Thailand in General is beautiful

Its one of my dreamlands as a kid and I am so glad I was able to finally get there. However, I wish I had more time to go around, shop and see more things. People are nice, transportation service is pretty nice as well

We traveled like the local residents from Thailand. Tourist bus, local vans, tuk-tuk, motorcycle taxi, local bus, trains, there is not a thing I can think of not using to travel around. The highways and the traffic around there, even during weekends. The sky train up high, on 7 and 8 floor. I have never seen such train station, one above another. I have no words but to say WOW.  Below are few pictures I found in google. I didn't get the chance to capture the pictures in my camera. Below the train stations are walkways, street, bus stops etc.

The highways are 6 lanes wide, and every lane is busy. There were many toll roads, some toll roads had 10-16 lanes, I couldn't believe it. Asia is definitely more developed than America in many ways. The 10 days, I was in Thailand and Cambodia, I didn't hear a swear word, I didn't hear people blasting their music nor loud people like in the USA. It was just beautiful.

So, to summarize Thailand is beautiful. There are many places I didn't get to visit and shop. Following places are for my next visit, which I am already planning on my head.

Chatuchak shopping market
http://www.chatuchak.org/
Chatuchak weekend market, situated on Kamphaeng Phet 2 Road, Chatuchak, Bangkok, is the largest market in Thailand. Chatuchak Market, also known as JJ Market, has more than 8000 stalls which are separated into 27 sections.

Asiatique 
http://www.asiatiquethailand.com/index.php/th
http://www.bangkok.com/shopping-mall/asiatique.htm
Asiatique has successfully combined two of the most popular shopping experiences in the city: a night bazaar and a mall. Ten minutes downriver from Saphan Taksin BTS station this once-bustling international trade port has been transformed, with over 1,500 boutiques and 40 restaurants housed under a huge replica warehouse complex. 

Terminal 21
http://www.terminal21.co.th/
It is a mixed-use complex on Sukhumvit Road, near the Asoke intersection, in Bangkok, Thailand. It opened in October 2011. The complex has two parts: The retail area – having a total of 9 stories.

Chao Phraya, Bangkok Waterway
http://www.bangkok.com/attraction-waterway/chao-phraya-river.htm
The Chao Phraya River (or Mae Nam Chao Phraya) runs north to south through Thailand, whose most notable and densely populated cities lie along the river's main tributary.

Journey back to Minnesota

I met interesting people while I flew out of Minnesota. However, flying back, I met some people who had no idea about rest of the world. No offense but people in this part of the world in general have no idea of rest of the world. And when it comes to general knowledge, sometimes its almost zero.

The couple standing next to me no idea that time zones are different in different countries. They have never traveled outside of USA. The guy who sat next to me was so dumb, he asked me whether I have climbed Mt. Everest. I went wha what?? He had thought, if you have money, anyone can climb. There were some other stuff he said made me think, omg seriously. The man was in his mid twenties, knew nothing.

There was a Laotian man who sat to next to me on the right, he was nice. We had the same flight from Taipei to LAX and to MSP. We talked for a bit about our flights. Since, I was able to sleep a lot, the flights didn't feel long. The veg meals were not good at all, made me feel really hungry. I found Slap Fish, where I had Fish Taco, it wasn't enough to fill 1/4 of my stomach.

I found another place where I had white rice with Shrimp and green beans. After eating that much, I felt a bit full. Its a big challenge to find food when you don't eat meat. After all this, soon enough, I was in my second home, cold land.

Central Bangkok, shopping Malls in the afternoon

While two of us visited the Wat, parents did some shopping for 23 karat G. Around noon was the check out time, they reached the hotel on time for that.

After checking out, we caught the Taxi and headed to Central Bangkok for shopping. I was excited to finally getting the chance to look around the nice Malls and shop. As a kid, I have always dreamed about shopping in Bangkok. 

Traffic was nothing new in the city. With tuk tuk, vans, nice expensive cars, buses, motorbikes, scooters going from one side to another. Our first stop was Central World, an eight story Mall. yes its 8 storeys high. Even USA doesn't have this type of mall.

Outside the Mall, there were Heineken, Chang beer big signs, which looked like restaurants or some events were going to get held in the evening. 

Singha Beer restaurant and concert area

Chang Beer Restaurant concert type area

View from Central World foodcourt 

Platinum Fashion Mall

The above is definitely a massive Shopping Mall with 3 buildings. Each building has massive amount of stuff to shop for. 3rd floor for women's clothing in 3 buildings, 4th floor for women's purses in 3 buildings and 5th floor for women's shoes in 3 buildings. Now tell me, whether its massive or not. We got lost over and over as parents were waiting on one side.

