First Day in Bangkok

View from my balcony

I woke up late after a restful night.  Judy, the girl who shared my last two flights, and I met with Bill, our faculty director, to hook up our internet.  I then met Lauren, another student, with whom I went shopping.  In a mall, I bought a surge protector and a cell phone for use here.  This was my first trip out to the streets and it was quite enlightening.  Everywhere you walk, there is a different smell from some kind of street food or restaurant.  The markets are crammed with street vendors peddling their wares.  In our neighborhood, there are not many tourists, so most of this merchandise is intended for Thais.  We then went to a restaurant for my first Thai meal.  The two menus at our table said "Cute Snail" and "Cute Squid," so we could not determine the name of the restaurant.  I ordered spicy pork with mint and it was delicious.  Thais eat with only a fork and a spoon.  The fork is used to push the food onto the spoon, which is the only utensil that goes into your mouth.  I also ordered my first beer at a restaurant, which was cold, refreshing, and liberating.  The wait staff speaks enough English to communicate.  I then came back to my room to rest.

Later in the afternoon, Lauren, another participant Shane, and I went out exploring.  We walked the streets for about two hours.  We came through some much more touristy areas and every centimeter of sidewalk was taken up with people selling things.  I saw T-shirts, remote controls, shoes, hats, jewelry, fruit, cooked meats, entire fried fishes, and DVDs for sale to name a few.  There are tuktuks (three-wheeled motorized taxis with a bench in the back) everywhere and their drivers pursue white people vigorously.

After this experience, I went back to my apartment and took a dip in the pool to cool down.  Soon afterwards, I got in touch with Laurel, who is visiting Thailand for a week on a vacation from her work with girls in sexual slavery in India.  I went to meet her at her hotel for dinner.  I took to BTS skytrain about 8 stops down the line.  It was absolutely packed, but very quick.  The stop was close to her hotel, the Imperial Queen's Park Hotel.  This hotel was huge with a very swanky lobby and two towers of rooms.  I met Laurel's friend Joe who works with her.  We walked around that part of town for a while looking for a place to eat.  We found a restaurant called the Seafood Market.  I had heard of it before I came to Thailand and decided we must try it.

The Seafood Market is much different from any other restaurant in Bangkok.  When you enter, you are shown to your seat, then you follow a young woman with a small shopping cart who takes you to the back wall of the restaurant.  Along this wall is every kind of fish you could imagine and a produce section.  There are about 5 different kinds of lobster and many kinds of fish, some of which are still alive.  We chose some prawn, shrimp, snow peas, and mushrooms.  After purchasing the seafood, they take it back to your table, where you decide how you want it prepared.  We had the prawn barbecued and the shrimp sauteed with butter and garlic.

A panoramic shot from my balcony

After this meal I was full and exhausted.  I walked Laurel and Joe back to their hotel and headed back to the BTS station.  On the way, I noticed how much this part of town was meant to cater to tourists.  A few zealous massage parlor workers attempted to stop me on my way, and there were far more white people on this side of town.  The BTS was far less crowded by then, so I was able to sit down on the way home.