Hello there my fellow readers! Here is my second update on my recent trip to the shopping paradise of Thailand, Bangkok! For those who want to read on the first update (not much is said actually LOL), here it is!
CLICKY! As most of you have known it, this Bangkok trip was special as it has been a super long time since I last went overseas with just my friends.
So right, after touching down in Bangkok, and catching a quick lunch meal at their food court, we headed to our hotel on their MRT. It was quite scary due to the fact that their gaps between the trains and the platform are no joke at all. It was literally thrice the size of the gap here in Singapore. Upon alighting from their MRT, we walked to our hotel as it was quite near. However after walking for just a little while under the hot glaring sun, all of us were perspiring like crazy. It was just so freaking HOT.
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This was the road we took on the way to our hotel. You can see how freaking narrow their walkways are. We were all walking at the edge of the road and since Hubby was in possession of the largest luggage there, I had to keep reminding him to watch out for vehicles. Believe or not, their roads here are much worst and terrifying than China. It felt like they had no system at all! So traffic was really a killer: we had to watch our backs every now and then to make sure that we were not in harms way.
Here they have traffic police on most of the main roads or roads which has the worst traffic flow due to it being narrow. I like how Bangkok has those hot pink taxis. Not only is it eye-catching, it is PINK! Hahaha, which is something you won't see in Singapore. I wonder if Singapore should try adopting this too :P
Oh and here is another sight you will never witness in Singapore: a mini tricycle-like-motorcycle-taxi called Tuktuk. Hubby and I managed to catch a ride in one of these bad boys and the journey was soooooo freaking cool. The driver who chauffeured us was speeding most of the time and the thrill you get when this bad boy takes a sharp turn is literally heart-dropping. Hubby and I had to grab the handrails all the time because we were afraid we might just accidentally slipped out of this vehicle due to it not having any doors whatsoever. But the feeling of wind in your hair is good(:
Here we are finally at our METZ Hotel(: And a photograph for the happy couple! (I tried this new editing tool on my phone which isolates various colours and shades. It is not really new to some people, but to me, it feels like some new toy I've just recently discovered! Hahaha and I am loving it!)
My Hubby being the Mr. Happy he always is(:
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After checking into our hotel, we decided to leave our baggages and headed out to the nearest shopping mall which is the ever famous Platinum Fashion Mall! Hubby and I left later than the group as we had a little problem with our metal safe box in our room. It was quite fail actually cause we kept keying in the wrong numbers and the handy-man was like -.-" as he had to stand by our side and constantly help us reset the password. The Platinum Mall was just a 5-10 minutes walk from our hotel: it felt something like walking to Tampines Mall from my house! Hubby and I made a quick stop at McD to refresh ourselves, and I can tell you with much certainty that their ice lemon tea tastes significantly better than the ones here we have in SG McD. I am serious.
A quick introduction on Platinum Mall first before I head on with my post: it is one of the best shopping mall so far I have ever seen. First of all, this shopping mall has 4 floors filled with small shops that sell lady clothes! Plus it has two sections in every floor, and each section has about 4 rows of shops, in which there are a total of about 8-10 different shops in one row. So now you know why I say it is a shopping paradise. The fifth floor is mostly accessories, children's clothing and souvenirs, so I did not really explore much of the fifth floor. The sixth floor has all the eateries besides the basement level and the seventh floor is a carpark :P The first half day was spent exploring the first two floors as that was all the time we had! We then made our way back to the hotel where Hubby slept like a pig. Hahaha.
The next day, Hubby and I decided to take a little journey by ourselves to another famous shopping mall in Bangkok called MBK Center. We googled-map the location as our hotel had free wi-fi (yay us) and we realized that it was relatively near our hotel. So we decided to have our own adventure! In addition, it helped us save money too since we were looking into food and shopping. (Actually I'm more towards the shopping part :P )
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It was an early afternoon for us, but we already see that part of the street was bustling with shopaholics and mini-stalls that sells different items varying from shoes, clothes, bags, food etc. It felt like these people really do endorse the idea of 'early bird catching the worm'. If I were to go out around the same time of the day in Singapore, I would not find such hustle and bustle. But of course, starting early meant that they had to close early too, thank goodness they have night markets! Night markets are somewhat the same as day markets but they only happen at night and somehow the atmosphere is different all in all. At night, you will definitely see the adult-scene coming to life.
This was some small alley that our trusted google-maps had led us into. Since then, Hubby was simply fascinated at how much work google had put into creating the MAP application. Especially when Bangkok has so many small alleys and walkways, and somehow all of those can be found on google maps without a single doubt. And being tourists in such unknown land, we found ourselves putting a huge reliance on google maps :P
If I am not mistaken, this open-area is actually an open court for the residences to play their various sports in it. I have to say that despite it looking really run-down and forsaken, many people still appreciate the fact that they have an open-area like this. I like how they fully utilize the area to profess their own artistic abilities through graffiti arts on the wall and such. Many say it is vandalism, I say it is just them being outspoken.
And here we are! After half an hour of walking non-stop, we finally reached MBK Center!(: It is granted a higher-class mall than Platinum Mall as the shops here are more well-organized and they have their own retail shops here as well. I did not see any overseas brands but some of their local retail outlets do sell expensive stuff despite it not being an international brand. Their security here is slightly tighter as well as before we entered the mall, we had to do a small security check to make sure we were not bringing in anything suspicious.
