In a nutshell it’s all about the street food! It took me only ten minutes of walking along a street in the Ratchaparop district on my way to the hotel after alighting from the airport bus to decide I am going to love Bangkok. There were street vendors everywhere preparing all kinds of food, much of it unfamiliar to me. So many culinary experiences waiting to happen!
The trip to Bangkok was a long one. For reasons I cannot now remember, I took a circuitous route through Kuala Lumpur. Finally, too many hours later to count, I was walking down the streets of Bangkok to my hotel absorbing my first impressions of Bangkok. The streets were busy, filled with traffic, but unlike Kathmandu, where cars and motorbikes were going everywhere, there seemed to be some order to the system. The street vendors were not only selling food, but a little bit of everything and there were people moving around everywhere.

The snack I had immediately on my first day. I found this during my roaming through the clothes market. They are balls filled with various things. I tried crab, mushroom and cheese types.

I had elected to stay in the Pratunum area, the center for the big clothing markets, because I knew that I would likely have a shopping list of things to pick up after sending some of my winter clothes home. My hotel was located right in the middle of the hustle and bustle and I could locate it easily thanks to modern technology- the map function on my cell phone.
After settling in and getting cleaned up I left the hotel to go exploring. It was mid-afternoon on a Friday and as I walked through the narrow cluttered aisles of the old Pratunum market about half of the stalls were closed. I picked directions randomly taking in all of the various items of clothing that were for sale, both retail and wholesale that I passed. As I emerged from one corner of the building, I found myself with multiple options of where to explore next, but all related to clothing malls. The famous Pratunum market does not stand alone. I counted, over the course of the next few days, about 20 different buildings that contained markets or shopping malls, all within a roughly ten block radius. They ranged from wholesale markets where bargining was expected to high end, exclusive shopping malls.

Everywhere I went there were people wondering around and shopping. Clearly the Thai’s take their shopping seriously! As I walked around I made a few mental notes on where to acquire the things that I would need before leaving Thailand, but was not ready to buy quite yet. Most of the time I just looked around in awe at the sheer quantity and variety of goods for sale. I am pretty sure that all 7 billion plus people on the planet could have trooped through this area and found an outfit and there would have been clothes left over.

An example of a mall map in one of the medium sized malls. Ladies note the number of floors of women’s clothing!!

As I was walking across a fairly busy road along an elevated crosswalk I looked down at the sidewalk adjacent to yet another mall and saw a long line of street food vendors. Deciding it was dinner time I went down to investigate. It turned out there was a food festival going on. I could not believe my luck and after examining every booth, picked a fried squid dish that looked interesting. Even better I had coconut ice cream for desert, which is not the simple coconut flavored ice cream that you would get in the U.S. It is vanilla ice cream, served in a young coconut shell after the tender, juicy coconut meat has been shaved from the inside of the shell. The coconut meat is mixed in with the ice cream to which is added mango and peanuts (and sometimes corn, but not in my case). It was quite tasty and I guarantee I will have more of them!

I turned in after dinner as I had been awake for about 36 hours at that point and was ready to get some much needed sleep. In addition I wanted to get an early start the next morning because I was heading to the largest Saturday market in the city, the Chatachuk market. My plan was to explore it and also try to get the remaining items on my shopping list in preparation for my upcoming volunteer activity.

Dinner Friday night at the food festival. Various types of squid from a street vendor.

Coconut ice cream. Yum! It will be a repeater….

Bright and early at 7 am the next morning I headed out to the nearest SkyTrain station to navigate my way to the market. I arrived at about 7:30 am and it was clear that I was early as many of the stalls were still in the process of opening. Thankfully, because it was early, the tourists and large crowds were not yet either. Like yesterday I simply meandered my way around, checking out the various types of items being offerred. I also kept my eyes out for items on my list. Even though there was a map of the market showing what sections had what kinds of goods, I found it a bit hit or miss. There was a lot of tourist related merchandise all over the market, but as I wandered into obscure nooks and crannies I found the local shoppers. Quite frankly I am not sure how I found some of the areas that I found because I did not recall seeing them on the map. I really enjoyed the wood furniture section- there were some incredibly beautiful tables, chairs, and wall hangings of various colors of wood. Luckily I currently do not have a domicile so I could resist the temptation to impulse shop- I had no where to put it! I also found the pet section, which was amazing too. On a whim I wandered into an adjacent building, another mall, and there I was lucky enough to find some of the items I had on my list. Success! I probably spent about three hours just exploring but as more and more stalls opened, the crowds grew larger and I decided it was time to go. Overall the market reminded me a bit of Izmalivia Market in Moscow but with more than just the tourist section.

Chatachuk market as the crowds got a bit bigger.

