bangkok Trip (16-19 July) Photolog 2005! Since it's pretty self-explanatory, I won't say very much more. Except tt Wendy, Geok, Yirang and Wendy's sister Shirley, made this trip so so so much fun. And so memorable. But don't take my word for it. Take the photos as the evidence.

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16 July 2005 - Day 1:

Ah yes. Lovely 16 July 2005. Saturday morning. We - meaning the 5 of us: Geok, Wendy, Shirley, Yirang and I, have to get to the airport early. And I'm talking 7am-ish early, so as to board our plane on time at 9-something.

So after checking our stuff in, we have a yummy breakfast at Mac's, assuming tt airplane food will be lousy. Esp coz this airline is a budget airline - namely Valuair.

Thing about Mac's is tt it always induces a photo-taking, si geena acting phase. Esp coupled with the fact tt we have time on our hands.

So what do Geok, Yirang and I do?

You got it. TP.



Helloooooooooooo Mr. Cactus Man!



Giant car. Me and Yirang love giant cars!



Ooh. So does Geok. And yeah. Too lazy to move. Heh.

So, we get on the plane without going TP-crazy (again) ala Penang. But oh. We get proved wrong. Valuair serves food. And in fact... when it asks:



...Even when we're full from breakfast, the yummy steaming hot nasi lemak with damn lemak chilli totally whets our appetites. Now this is a budget airline worth riding on.

So, we we get to our hotel in 1 piece. Well. That's a couple hours on a comfortable plane, a really hot and stuffy ride down from the airport down the congested roads into Bangkok city, and then welcome to First Hotel.

Frankly, if we'd known exactly how it was, it would've been the last hotel we'd go to.

"Almost" a 3 star hotel? I think more like 2-star going on 1-star.

Ooh. Anyway...Lift picture! (Just to see if we could, coz there is a mirror in the lift. Yes, mirror pictures seem to be a speciality too.)



And then, we get intoduced to our rooms.

Wendy and her sister get 1 room.

Me, Geok and Yirang, get 1 to ourselves.



Welcome to our room.

It's damn lousy actually. Look at the cracks in the walls and the paint and the leaks. No no no. In fact, just look at the dismal state of the ceiling! Can you see the despair in our faces???



Yeah. That gives you the general idea. So instead of getting to know our rooms even better (like we want to in the first place), we cheong to our first stop in Bangkok - Mahboonkrong aka the famouse MBK.

To buy... bras.



Ooh! Caught in the act! Heh heh heh.



And guess what? We pass the Mona Shop! Where you go if you want to buy a Mona or two (but IMHO one is more than enough. Talk about the running terror of a lifetime!!! But I still love you anyway babe.)



The perfect ouple photo! Wendy gets to be with her beloved De Hua. Who like fine wine, improves with age. You can see the intensity all in his face as he looks down, seemingly unaware of the fact tt he is just advertising a Bossini brand in a Bangkok shopping centre.

Oops. But we've shopped too much! In the end dinner is rushed at a Thai fast food stop for burgers and rice...



...Coz we're gonna get picked up to watch our first ever (for me, it's my 3rd) Thai cabaret show! Also known as the ah-gua/transvy show.



That's the um... girls... performing.



Ooh. I'm scared! I don't wanna go down!



Ans she's... she's... a man!

Yeah. So anyway deciding tt we shouldn't be sleeping too early, we decide to stop over at the Suan Lam Night Market to looksee looksee a bit (get some trauma out of our system).



Yay! Welcome to the Suan Lam Night Market (all of us)!



And again (ze dragonboaters!)!



Now, time for some major exploring...

So anyway, we stay at the market till they close at 12am. Then it's back to our hotel rooms. Where we discover a total of 4 cockroaches!!! 3 in our room, and 1 in the bathroom! We demand a change the second day...

But we go to sleep anyway. Even with the roaches. Eee-yuck.

17 July 2005 - Day 2:

Day 2. Time to go the Jatuchak Market - aka the Weekend Market! We go there by taxi - see our faces... so bright and chirpy!



And walk through Jatuchak (and yeah. once a dragonboater, always a dragonboater. All of us still look like we're going for training, even in a country tt isn't even ours) looking at the treasure trove of barang barang to buy...



...Oh. And I get incredibly broke. I kid you not. I busted most of my money on Jatuchak. Dammit. But tt story everyone's already pretty familiar with.

We come back around 3pm (I think), all starving for lunch...

Food food food.

And we hunt for it...



Determined to find...



...The oasis of root beer floats, ice-cream waffles and curly fries!

ANW!!!











Yeah. We actually considered this a TP-worthy moment.

Anyway it's apparent from the enjoyment all round of the root beer floats, tt it is a TP-worthy moment!



So after a hearty lunch, it's finally back to the hotel to move into our new rooms.

Notice the marked improvement.

Even Wendy and Geok are so pleased with the lamp.





And I and Yirang are so comfortable unpacking on our beds.



And there's another mirror pic! Is tt Yirang and her twin??? *gasp* And I thought only Wendy/Cindy had a twin...

BTW: we didn't know this at tt point in time, but our new rooms were actually haunted. They'd been previously burnt down in a fire, and rebuilt.

First Hotel is really blacklisted. ARGH.

So after settling into our new rooms - and checking to make sure there are no cockroaches, we go on another shopping spree, this time to explore Central World Plaza (the former World Trade Centre).

It's 8pm when we're done, and we want dinner. Bad.

So we ask this cab driver to bring us to a night entertainment area for dinner. Judging from the map, we think tt Patpong sounds like it has a lot of nightlife.