However, this mall still do have its own selling-point. Even though it does not have many fashionable clothing outlets, it does have something which many girls would die for: medi-pedi-cure. Yes their nail-services there are superb and I have heard many compliments about it. In addition, they have many massage parlors there even though I did not have the luxury of trying one myself :P Hubby and I were there mostly for the souvenirs. They sell quite a few exotic items there: scented candles, household decorations, ancient tea set etc. I can tell that Hubby really does like MBK Center as he is really into interior decorating etc. Oh and another good thing about this mall is that they have a freaking bowling alley, which is super cheap! So to those who just want to relax and bowl, MBK is a place for you!(:
After exploring this particular mall, Hubby and I set down for lunch and we had Burger King! Hahahaha. I know we should have tried some local delicacies but I guess I was missing their thick swiss mushroom burger :P Hubby wanted to grab ice-cream from Swensens but we headed off straight after BK.
Our next stop was Chinatown: somewhere which Hubby was dying to go to. We decided to walk there too as we felt even more adventurous after walking to MBK. Chinatown was much further but it was still a walkable distance from MBK. So we set foot!(: With a milkshake armed in one hand and ice lemon tea armed in another, Hubby and I were on our way to Chinatown!
Once again, we let Google Maps be our stars in our 'sea voyage', and it led us to a small neighborhood. You could tell that this neighborhood was quite a rough patch with very dire living conditions, but as I walked along their corridors, the people there were actually quite affable. Well not to Hubby and I, but to each other. I guess in such situations, people will tend to forget luxuries and focus more on having good relations with one another.
After walking for about 45 minutes, Hubby and I felt like we could use another pit-stop to freshen ourselves up against this scorching heat. For those of you who complain under Singapore's hot weather and humidity, I suggest you to think twice before coming to Bangkok. The weather here is twice the heat figuratively speaking, but still, it was TOO DAMN HOT. Thank goodness we found a 7/11 store just as we felt we could not go on. We drank to our fill and enjoyed the air-conditioner for a full 15 minutes before continuing our long and weary adventure.
It took us another half an hour and a few stops to ask for directions here and there, that we finally saw something that was pleasing to our eyes: HUGE colorful, eye-catching Chinese signs that were hung throughout the rows of shop-houses all along the road. That was a sure confirmation that we had finally reached Chinatown. The ambiance never changes: it was crowded with people selling seafood, durian, ginseng drinks etc. We smiled to ourselves and continued walking, admiring the hustle of this particular wonder.
It is such a familiar sight: huge hanging red signs in which I don't understand what is written on it. Hahahaha. It reminded me of dear old China.
Hubby's heart sang out a love song to these small stalls; he simply adores eating snacks from such stalls. He felt like it reminded him of his childhood back then as he was living in China. We don't really get much action like that in Singapore, so Hubby was very enthusiastic about trying the different kinds of delicacies laid before his very eyes. Of course I was more of the "I want to know what I put in my mouth" type, so I was not as spontaneous as he was.
Here, we also noticed that there were a few smaller, narrower streets that were adjacent to the main streets. This piqued our curiosity for adventure which led us to a crazy trip. There were so many small paths like this that led to more small paths and basically wherever we turned, there were just more and more paths. We knew we could not exactly explore the whole Chinatown, so we decided that we should walk wherever we fancied. For one moment, we would keep turning right, and at another moment, we would keep turning left. It was truly an adventure for us!(: Thank goodness for small snack/drink stalls that constantly refreshed our energy levels.
Oh right, these BBQ snacks are probably the best in Bangkok. Even though their sauce are mostly spicy and freakishly merciless on my tongue, but it was damn good. My mouth was burning but I just had to have more. It was like a never-ending cycle of doom. Hubby also found their food really spicy even though he is one that does not get faltered easily by spices. Really, I've seen him pouring down two spoons of red hot chili pepper that made his whole soup blaring red, and he drank it like it was iced tea. Just the look of it made me perspire, but he liked it. So in Bangkok, he really did have a kick in feeling 'normal' for once as he tasted all of their devilishly spicy dishes.
After walking for many hours in Chinatown, Hubby and I were just exhausted from top to bottom. Our heads were pounding from the heat, our knees were shaking from all the walking: so we decided to head back to our hotel to rest our enfeebled bodies. It was truly an eventful day! And we finally took the extreme challenge and got ourselves a ride on their famous Tuktuk!(: It is the ride I will never forget in my entire lifetime because it felt like the driver was trying to kill us with all the sharp turns and sudden braking. We did not buy much from Chinatown because they did not sell much fashion/clothing. They mostly sold house furnishings, stationaries, accessories, little traveling items and FOOD! Hahaha(:
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That concluded our first two days in Bangkok, and frankly speaking that was 90% of the pictures Hubby and I took in Bangkok. I was too lazy to edit all the pictures but the next few days in Bangkok was mostly shopping and eating, so we did not take any pictures. Hubby was slightly disappointed because he did not get to see Bangkok's places of interest like the floating market, the temples etc, but we did managed to explore most of Bangkok's famous shopping places. LOL.
I will post more about our Bangkok trip on my next post, and introduce some of the places which I think you should go to if you ever decide to drop into Bangkok. PS: Most of these places are mainly for shopping enthusiasts ... Hahahahahaha :P
Toodles~