Bangkok never became one of my favourite cities, but the visit there was certainly interesting. The main problem is getting used to all the different impressions that are coming at you all the time. The streets are crowded with all kinds of people, food is being prepared and sold everywhere, stray dogs are all over the place, the volume of traffic is enormous and there are all kinds of different sounds and smells. It is very hard to find peace and tranquility in Bangkok, except in some of the temples. We spent the first three days wandering around the city, getting used to the pace and learning how to deal with "new friends" that had all kinds of "fantastic offers" for us.

Day 3 - June 29

Our first impressions of Thailand were mixed. It started out pretty badly with the immigration procedures. There were lots of counters with immigration officials at the airport, but unfortunately we ended up in the slowest line of them all. After the long and boring flight, it was extremely frustrating to wait for nearly two hours, watching the guy behind the counter work as slow as humanly possible. In addition, we were further delayed by a group of Chinese who hadn't managed to fill in their immigration papers properly.

As we stood in line, I thought I heard my name being called up over the loudspeakers. I wasn't entirely sure, but it sounded like I was requested to contact the information desk. I guessed it probably had something to do with the guy from Asia Travel who was supposed to pick us up and bring us to our hotel. However, being stuck waiting for Mr. Slow to let us into the country, there was nothing we could do.

After finally coming through immigration, we ran to the baggage reclaim and easily located our backpacks lying on the floor next to the conveyor belt. At least they hadn't gone missing, which was more than could be said about the pick-up guy from Asia Travel who was nowhere to be found. There appears to be some sort of curse which makes sure we're always abandoned at the airport :-) Though, unlike last year when Lufthansa nearly ruined our holiday, this time the consequences were not so serious. If the transport hadn't already been paid for, we could probably easily have found our way to the hotel by ourselves.

At the information desk we learned that they really had requested my to contact them. Obviously it was the guy from Asia Travel who had asked for us. The information staff were very helpful, and after explaining our situation, a woman followed us to another airport official. Using his own money to phone Asia Travel from a pay phone for us, he told us that they would send the guy back to the airport.

While waiting near the information counter, one of the women signalled that there was a phone call for me. It was from a woman at Asia Travel who once more confirmed that the pick-up guy would return within twenty minutes. When he finally arrived, we had to run out to the car because he had double parked. Apparently, he had waited nearly two hours for us and then given up. I certainly don't blame him, because who could have expected the idiot from the immigration to hold us up forever?

First impressions of Bangkok weren't so bad on our fourty minute journey into the city. There was lots of traffic but it flowed quite smoothly, and from inside the air-conditioned vehicle, the heat, humidity and general noise was hardly noticable. However, the hotel had looked very nice on the Internet, so we were quite surprised when we turned off the road and drove into a small back alley. The surroundings of the New World Lodge were certainly not as expected.

After checking in and being shown to our room, our disappointment increased. Although the room was quite large, it had a kind of shabby look, and inside the bathroom we immediately came across the hugest cockroach we had ever seen.

The natural thing might have been to relax for a while and maybe get some sleep, but both of us were too excited and wanted to get out and experience Bangkok. However, our first priority was getting something to eat, so after putting our passports and tickets in a safety box, we sat down at the hotel restaurant to have our first meal in Thailand.

We were happy to see that prices were even lower than expected, around 60B (=15 NOK) for a main course. Clearly we would be able to eat very well during the holiday without it costing us very much. Even when taking into account that meals would generally turn out to be smaller than we were used to, food was very good value for money in Thailand.

For this meal, we both had chicken soup with rice, which was quite OK. Actually, we didn't know we had ordered soup, but never mind! The soft drinks came in glass bottles and tasted horribly. There has to be something wrong with drinks in glass bottles in Asia because this was the case everywhere. We would later avoid drinks in glass bottles whenever possible. Soft drinks in cans and plastic bottles seemed to be okay, though.

Time had come to get out on the streets and really experience Bangkok. However, it's very difficult to be prepared for the Bangkok experience. From inside the air-conditioned vehicle it hadn't seemed so bad, but being out there by ourselves it wasn't long before I felt I'd had enough of Bangkok.

The main problem is that you so overwhelmed with impressions all the time that you just don't get a quiet moment. There are hardly any quiet places where you can hide away from the hustle and bustle of city life. The streets are crowded with people, making it very hard to actually move around. You see all kinds of different people, Thais, Westerners, Chinese, Buddhist monks and whatever. Hawkers are all over the pavements, preparing and selling their food, giving even less available space. Stray dogs are everywhere. Walking around you notice all kinds of different smells from the food being prepared. Mix in with the noisiest traffic ever seen, and no street lights for pedestrians, making crossing the road into a real exercise, and you have some of the Bangkok flavour.