It was a super busy day. We also made a stop at the Big C Supercenter, however didn't purchase anything. Another stop was the Electronics building, I believe its Pantop Plaza. We went to check out the mobile phone Samsung S6 along with the screen protector for the Tablet and the outside case. We waited for amost 30 minutes only to find out, the screen protector we had asked for was not really available. Duh!!

It was almost 5:30pm, so we had to rush to Big C Supercenter to pick up our carry-ons. We were planning to head to Asiatique, but since we had already walked for 17 miles, we decided to have dinner in the Central World foodcourt again and head home. I didn't get to do much shopping, disappointed but was time to go back. Last and only day in Bangkok is over. 

The only day in Bangkok before we head back to Pathum Thani

Thailand is one of my dreamland as a little kid. I am happy to visit the country this year. I also wanted to shop here a bit, as I love Thai clothes. Unfortunately, I have very little time today.

After having breakfast, me and brother headed out to see Wat Saket and Wat Pho (reclining Buddha).

Wat Saket Ratcha Wora Maha Wihan is a Buddhist temple in Pom Prap Sattru Phai district, Bangkok, Thailand. The temple dates back to the Ayutthaya era, when it was known as Wat Sakae.

Wat Pho is a statue that represents Buddha lying down and is a major iconographic and statuary pattern of Buddhism. It represents the historical Buddha during his last illness, about to enter the parinirvana. He is lying on the right flank, his head resting on a cushion or relying on his right elbow, supporting his head with his hand.
 

 

As I saw the reclining buddha, it gave me some piece in mind. I wanted to sit there in quiet and relax. It wasn't possible with so many tourists around. 

Both of the these temple were so beautiful. It felt like deja vu as I have seen the pictures of these places as a little kid when my parents visited many times. While walking around, capturing the beauty in camera, me and my brother were talking about different positions of buddha. That is when I realized, Buddha passed away in the reclining position. I should know that.

Journey to Bangkok from Pattaya City, A BAD EXPERIENCE

We got down from the ferry just afternoon, it was so hot and humid that we didn't want to stick around too long. We took the first Tuk-tuk we saw. That's where our not so great journey started.

The guy asked for 30 Baht each instead of 10 Baht . Since it was so hot, we agreed to that. He took us to the Van station from inside roads. It took longer to reach that station only to find out, he took us to a wrong location where they were running things wrongful way, we would call it #black way.

The Van charged us 150 Baht instead of 100 Baht each. My brother asked, why 50 Baht extra. Since the driver took us to the wrong location, we had no choice but to pay extra.

The driver drove slow, we didn't know why. As the time passed, we realized the AC in the van wasn't working so well. With almost 12 or more people, it was really hot inside. We were already getting late to reach Bangkok, that's when we found out something else that was happening. The driver decided to stop the Van in the middle of the highway, when there was no traffic. It took about 15 - 20 minutes before we decided to ask the Thai people. No one was aware what was happening.

The stupid driver was smoking leisurely outside. Some of the passengers left as the Van was stopped, there was no sign of us leaving that place.We then found out, the driver was waiting for another Van to arrive there, as the Van we were in Did NOT have permit to enter Bangkok. We were surprised y what was happening. Now, we saw the connection between the tuk-tuk driver taking us to the wrong location charging us 3 times more per person, and Van charging us 1.5 times of what we were supposed to pay.

They were running the service in wrongful way, illegal way. After about 5 - 10 minutes, another Van came, we switched the Van, but the driver still wouldn't drive. Now, we have wasted more than an hour, we were late, hot and we were getting upset. Even with all those, Thai people weren't speaking at all.

Finally, my brother raised his voice and said 'What is your problem? We paid more, we are late." etc etc. That's when the ladies next to me spoke in Thai, do not know what they said. Within another 5 minutes, a guy entered the Van and driver started driving.

By this time, there was so much traffic in the road. And another dramed started there. The driver started to drive crazily in the 46 lanes highway. He was speeding and changing lanes like crazy and also was making his own lane in the left. He kept blabbing, not sure what he was saying though. The girl next to me, recorded and later they told me, the driver is going crazy.

Finally, we reached Bangkok, it was almost 6pm, when we got there. The driver dropped us in the wrong location again, we had to walk like 10 minutes. Oh my my, our plan to shop around was all messed up.

The traffic was so bad, we took the local bus to get to the hotel. We checked-in and then headed out to the check out the area around. What a day we had. The one thing I regret was, not taking the picture of both van's number plates. Now, what happened to us will happen to others too. I hope at least, the girl next to me posted it in social media.

Early morning in the Samae beach in Koh Larn island before heading back to Pattaya city, to get to Bangkok

We woke up early, sat in the motorbikes and headed to Samae beach. This beach was a bit different but since it was early morning, there were hardly any people. Awesome quiet morning in the beautiful beach. If I had time, I would have loved to stay there all day. We rented two beach chairs for 100 Baht with an umbrella and let our parents walk around the beach first.

