timestravelerstales: Bangkok (Not) Dangerous

There are two movies which inspire me to go to Bangkok. The first one is Bangkok Traffic Love Story and the second one is Hangover Part II. Those movies describe Bangkok as a hustle bustle city, which is crowded, messy, confusing, but interesting as well. Then, I really started to get so curious with Bangkok so I decided to take my Thailand trip. At first I planned to have Phuket and Bangkok trip. But since, I moved job and I didn't get annual leave yet, so I decided to go to Bangkok only. It was not a backpacking actually, since I needed to cancel my Phuket airfare and booked a new ticket to Bangkok. Which was quite expensive! I landed on Svarnabhumi airport and my first impression was the airport was huge. I think it is the hugest airport in South East Asia. There are four terminals in one single building. So, it is surely huge and hectic.

Huge airport exterior

The interior is also vast

The weakness is there was no good internet access in the airport. No free WiFi and not even computer to access internet. Actually the internet problem is not only in the airport. Overall, I must say the internet service in Bangkok is expensive. Free WiFi is not available at mall or in public areas. You have to pay for the WiFi and moreover, the internet package for mobile is quite expensive as well. You must spend like 50 baht per day or 300 baht per week approximately. It is quite expensive compared to my country. 300 baht can be used for one month internet service, including free WiFi access from some operators in Jakarta. And free WiFi can be accessed in almost all malls in Jakarta. There are other options as well to go to internet cafe. However, you might be shocked knowing that the keyboard is in Thai letters. Huh!

Anyhow, the journey went on. I spent my three days just visiting Bangkok. We went to Chao Praya River, Wat Arun, Khao Shan street, Chatuchak Weekend Market, and Grand Palace. I would like to say, we were lost in translation. Most Thai people do not speak English. So we used mainly gestures. When we shopped we used calculator to haggle. The nastiest experience was when we got rejected by a taxi because we spoke English. So, we were on our way to Grand Palace and we ran into pink taxi (we called it that way since the color was indeed pink. Very unique). We told the driver we wanted to go to Grand Palace. Knowing we spoke English, the driver with his gesture asked us to leave. He could not take us with him. We couldn't imagine that were humiliated by pink taxi. Okay, fine. Another funny moment was when we wanted to order food. The menu was written in English and Thai. We wrote down the menu in English, of course. When we gave what we ordered to the waitress, she seemed confused. It turned out that she did not understand what we wrote. Amazing! How come there were two languages on the menu, but the writer could not understand English words? So, again we used Tarzanic jungle language, by gesture. We pointed out what we wanted to the waitress and she wrote them down on the paper. Then, we could eat. Thank God. With this experience, we were forced to learn a bit of Thai. I am a Muslim and it is very essential for me not to eat pork. So, when I ordered the food I kept mentioning “mai ka moo” (no pork). And other word that we learnt was “Sawadeeka” (Hello), and “Kob Khun Ka” (Thank You). There was another funny experience, it was still in the taxi. So, we were driven by a woman taxi driver. She tried to be nice by smiling to us. She even talked to us. We had said to her that we did not speak Thai. But she kept talking like we understood what she was saying. So, what we did just “uh hum”, “okay”, “yes”, but we barely knew what she meant. Then on the side of the road we saw a butcher house and we saw a pig being slaughtered (I felt sick seeing that, actually). The driver then said "moo, ha?" We both at the same time said "yes, moo". That's the only mutual communication between us. Haha!

My advice is, do not go to Thailand alone if you do not know Thai, because surely you will get confused. I can guarantee that. People whom you can ask for directions are only BTS officers. They can speak little English. Some tuk tuk drivers are good in English also. But, be careful of scamming. We were once almost scammed in Grand Palace. Grand Palace is a palace which has many gates. When we arrived, we entered the nearest gate. There was one person there saying to us that the palace was closed for certain ceremony and would be opened in a few hours later. Then they offered us if we wanted to go around Bangkok while we were waiting the palace to open. We did not believe that. Fortunately we read in some travel forums that there were many scammers in Grand Palace which would fool us with such a trick. What we needed to do was to keep walking and find another entrance gate. And yes, we finally managed to get in the palace.

What do I love most from Bangkok? I love Tuk Tuk. In my opinion it was the most efficient transportation system during my trip there. Well, BTS was good as well, but you had to walk up the stairs and sometimes there were no seats left. Taxi could trick us as well with high price. Bus did not take us to the place we wanted to. But tuk tuk, with smart haggle, could take you to everywhere. If you travel in group of three or four, this is the best mode of transportation in Bangkok. Another thing I love from Bangkok is the food. I love the Thai tea, pad thai, tom yum, and the porridge. Even KFC there tasted better. What made me inconvenient was that there were many pork menus in every restaurant. It was a bit difficult to find halal foods there. We have to be choosy with foods. But the porridge was great, and the pad thai, and the milk tea. Hmmmm. Bangkok is also a shopping paradise. In Chatuchak weekend market we can get various souvenirs, clothes, bags, etc with cheaper price. I bought my daddy a hat, which was priced for 150 baht (or US$ 4.5). In Jakarta, it could price up to US$ 8 or more. P.S. my Daddy really loved the hat. Just bring enough money to Bangkok for shopping and eating. You surely will be pleased. Overall, I love my Bangkok experience and I would love to come back there someday. Bangkok is not just another big city in South East Asia. But it offers us great hedonistic and culinary experiences which we cannot find in other cities.