On the bright side, the heat and humidity were not as bad as expected. In fact, I would say it was considerably worse in Southern Florida last time we were there, not to mention Texas in the summertime.

We just walked around the streets of the Banglamphoo area at random for a while. None of us liked it very much, but we were hoping that this was just due to general fatigue and that next morning things would seem much better. Eventually we purchased a map of Bangkok to make navigation easier, and made our way back to the hotel.

After relaxing for an hour, we had regained some energy and decided to give Bangkok another try. We figured that the riverside might be a nice place, so we walked down a side road which we thought might lead there. However, the alley turned out to be a dead end and the area was mostly unlit and looked pretty bad. Several people were living on the sidewalks, and when a stray dog started barking at us, we quickly went back where we came from.

We spent some time searching for a nice restaurant but didn't really find one we liked, so in the end we ended up having our evening meal at the hotel. I had Macaroni with chicken and egg which was really good! We were in bed by 2300 and I fell asleep immediately.

Day 4 - June 30

I slept extremely well during the night, but since May Tina only fell asleep very late we didn't get up until 1100. After eating pancakes for breakfast in the hotel restaurant, we headed for the Grand Palace, Bangkok's main tourist attraction.

It didn't look very far away on the map, so we decided on walking down to the palace. However, due to the crowded sidewalks this was a much more time consuming task than we had initially expected.

We hadn't walked for very long when we were approached by a friendly Thai who apparently wanted to get to know us. The conversation went something like this:

- Where you from?
- Oh, Norway -- very cold! Where in Norway?
- Oh, Oslo -- very nice! I have friend in Oslo! - You know Holmenkollen, very nice!!
- You like football? -- see Euro2000?
- Norway knocked out -- very sad!!
- Spain 2-3 and then 4-3 in last minute -- very sad!!
- How long you in Bangkok?
- Oh, only one day! Do you like it!?
- Where you going now?
- Oh, the palace! Palace closed! Not open! Open later! Closed now!
- But, my friend! -- I give you special offer!
- I show you Standing Buddha, Sitting Buddha, Lucky Buddha, Golden Buddha!
- For you my friend, special price! Just for you!
- Only 20 Bath! Large Tuk-tuk! 20 Bath! Good price! Good price! OK? OK?
- Come with me! Good price! Only 20 Bath! OK? OK?

We didn't really feel like going on a tour at the moment, but rather wanted to explore for ourselves. So we declined his offer and continued walking towards the palace.

Before reaching the palace there was an enormous road intersection which we had to cross. Without traffic lights for pedestrians, this was really difficult and probably took us at least 15 minutes. At one point May Tina dashed across the road when I thought it was too dangerous, making us stranded at opposite sides of the road. I had to at wait at least 5 minutes before a small break in the traffic enabled me to run across to her.

Now the palace was almost in our sights, but suddenly there was another friendly Thai who wanted to get to know us better. The conversation seemed vaguely familiar:

- Where you from?
- Oh, Norway -- very cold! Where in Norway?
- Oh, Oslo -- very nice! I have friend in Oslo! - You know Holmenkollen, very nice!!
- You like football? -- see Euro2000?
- Norway knocked out -- very sad!!
- Spain 2-3 and then 4-3 in last minute -- very sad!!
- How long you in Bangkok?
- Oh, only one day! Do you like it!?
- Where you going now?
- Oh, the palace! Palace closed! Not open! Open later! Closed now!
- But, my friend! -- I give you special offer!
- I show you Standing Buddha, Sitting Buddha, Lucky Buddha, Golden Buddha!
- For you my friend, special price! Just for you!
- Only 20 Bath! Large Tuk-tuk! 20 Bath! Good price! Good price! OK? OK?
- Come with me! Good price! Only 20 Bath! OK? OK?

