Saturday, January 26, 2008

Bangkok Day 2

I have found the Thai people to be very nice and friendly. Walking around on my own, I have stopped and spoken with a few of them and generally on learning that I teach English in China, they recommend I teach in Thailand in the future. It seems that the general level of English here is better though, so there may be less demand for me...


Unfortunately, as in any tourist destination, there are also a number of people also trying to make a quick buck at your expense. Sometimes it is tough to tell the genuinely friendly people wanting to practice some English from the approaching touts wanting to take you on a costly detour or to a nearby suit shop. The most common scam tends to be asking where you are going followed by telling you that that particular destination is closed for whatever reason and they'll offer to take you somewhere else instead. In the morning, Wat Pho was "closed" to foreigners and only open to Thais for "morning prayers." I was told to come back in the afternoon, but in the meantime, I could go see a different Buddha for a few extra Baht. Of course, walking to the entrance reveals that it is not closed at all... Interestingly enough, I was by the same temple in the late afternoon and told by a different tout that it was closed in the afternoons and I would have to visit the following morning, but he could take me to another site of interest. If it were up to them, I'd have never seen the temple!

After walking just a bit further down the road, I reached the entrance to Wat Pho (Wat is Thai for "temple") and purchased a ticket, checking the sign to see that the temple was open daily starting at 8 A.M., despite any nonsense you may hear otherwise. The temple is home to the world's largest reclining Buddha and at around 150 feet long, I'm sure he blows away the competition. It seems to be a recurring theme to have a world's largest ______ Buddha as your tourist draw. So far I've see the world's tallest Buddha (LeShan), world's largest sitting bronze Buddha (Hong Kong) and the world's largest reclining Buddha (Bangkok).


After walking around the rest of the temple grounds, I had a lunch of chicken with spicy basil leaves nearby that was spicy enough to clear the sinuses and then some...

Following lunch, it was time to go across the street to visit the Grand Palace, which is home to more temples and the famous "Emerald Buddha." It turns out that the Buddha is actually made of jade, but was originally mistaken for emerald when it was first discovered. Nonetheless, it is one of the more important Buddha images in Thailand.

That evening, I met with Lindsay (a fellow teacher from Zhanjiang who was in Bangkok) and some of her friends at the Conrad Hilton hotel. She knew a person who was going to be playing in the band at the bar that night, so we went to watch. It was an interesting experience... It is a five-star hotel and the bar was quite nice, the crowd provided most of the color though. Since we arrived early for happy hour specials, there were not many people there yet. Gradually middle-aged business men begin to trickle in followed by attractive Thai girls young enough to be their daughters. Prostitution operates in sort of a gray area in Thailand, not necessarily legal or acceptable, but widespread and tolerated. It was something of a surreal and strange experience being in a luxury hotel and surrounded by women for hire and farang (foreign) businessmen buying up bottles of wine for them. The band was pretty good though, covering popular English songs, which were nice to hear again after only getting bad techno music at Chinese bars and we had a good evening.

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