Thailand 2004 travelogue BKK & USM

"BA009 now boarding at Gate number 3" said the tannoy announcement. Will we get that mythical upgrade I thought. The flight was over booked some poor so and so is not going to make it. More to the point will we get into that hallowed turf known as Business Class. WEe have friends who have friends who know people "if they can they will" was the word. But sadly to no avail. The flight was packed but we had a bulk head seats that give a little extra room.

When we were inflight a member of the crew came and saw us and mentioned a name and sent a bottle of something fizzy. It would have worked if there wasnt so many people.

The lady next to me had a head cold. Whoopee I thought I will end up with that knowing my luck. 10 hours of sniffles to BKK. I gargled as soon as I got to the hotel in some vain attempt to hold off the worst.

4 movies, 2 meals and a snooze later we arrived in BKK.

Immigration, baggage reclaim and customs through quicker than I thought. But then we entered the lions den of the arrival area. "Hello Boss you want good taxi" was all I heard as I searched for our name amongst the signs. Ang was desparate for a ciggie as she had lasted over 12 hours since the last dose of nicotine. I took her outside then the heat truely hit us for the first time. Wow that is humid.

I then went back inside through the Hello Boss hoards. I looked around and made a call to the hotel. That was like ordering chinese take away never really knowing if you are getting what you wanted in the first place. I had turned the wrong way and at the end of the corridor was our man like a ship in the desert, a pint on a friday he was there.

But first I had to fight back through Hello Boss to get Ang.
When we got back to him Ang had had 3.5 ciggies and was feeling more her self. We were wisked off to a Mercedes and into Bangkok. We chose The Landmark Hotel on the Sukhumvit Road.

The hotel was FAB. The room was beautiful and the view from the 25th floor was breathe taking.

We unpacked, rested a short while then our friend rang Hi can I come round for a quick drink. We met Rick and he told us the local turf and the do's and donts. He then had to go to work and we were hungry and very tired.

We chose the restausant on the 31st floor. An amazing view over Bangkok to start our real Thai adventure.

Day Two

We surfaced very late and decided to ride the skytrain to do some shopping. We rode to Chit Lom and then walked to the World Trade Center shopping mall. A large area of shops that really did not excite us, mind you I think we were still so tired that anything could have happened and it would have gone over our heads.

That night we went out for dinner with Rick and he showed us a very different side to Bangkok which we tell you all about when we see you!!

We also saw the street food sellers and their wares. Most would give you food poisoning by just looking. I found it interesting to see and smell. Their use of herbs and spices even by the side of the road was outstanding. We stopped at what looked like sticky brown sweets for sale. But then I looked further to see deep fried grasshoppers and all sorts of bugs for sale. I thought of the Monty Python scetch where they were selling Crunchy frog.

Day 3

Hit us like a cold fish so we chilled out and watched the day go by. I ventured out to buy a few cheap shirts. 5 legged Polo shirts for 300 baht each in the market along the street.

That was it for now in Bangkok we had great plans to see the sites but decided to see them on our return. Samui was calling us