Friday in Bangkok - The best bar ever

So we managed to get out of the hotel and head to the old town of Bangkok with the aim of seeing the stuff going on there. We were lucky that Pezza's hangover cleared when it did because we got there for about 2.30pm and the thing shuts at 3.30pm. We pulled up at the Grand Palace which is the way you'd want your palace to be if you were a King - absolutely everything is audacious and made of gold.

After pulling up we got offered the usual scams of "It's closed today because it's 'Buddha Day' come and see the 'Lucky Buddha' - my friend, he take you there." All utter rubbish. So we went in and it's a mixture of tourists like us, tourists who are genuinely interested in this sort of stuff and Thais who go to worship the Emerald Buddha which is an eerie room with a huge alter type arrangement with a little green man sat at the top of it. I couldn't get a picture of the little green man himself but I did get a picture of the sign saying I couldn't take a picture, talk or point the soles of my feet at the Buddha - this is the equivalent of us doing the 'V' sign to the statues of Jesus in churches (then why are there no signs saying No V Signs or perhaps No Mooning at the Son of God.

We stayed for a bit, got a load of pictures and left. We got a tuk tuk back to our hotel where we had another little doze before heading back to Khao San Road. The porter at the hotel said, "Why you go there? There is nothing there. You go to Patpong for ping-pong show!" We ignored him and gambled on turning up at a deserted Khao San Road.

We got there and it was really busy. Much more busy than the night before - not sure whether that's because it's Friday or because we're a little earlier than last night. We passed the bar we landed in last night for a stroll down the road, there were travellers everywhere with very accommodating bars & restaurants so we settle for something to eat. We then found the greatest bar I have ever been in. It's easy to forget what England is like but I do know that in order to run a bar you need some vital things: Firstly some premises where you research the area to see if people will come and what the competition is like etc etc and then you need staff, licence to sell booze and preferably a good relationship with the local police. What we have here is a few women who own a cart, some booze, a few signs saying Buckets 300 Baht and another trolley of little stools and a cd player. They wheel along until they find somewhere busy and just set up there and then in the middle of the road. When the bobbies come along we are all told to stand up, move off the road and pretend we're just walking on the pavement.



They go past and we we make ourselves comfy again. Excellent idea that I can't see taking off on Deansgate as it would be full of tramps and get robbed. It was genuinely fascinating and we bumped in to a bloke who is the absolute spitting image of Will Macdonald.
A couple of buckets later it was time to head home. We persuaded a tuk tuk driver to take us all the way and he didn't hold back (I'm drafting this on the plane from Krabi back to Bangkok - hopefully by the time I upload it I can put some video of the journey on here). The tuk tuks are mega as they give you a real street eye view of the roads of Bangkok - we just missed out on the best picture ever - a family of 4 all on one scooter; Dad driving with one kid on the handlebars, mum at the back with the other kid sandwiched between the two! Great Stuff.

Just getting into Bangkok now. You know the jetties at most airports are sponsored by HSBC? Not in Thailand! They have pictures of the King, all serious looking with "LONG LIVE THE KING" plastered on them. You are left in no doubt who's in charge in Thailand.

The best laid plans...

They say that the Grand Palace and the Emerald Buddha are some awe inspiring sights that are a genuine 'must see' when in Bangkok; that is why we booked a morning tour of these magnificent structures and other places of interest in Bangkok's Old Town. That is where we should be right now but instead Pezza is in the bathroom being very sick and I'm blogging away.
We got here yesterday after an annoying but uneventful flight. Annoying because it's a 7 hour journey at night but it drops down in Mumbai on the way so you can't really get a good night's kip but we checked in, had an hour here and then wandered into the city. It's a genuine assault on the senses with so much going on everywhere - not even just street corners but all along the street as well!

View of the Chao Phraya river from our hotel

We did the tourist thing and took the tuk-tuk around town for a bit and had a stroll - we stumbled across a random 'International Balloon Festival' which was quite funky, there were huge and elaborate kites, hot air balloons, political rallies etc all with the backdrop of a temple gently lighting up in the evening sky.

We soon established that we were nowhere near where we wanted to be for the evening and got on a river taxi to an area called Sukhumvit. The river taxi is a bargain at 12 Bahts, especially when you consider it includes free 'certain death'. Sukhumvit is where there are markets, bars and restaurants where we had our first taste of the local cuisine which was delicious but needless to say visits to the toilet are currently being met with a bit of a sting. Fantastic atmosphere and food, all for under a tenner for the two of us.

It was then to Patpong for the markets and the 'other side' of Bangkok's culture. We found a bar that we assumed was a brothel but after a couple of beers in there and close observation it was just a bar that blokes go in for the privilege of buying the women in there a drink for a bit of company, it was a bit dingy so we moved to another bar that was open air with a live band on. Safe, we thought. But this bar was exactly the same and some bird (Number 55, as she was called) came up to us and started chatting. She was lovely with a big bruise on her arm and the side of her face that she got from, she says, a fight with a crazy lady. Her colleagues were approaching us and apologising that we seemed to get the mental one. I bribed her with a drink and we promptly left for the hospitality of an Irish bar. En route, however, we must have been approached by a dozen blokes offering us a 'ping-pong' show. This is not, repeat NOT, a table tennis tournament. It is accompanied with a 'banana show' and a 'smoking cigarette show'. We didn't go in as we were nowhere near drunk enough and the constant badgering was beginning to get us down.

We therefore headed to Khao San Road which is a haven for travellers.

This was much more like it with live bands, cheap beer and Sambuca. The place was full of travelling westerners and all the blokes (me included) were dressed exactly the same in our t-shirts, baggy shorts and flip-flops.
It was here that the route of Pezza's current condition can be traced back to (we think) as we drank for a few hours and enjoyed some pad Thai from one of the street vendors. Not a ping pong ball in sight!

She seems to have pulled herself together now so we're getting ready and will head back out.

Andy

Oh, one more thing - there was some silly bitch in Dubai whinging that the standards of the Jumeirah Beach Hotel had gone downhill. Her reasoning for this was that there were only 4 complimentary apples in her room each day instead of the usual 5. Well, check out the standard of the Shangri-La in Bangkok!

Only 3 apples but 2 bananas and a plate with cutlery AND a flower! Wow - that's what you pay the money for!