After that my brother's turn. We walked all the way to the end of the shore in an end, then went to the middle of the shore where they had the fishing station. We decided to sit down and just enjoy the view. That's when we noticed silver small fish in the water.

Fishing area

After spending about two hours in the beach, it was time to head back to the hotel to check out. The hotel owner lady was so rude and sad looking person, she wouldn't even smile once. Anyways, we paid those ladies as motorbike taxis, paid them 100 Baht for a 5 minutes of ride to the Port. 

We took the 11:30 am ferry to Pattaya city, to take the Van to Bangkok.  While we waited for the ferry, we had lunch and then waited in the ferry to head back. 

After lunch in 1pm Ferry, we headed to the beautiful Koh Larn island

Koh Larn Island is about 20 minutes speedboat ride or 45 minutes ferry ride off the coastal city of Pattaya which is about 1.5 hours drive from Bangkok on the Eastern Seaboard.

As we reached the island, oh my my, it took my breadth away. The shore was just superb, however I didn't realize, how many beach it had. We got the motorbike taxis, they took us to the hotel where we checked in. The hotel wasn't anything special, it was old but for a night it was okay to stay.



We took the motorbikes and headed out to check out the beautiful beaches. Our first stop was Nual Beach, on the far end of the island, it was very quiet, only a handful of people. We didn't stay there too long as it was getting late so, we left early.

We made couple of other stops and on the way to our hotel, it rained so heavily, we had to stop at a restaurant, that's where we ended up having early dinner. And the day ended with beautiful beach.

Around Pattaya City before heading to the Koh Larn Island

After having breakfast, we headed to see the big buddha at Wat Khao Phra Ba. It was about 20 minutes of walk from our hotel so we decided to walk. The walk wasn't too bad, it was hot and steep hill. The statue was beautiful. 

Khao Chi Chan

Pattya City Day

We woke up at 5am and got ready to leave at 7am. My brother's friend Ozone wanted to give us a ride from Pathum Thani to Pattaya city as he was going to visit his family. We found out that his car is stuck as someone had parked behind his car, so only thing he could do was to wait. We waited till 9am or so, after that we decided to go on our own in the Van. Van ride, taxi ride, bus ride etc etc and finally reached Pattaya City. The Van dropped us about 1.5 km from our hotel. I started google maps and we started to walk there. It was so hot and humid, all of us were sweating and getting dark in the sun.

The moment, I saw our hotel, that was a big relief. We check-in to the hotel, and went to grab lunch in the downstairs restaurant. We discussed the places to go while we had our lunch. Dad and brother wanted to rent the motorbikes, but mom and I weren't very excited as the roads were pretty busy.

Finally, we caught the tuk-tuk and headed to the Jomtien Pattaya Beach. It was in the middle of the afternoon, super hot, we stayed there shortly, took pictures. We caught another tuk-tuk to another beach, I can't remember its name.

Bye Bye Siam Riep and hello Thailand

We started out journey at 8am from Siam Riep, hoping to get to our place early. Unfortunately, Thailand Immigration and Customs line was so bad, we ended up standing in line for over two to three hours. It was so crowded yet, they didn't open more counters, they didn't care how long we were standing in line.

Finally my turn came, and guess what, that woman's phone rang. Yes, and this is the Immigration and Customs worker, taking her personal call while she is looking at my documents. She was laughing on phone and taking her sweet time. She hung up after about 2 minutes. Within couple of seconds, she called someone and again, she was talking on phone. I wanted to report her but, I didn't how. I can't remember where did I write her number down.

Three of us passed the Immigration and Customs, then we had to wait for my dad. In the middle of viewing the documents, they decided to the change the officer. There we three were waiting, wondering why it was taking time for dad. Only to find out, stupid people were taking time for nothing. What a waste of all of our time.

By the time, we reached the Mochit bus station, we postponed our Pattaya plan that day and decided to go home instead. After a long hectic day, we made it to our place.

Siem Reap, Angkor Wat in Cambodia

The tuk-tuk driver picked us up at 5am from our hotel. It cost us $20 per person. First stop was to see the Sunrise at Angkor Wat. The Sunrise wasn't quite what we had expected. There were a lot of tourists waiting to see it as well. Palace inside the Angkor Wat was beautiful though.

Below are the pictures of the places we visited.

Bayon Temple, Angkor, Cambodia
Stone Heads of Bodhisattva Avilokiteshvara, Bayon temple, Angkor, Cambodia
Temple of Ta Prohm, Angkor, Cambodia
Ta Prohm
Preah Khan