We still didn't want any tour and eventually managed to get away from the guy by crossing the street. Stopping briefly to check with Lonely Planet whether the palace actually was closed, another friendly Thai approached us. We were now starting to get a feeling of Deja vu:

- Where you from?
- Oh, Norway -- very cold! Where in Norway?
- Oh, Oslo -- very nice! I have friend in Oslo! - You know Holmenkollen, very nice!!
- You like football? -- see Euro2000?
- Norway knocked out -- very sad!!
- Spain 2-3 and then 4-3 in last minute -- very sad!!
- How long you in Bangkok?
- Oh, only one day! Do you like it!?
- Where you going now?
- Oh, the palace! Palace closed! Not open! Open later! Closed now!
- But, my friend! -- I give you special offer!
- I show you Standing Buddha, Sitting Buddha, Lucky Buddha, Golden Buddha!
- For you my friend, special price! Just for you!
- Only 20 Bath! Large Tuk-tuk! 20 Bath! Good price! Good price! OK? OK?
- Come with me! Good price! Only 20 Bath! OK? OK?
.....
- Where are you going!? -- There's nothing to see down there!
- Come with me!
- I show you Standing Buddha, Sitting Buddha, Lucky Buddha, Golden Buddha!
- Good price! Only 20 Bath! OK? OK?
- Come with me! Come with me!
- Where are you going!!?? Where are you going!!??

Wasn't it possible to get one single moment peace in this city? We hurried down the road past the palace. Behind the walls we could see the roofs of the buildings inside. It looked very beautiful, so we definitely had to see the palace while we were in Bangkok. We turned left and found a bus stop were we could sit down and make some new plans.

According to Lonely Planet, it was actually correct that the Palace closed for a while in the middle of the day. We should of course have checked that before leaving the hotel. Now, what should we do instead? We took out our Bangkok map to look for other attractions in the area. Then, suddenly, a friendly Thai, who also seemed to be waiting for the bus, started talking with us:

He asked us where we were going and we answered honestly that we had no idea. Then he wanted to show us on the map where we ought to be going. According to him there was a special Bangkok promotion going on now, so that the government was subsidising Tuk-tuks to take tourists around cheaply to give them a good impression of Bangkok.

If we could get hold of a "government tuk-tuk", it could take us around for only 20 Bath. He borrowed our notepad and wrote down some things which we ought to visit, and then he stopped a tuk-tuk for us. After talking briefly in Thai with the Tuk-tuk guy, he explained that the tuk-tuk would take us around to all the places and wait for us while we were looking at the attractions. After we were finished, he would take us back to our hotel.

We had some doubts (which were later confirmed) about the things the guy told us, but at that moment we were quite frustrated at having walked in vain all the way to the palace, and since we had nothing better to do, we decided to go along with his suggestions.

We completely lost our sense of direction while we were driving around on the tuk-tuk, but it was a quite pleasant ride and eventually we stopped near a temple where there allegedly was a "Lucky Buddha". The place looked closed, and some people were busy painting, but we went through the gate anyway. The temple itself was actually closed, but at least we could walk around it, seeing that it was quite nice. There were no other tourists around, but of course there was a friendly Thai who wanted to speak with us. He showed us how setting fire to some small sticks and placing them in front of a small Buddha would bring us luck.

The next stop on our list was a "Thai Factory" called Top Ten Collection and was only a few blocks away from the Lucky Buddha. At the moment we were the only customers there so the owner took care of us personally, applying the usual tactics of becoming our "friend" before trying to sell us anything.

In advance I had decided to buy a suit in Thailand, so this was a nice opportunity. After some hard bargaining we settled on a price of 7900 Bath for my tailor made suit (including trousers, shirt, tie and everything). Later we would see that prices in Phuket appeared to be slightly lower, but I still have no regrets. It was very cheap compared with Norwegian prices and the suit would turn out to be of excellent quality.

After having taken all kinds of measurements, we were on our way to the third point on our agenda, the "Standing Buddha". This Buddha was very large, apparently the largest Buddha in the world. The tuk-tuk driver then took us to another temple, this time with a sitting Buddha. Again we were the only people aound, except for yet another friendly Thai who we had a conversation with.

The last point on our list was a "Gem Factory". As usual, we were the only customers inside the shop, and the owner kept going on about what a fantastic bargain we could make. Allegedly they were wholesalers, but today only (what a coincidence!) they were open to the public, selling at very low prices. And in addition, there was allegedly no tax on exporting gems only for a limited period, so we could sell them in Norway at much higher prices. None of us care much about gems, and have no idea how to assess the quality of a gem, so obviously we didn't buy anything despite the efforts of the owner at becoming our "friend".

Now the tuk-tuk driver was supposed to take us back to the hotel, but he explained that there was some attraction on the way to the hotel which we could stop at, if we wanted to. We didn't quite understand what he was trying to say; it had something to do with "ten minutes" and "free gas". Apparently he would be given some free gas if he took us to this place. We weren't really that interested but agreed since it was on the way to our hotel. (At that moment we had no idea of our exact whereabouts in Bangkok.)