We later find out tt 1) the cab driver is dishonest and is trying to cheat us of our money; and 2) the nightlife tt Patpong has does not revolve around food.



BTW. Just to point this out, the neon sign reads "Super Pussy". And the 'menus' offered by the outlets in Patpong also include 'pussy' in every 'dish'.

Traumatised further, we take a cab back to the safety of Suan Lam Night Market.

And food (although at this time we're so ravished we could eat almost anything! Well. Except um, pussy of course)!!!



Yum yum.



Ahh yes... The look of contentment. Beef ball noodles, pad thai, tom yam soup, papaya salad and coconuts!!!



Give me my chilli and I'm happy, baby!

Post-dinner activity includes wandering into the beer garden where there are live performances... by utter losers.



Like this so-called rocker dude who plays an electric guitar that is *unplugged*, and who unscrews the mic stand, has it break apart into 2 pieces while he is singing, and basically give the 5 of us the time of our lives collapsing into helpless laughter.



Ooh! And requisite Rock Chicks pic! Yeah. Even in Bangkok.

So with the lack of entertainment, it's plunging back into the shopping activity of Suan Lam for us.



(Gosh. Don't we *ever* stop???)

Anyway the long and short of it is... we leave at 12am again. We reach our hotel rooms close to 1am again. We sleep after 1am again.

And on Day 3 we're all supposed to *leave* at 7.30am for a guided half-day tour of Bangkok.

18 July 2005 - Day 3:

We wake up at 7.20am.

Yeah. Tt was a disaster. Suffice to say we were all late and we barely made the tour.

Plus the koon demon got all of us.



First stop was to the Mekong River. We were to take a boat from this dock up the river to see the Temple of the Dawn.



So tt's all us at the dock. Sorry. Too early to be happy. I need my beauty sleep lah dammit.



So first stop = Temple of the Dawn.

KNN. I get whacked out of 100 baht for the picture below.



Then it is to the temple...



With spires tt look like this.



And yeah, is hell to walk up.



Oh yar. Also cannot sit or stand around.



Nevertheless, there is the group picture!!! Hello! We were here!



Wendy goes down to the level of this little guy...



And tt's me and my namesake. ;)

After leaving the temple, we get back into the boat and ride up a bit further upstream to feed catfish! (But I'd rather feast on catfish, IMHO. Heh.)



Our half-day tour ends after a trip to a gem gallery tt none of us can afford. Who on earth wants to buy diamonds??? Aiyoh. But the upside: we get dropped off at an authentic Thai restaurant tt we had been searching for since we first came.

It's so authentic tt the food is oh-so-yummy.



And we get to take another unglam mirror pic - Wendy and her twin! But it's not Cindy! *gasp*



BUT THEN...

It's so authentic it even has authentic big Thai cockroaches!!!

ARGH!!!

So we get out of there ASAP after eating. Which means shovelling food really fast into our mouths. In any other situation, it would be amazing, coz this is the only time I have *ever* seen Yirang eat fast.

We walk down past our hotel, looking for another cheap market to buy more stuff at. Well. We end up entering this shopping centre and even with my lack of cash, I can't resist boots (I have a boot weakness. I'm sowwy)!



And well. They took the above pic while I was trying the boots on coz they said I looked damn funny. Which is true lah. For some reason I'm reminded of some crazy Nazi girl.

We walk out of tt shopping centre and explore a few more till we get to this one tt sells Muay Thai gear. And yeah.



Geok and Wendz have a go with each other. Hai-yah!!!

And coz outside the building, we find this sampan thingy...



Then it's time for our first tuktuk ride!



That's us in the tuktuk btw.



Oh you can't tell? Let's try from another angle.



And another...



Okay, got it now?

We go to Hard Rock Cafe Bangkok. Take pictures!!!



No?



Right. Who cares anyway?



But it's too expensive. So we walketh away...

To Chinatown!

Where there are a 100 different varieties of he bi (dried shrimp)!



And oh-so-good food!



Crab with tanghoon, pork ribs, brocolli with scallops and X.O. sauce, live prawns... oh man...

After tt, it's finally back to our hotel. The final night.

Do we sleep early tonight? HELL NO! We play the Bean Game!

With Wendy the self-proclaimed Bean Queen.

And the rest of us losers doing forfeits for her sadistic enjoyment.



Oh. And those forfeits are push-ups and sit-ups. I think for me and Geok, it numbered over 100... TMD. Even after race we can't escape dragonboat!



19 July 2005 - Day 4:

The final morning. It's time to check out.

Final pictures in front of our doors...



Geok, me and Yirang!



Wendy and Shirley!



...And outside the lift on the ground floor cradling a part of all our stuff (I came with less than 1 bag, and left with two very full bags).

We check out our stuff coz the policy is to check out by 12pm, but we don't need to leave for the airport till 4pm, so what do we do?

Back to Mahboonkrong for final shopping spree!



Mirror pics!!! (With flash, and without)



Ooh, hunky anime guy...



Ooh, hunky anime guy's stomach.



Food. We need food.



We have to hunt for food.

And we find it...

I get my hot dog thingy, and boy is it yum!!!



And Wendy savours her green bean sweets...



But we are not content till we come to...



DUNKIN DONUTS!!!

We *must* have our donuts! Otherwise we'll all be really, really sad... :(



Ooh. But we *do* get our donuts.



And guess what else we get?



ICE-CREAM!!!

From Baskin Robbins!!!



So after tt, it's back to catch the ride to the airport. And then it's on the plane, and back home.

Goodbye Bangkok, Hello Singapore.

We'll miss you.



And *I* miss you girls.