Next on my list was a visit to the flower market, another notable Bangkok site. It was clear across the city, however, so I had to retrace my steps almost back to my hotel, and then beyond. I decided to walk from the SkyTrain station nearest my hotel even though my map warned me that it was a nearly hour and a half trek to my destination. I had no schedule, I enjoy walking, and it is a great way to explore a city, so off I went. It turned out that walking was likely only slightly better than taking a taxi. For about forty minutes or so I was moving the same pace as a blue bus alongside me! Even though it was fairly hot, I had a great time watching the neighborhoods go by. I passed numerous street markets, mainly focused on produce and street food. I found the carpentry district, where furniture makers were at work, the glass district where I observed windows and doors being framed, and fortunately enough, I stumbled into an area where window decorations, linens and other types of items were on display. One item still left on my shopping list was a mosquito net and as I walked along randomly glancing in windows, I saw one. Unbelievable as I had given up trying to find such an obscure thing in such a big city- but there it was. Mission completed, I was now stocked up for my upcoming volunteering adventure. As I walked around I noticed, as in Nepal, numerous shrines tucked away here and there. What was different from Nepal, however, is that I also noticed that almost every shop, building, or home that I passed also had what looked to be their own personal shrine as well. In addition, many of them had pictures of the king of Thailand featured, surrounded by orange and yellow flowers. I was told before coming to Thailand to be respectful of the monarchy and seeing the plethora of the flower wrapped pictures, the advice makes more sense to me.

I stumbled into the pet section of the market somehow and saw this. Not sure what to make of squirrels in dresses.

Fish for sale.

Eventually, in early afternoon I arrived at the flower market. What was really noticeable were the multitude of yellow, orange and white flowers that are found all over the city displayed at the numerous shrines. The ladies in the various stalls were stringing these flowers into devotional rings, garlands, and streamers. There were other flowers there, of course, and I saw some produce too but the majority of the space was allocated to the devotional plants. Having spent a reasonable amount of time looking around I decided to walk further along the river. I could tell I was nearing a tourist hub because I was seeing more and more westerners on the street. Sure enough after another twenty minutes I discovered two major Buddhist temples and the Grand Palace, along with a pier popular for departures to visit the various floating markets of Bangkok. I simply walked around and took note, knowing that later in June I would have an opportunity to visit when I returned to Bangkok after the volunteer work.

Local market/shopping area that I saw during my walk.

Finally I was done walking and started heading to a nearby intersection to hail a cab. On the way, as I was walking past the Grand Palace, a tuk-tuk driver, upon asking me where I was going (as popular of a question here in Thailand as it was in Nepal) suggested that I take a water taxi down the canal and avoid the heavy road traffic. Since that sounded interesting on many levels, I agreed and he gave me a lift to the pier where the long boat taxi departed, the last station droping me off practically at my hotel. So I got a boat ride on one of Bangkok’s many canals, delivery quickly and efficiently to my hotel, and all at a cost of about 50 cents. Back in the environs of my hotel, I treated myself to a foot massage as a reward for 7-8 miles of walking. There are storefronts offering massages everywhere and for approximately $10.00, including a healthy tip, I had a wonderful, relaxing hour of foot rejuvenation. I am pretty sure there are more in my future. Excellent end to a day of “urban hiking”.

Side canal with water taxi. I have yet to do a full exploration of the waterways of Bangkok. That is coming!

As I left the water taxi station to head for my hotel, I saw yet three more major malls I had not seen before mainly because I had not walked that way from my hotel. I decided to go and drop my purchases in my room then venture forth to the newly-discovered complexes to find something to eat for dinner. Amazingly enough, as I approached the plaza in front of the largest mall I had yet encountered, I saw another food festival of some kind taking place. My dinner plans crystallized in that moment- more street food to try. I examined all of my choices and went with something a bit more traditional, Pad Thai, as it is a dish I really like and I wanted to have it at least once while I was in Thailand. It was fun to watch the vendor deftly pour oil, egg, rice, noodles, vegetables and seafood into the super large wok he was using and see the result moments later. It was rather good, if a bit heavy on the oil. Some of the booths were Thai fusion food so I opted to try a Thai version of a sweet crepe for desert. It, too, was good, although I am not sure I would have thought to pair shredded carrots with nutella.

One of the great things I have discovered is that it is possible to get fresh fruit juice, inexpensively, almost everywhere. Here is an example and even better I have no idea what half of this stuff is. Lots to explore!

I spent an hour or so in and out of the various buildings just to watch people. I was also curiuos about the extent of the three buildings as they looked huge and it was hard to imagine having enough shops to fill just one of them. Inside, just like a Saturday night in the U.S. were tennagers and young people moving all over the place , talking, shopping, and hanging out. Something not usually seen in a U.S. mall, however, was the large shrine in between two of the buildings where, even this late in the day people were placing devotions. As I watched two young women went up to a desk, likely paid some money, then went to the top of a small stage and kneeled down. Behind them were musicians and a troupe of women dressed up in what looked like formal folk costumes. The musicians started playing and the women started chanting. When they were done the two young women kneeling, bowed, got up and walked away. I saw this repeated several times and assumed that the group was somehow involved in some kind of ritual people were performing. My first Thai mystery. (besides the “why does everyone like to shop so much?” question) I am not counting, of course, the food mysteries. I’ll have to keep them separate and do a whole blog or two on food!

An example of a neighborhood shrine. These can be found fairly frequently.

An example of what I will call a “mall shrine”. Saw several of these near malls and other large buildings.

Examples of the flowers that bedecked shrines all over the city.