He took us to another fabric shop where we didn't buy anything. When we left the store, the tuk-tuk driver was angry with us for not spending a full ten minutes inside, as then he wouldn't get the free gas. So that was what he had been trying to say! Feeling a little bit sorry for the guy (after all he'd been driving us around for hours), we agreed to visit a gem shop next door to the fabric shop. This time we made sure we stayed inside for exactly ten minutes (without buying anything, despite the efforts of our "new friend" the shopkeeper) before leaving.

The tuk-tuk driver still didn't seem entirely happy with us, but at least he drove off with us. However, after a few minutes he stopped, saying that we had to get off and take a taxi back to our hotel. Apparently there was a reason for this, but his English was so poor that we couldn't understand what he was trying to say. After arguing with him for a while, it became clear that he wouldn't take us any further, so we eventually got out of the tuk-tuk. We refused to pay him anything, but he didn't seem to mind and just drove away.

Feeling frustrated and having absolutely no idea of our whereabouts, we just continued walking up the street. Eventually we reached a huge intersection and asked a policeman for directions. After studying the map for a couple of minutes, he was able to pinpoint our location.

Several buses were going down the street, so we got on one and hoped it would take us near our hotel. Unfortunately, when we got off the bus, we went the wrong way and wandered around in the area for thirty minutes before essentially returning to our starting point. Learning from our mistakes, this time we proceeded in the right direction and soon arrived back at the hotel.

After showering and relaxing some at the hotel we went out again and walked around Banglamphoo looking for a place to eat. We ended up at a Thai restaurant in the street near the river. I had Macaroni with ham and some spring rolls. The food was excellent, but again the meal was rather small and it was difficult to attract the attention of the staff to pay the bill.

On coming out of the restaurant we noticed a small park on the other side of the street, where we sat down to relax. Being next to the river it was a very nice place, and actually the first quiet escape we had found outdoors in Bangkok! We saw an extremely cute little poodle puppy wearing a Liverpool FC shirt! We called it a "Liverpoodlian"! The Thais really seemed to like dogs, especially poodles seemed to be very popular. Despite the large number of straydogs, many dogs seemed well taken care of, the Liverpoodlian being a particularly good example.

There were hundreds of Internet cafees in Banglamphoo we discovered, most of them charging only 1 Bath per minute. We spent some time in one of them sending some travel reports back to Norway. The rest of the evening was spent relaxing and updating our diaries at the hotel.

Day 5 - July 1

We got up around 1015 and had a standard American breakfast at the hotel. Before leaving the hotel, May Tina had an idea of how to solve a problem that had been troubling us for the last two days. There were some incredibly huge cockroaches in our room, and they had the annoying habit of suddenly appearing each time we used the bathroom. However, May Tina had noticed that they always ran behind the toilet when they got scared and a closer inspection revealed a small hole in the wall there. Now, her theory was that if we could close this hole in some way, that maybe they wouldn't be able to come back inside. Our first try was to put lots of tape across the hole, hoping that this would be sufficient to keep the cockroaches out.

We had originally planned on going to a park, hoping for some peace and quiet, but we first went into a shop and bought a bus map. This new map turned out to be very nice because it also had suggestions for various "walking tours" around in Bangkok. Instead of heading for the park, we instead hopped on a bus going towards Chinatown.

Getting around by bus in Bangkok turned out to be painfully slow, but eventually we could get off at Wat Ratchburana on the edge of Chinatown. The temple was pretty nice and quiet, quite unlike the busy streets of Chinatown.

It was not difficult to see that we were in Chinatown as most signs were in Chinese and there were Chinese people everywhere. The place was very chaotic and just as in Banglamphoo, people were selling all kinds of stuff on the streets. They seemed to specialise in different goods on different streets. On one street they sold mostly electronics, while on other streets they were selling jewelery, clothes, fabrics or whatever.

There also was an Indian section where they were mostly selling fabrics (silk), apparently at extremely low prices. Some of the stores were incredibly huge containing all kinds of fabric! Our mother would have loved this area! We spent quite a lot of time browsing in these shops because May Tina wanted to buy some fabric for our mother. This was partially out of self-interest as she would then be able to create all kinds of clothing for her.

