...a room somewhere- Bangkok

After that search on the first night at Bangkok, we stayed at one of the places we had come across a couple of times during our research but could not get through to via email-bella Bella Guest house on Soi Rambuttri. We took an a/c room for Bangkok and the darned thing had no controls so we froze every night. The staff was about as friendly as the woman who lives across the hall from us here (that’s more or less as friendly as a sleeping frog).

Bella Bella was really pretty basic but the loo was decent and clean, and that was enough. The blankets were weird (warm but, strangely small), there was no mirror ( I shaved with some difficulty!), and there were no plug points! They’d charge you to charge your camera batteries and stuff downstairs! And oh, no TP either. Extra charge for that too!

Bella Bella House
Soi Rambuttri, off Khao San Road
Double with aircon- B520 (+one time use of plug point at reception B20, and one roll of TP for B10)

Siam Snapshot - toilet training

Same Same

Bangkok traffic is notorious, and with bloody good reason. One evening we forgot about this, and found ourselves in the fourth tuk-tuk we haggled with, begging for haste. This chap was quiet at first, and then got talking. The conversation was full of twists and turns, as was the drive. Here was the kind of driver who hated stopping, even if this was rush hour. Every traffic jam we came to, he would weave through the cars. When, inevitably, weaving was not an option, he’d just get off that road, into a side street and change the route. This happened again and again and again- it was confusing but bloody entertaining.

“You from?”
“From India”
“Oh, India!”
(Yes)
“Not many India people here”
“Oh? You don’t meet many Indian tourist?”
(What about the hordes of shoppers, I thought)
“India people no wonny”
“Sorry?”
“India people no wonny”
“Huh? No…worry?”
(oh…he means we Indians are a carefree lot)
His lifted his hand and rubbed his fingers together in the universal sign for bank notes.
“India people no money. No MONEY”
“Oh-no money! Ha!”
(Huh?)
“Ha ha! Yes, Indian no money…like Thai”
“Ha ha”
“Falang have money”
“Ha ha, yes no money. So you give us discount on tuk-tuk fare”
“Ha ha ha”
Lots of ha ha.
I realise now I’ve no idea what was so funny, actually. ‘We’re poor sods, you’re poor sods’.
Same same.


farang* - tourist/westerner in Thai

Siam Snapshot - 3.B

Beach,Beer, Bliss!

Haven in a City

It was a hot day- the hottest of our trip, it now turns out. Though it had not been half the day yet, we still arrived at Wat Pho hot and bothered. Stepping off our tuk-tuk, we looked up to a small, unimposing gateway. Behind it lay Wat Pho and, more famously, the Reclining Buddha. If there were two things a tourist brochure would tell you to see, this would be one of them. Kids played in the courtyard as we stepped through what turned out to be a bit of a side gate. Tourists milled around the ticket counter, waiting to buy the 50B (app US$1.25)ticket. Standing by the side of the main building, a commonplace structure, you could see glimpses of glowing gold through its meshed windows.

Before we knew it we were standing barefoot in the ordinary looking hall, quiet and still. In front of us lay the expectedly gigantic Buddha. Expecting it did not quite make it predictable, though. You’d think knowing you were going to see the biggest reclining Buddha would prepare you for the instinctive staring and gushing, but you’d most likely be wrong. For one thing, its huge- rendering the mundane structure that houses it completely irrelevant. For another, it glows in a slightly surreal way. It felt warm and quietening and cool at the same time, standing there.

Then we started hearing repetitive clanging sounds- one after the other, and overlapping as well. Just round the corner from the mother of pearl feet of the Buddha we saw people in an orderly, slow-moving file. They were dropping coins into metal containers lined up along the wall, maybe 50 or more of them. For a moment I thought that the 20B you paid to get the coins to throw into the buckets was slightly meaningless and just a mildly imaginative way of getting something for the renovation fund. But I stopped myself almost before the thought could form itself completely- nobody was forcing you, nobody even asked you.. but we still felt like doing it.

Yet, if the Reclining Buddha dominates Wat Pho, it shouldn’t. Stepping out, we spent the better part of two hours in its rambling grounds- stupas, temples and Buddha images everywhere you look, and especially where you don’t. In one of the wihaan, we were lucky enough to witness a monk initiation ceremony (though I’m not sure if that’s exactly how its described). It was peaceful and captivating, with the young monk’s family in rapt attendance.

There was a “nothing yet much” feeling about that time. I can easily see people saying there is little to see besides the famous figure that Wat Pho is home to, but I would tell them to give it just a few minutes. Walking around through doors and gates and corridors you could chance upon small treasures and quiet moments. We did, and it leaves the visit to Wat Pho as a cherished one in our minds.

Siam Snapshot - postcards

Thailand in Numbers- I

destinations in Thailand : 3
nights in Thailand : 13
days in Thailand : 13
hours in Thailand : 312.5

flights : 3
flights on time : 2
airports : 3
train journeys : 3
train journeys on time : 1
hours spent in trains : 39
cross-country km travelled : app. 2800km
boat rides : 3
days motorbike hired : 4
distance ridden on bike : app 200km
hours on a raft : 0.45
hours on an elephant : 1
types of public transport taken : 7

The Colour Orange

I wonder if it is the calm of their homes that they reflect, or if the residences mirror their inner peace. I don’t know if spaces that offer solitude feed off their soothing presence, or if their equanimity is a result of tranquil surrounds. In all probability, monks and their temples share a serenity that transcends the both of them. Either way, the fascination they have always induced has somehow never prompted explaining, till now that I try and put it down in words.

Thailand brought this fascination back with a gentle force that could only be its own. It seemed we never tired of pointing out to each other yet another monk on the street, or one shopping or one ona cellphone or one ( I did not believe this!) smoking. But tire we never did. Sometimes we just looked, sometimes we greeted them the traditional way with a reverence touched by schoolboy-ish anticipation of their response. Sometimes we shamelessly whipped out the camera at the first glimpse of orange, other times we chastened ourselves, feeling like we were rudely prying.

They are a part of Thai culture like little else can claim to be, their presence seems to define the country’s personality. A Thailand experience is moulded by their unobtrusive aura. In many ways Thailand is them, yet they are much more than Thailand. They seem to transcend their surroundings, not being shaped by what is around them but by something that is entirely its own. Which leaves me grateful to the country, but also to something more…which I haven’t much of an inkling of.