After a while we came across a KFC and since we were both quite hungry, this seemed like a good opportunity to get something to eat. It was interesting to notice that even KFC meals were smaller than normal, the french fries being particularly pathetic.

On continuing our walk through Chinatown, heading for the Hua Lamphong train station, we noticed one more important difference between this area and the rest of Bangkok -- there were no stray dogs to be seen! Why could that be, we wondered? It couldn't possibly be that the Chinese were eating them? I hope not!

There was supposed to be a Golden Buddha close to the train station, but finding it was not easy. Eventually a guy showed us the way, and although the temple was about to close, we got the opportunity to see yet another Buddha. I have to say that seeing all these buddhas wasn't turning out to be all interesting, but we decided to have a look since we were passing by anyway.

As we arrived outside the train station, we were stopped by a man wearing a TAT (Tourism Authority of Thailand) badge, who apparently wanted to help us. After briefly explaining our plans, he led us to an office in the street next to the train station. At first we thought this was some kind of official tourist information office, but this was not really the case.

Anyway, we had arrived in the office of Richly Travel Centre, which was quite a coincidence because before leaving home we had looked at the homepages of various trekking companies, and decided that Richly Travel looked most promising. It had been our intention to visit them after having checked the train timetable, but instead they got to us first!

We spoke for a long time with the owner, Mr. Prakit, who although he clearly wanted to promote his trekking tours in Chiang Mai, was very helpful in answering all kinds of questions. His English was excellent, which was a nice change. He was a good salesman too! Although, we had more or less decided in advance to go on this tour, he made the decision quite easy.

He showed us a notebook where various people had written about their experiences with their trekking tour, all of them being very pleased. Everybody had written in their own language, including quite a few Norwegians, so it could hardly be just a fake.

Mr. Prakit informed us that there was no Malaria in the trekking area, so we didn't need to take any pills. We were getting pretty tired of Bangkok, so we eventually decided to go trekking quite quite early. Mr. Prakit provided tickets for us on the night train to Chiang Mai already on July 3. In total we paid about 3400 Bath each for the train ride, a 3-day trekking tour and two nights at a nice hotel in Chiang Mai. We thought it was very cheap.

From the station we took a taxi back to our hotel. The taxi was metered and he ride cost only about 50B, so clearly this was a good way of getting around in Bangkok. The meter started at 35B and ticked slowly upwards. We left most of our stuff in the room, took a quick shower and went down to eat at the hotel restaurant. I had some more Macaroni with chicken and egg, which again was great.

Out on the street we took a taxi down to the Patpong area. It is on the opposite side of the town, but the ride was still only 70B. This area is famous for its nightlife with various sex clubs/shows, but to be honest I thought it was quite pathetic, a typical tourist trap. It certainly didn't have any of the charm of Amsterdam's Red light district.

From what we had heard in advance, I was expecting a large area of streets lined with sex clubs. This wasn't the case at all, as in fact, there seemed to be only two streets of containing such clubs. However, even these streets were mostly filled with stalls selling tourist stuff, and the area was so packed with tourists that it was difficult to walk around.

Each time we walked past a sex club, several people would come running over to us, shouting about "pussy doing this, pussy doing that and pussy doing godknowswhat" at "no cover chaaaaarge". None of us liked the area very much, so after walking around for a little while, we decided to look for an Internet cafe. However, the cafes in this area were about five times as expensive as in Banglamphoo, so we didn't bother with them. Before taking another taxi home, I had a small meal at KFC, because I was still a little bit hungry after the small Asian meal earlier.

Although taxis were a convenient form of transport, a problem was that most taxi drivers had very poor knowledge of Bangkok. A typical conversation with a taxi driver went something like this:

- Can you take us to Thanon Samsen, please?
- Huh?
- Thanon Samsen, can you take us there?
- Huh?
- Thanon Samsen, please!
- Huh?
- Thanon Samsen, I'll show you on the map. Look, there it is, Thanon Samsen!
- Huh?
- See, right here on the map, Thanon Samsen!
- Huh?
- Thanon Samsen, look we are here in Patpong, and want to go to there, Thanon Samsen.
- Huh?
- Okay, just forget it, take us to Khao San.
- Aaah, Khao San. Okay. No problem.

Khao San is the main "backpacker street" in Bangkok. It is filled with cheap hotels, restaurants and internet cafes. There are hardly any local Thais around, and the place is full of Westerners. It's probably a great place to stay if you don't want to feel like you are in Thailand. Fortunately, Khao San was located in walking distance from our hotel, so we could go there by taxi and then walk home.