Traveling in fast forward – Bangkok, Thailand in 24 hours
I got up at 8.30am and felt surprisingly refreshed, it’s not often you have to survive on only 2 hours sleep but at the same time it’s not often you get the opportunity to explore an environment and culture that’s completely new to you. I took a look out the window and just gazed at the concrete jungle that is Bangkok. For the troubles of the night before, the hotel graciously gave me a free breakfast and a few other nice treats. I enjoyed a few fruits that I’d never had before; I’m quite the food lover so even simple things like that were interesting to me. It’s amazingly humid and very hot, 30 degrees at just 9am in the morning. Luckily for me and the other Hotel guests having breakfast, there are half a dozen huge fans cooling the area. After finishing up my breakfast I head out into the unknown. I have no idea where I’m going or what I want to do which is part of the fun, it’s sometimes nice to have no plans or schedule, just the freedom to do whatever crosses your path.
The Pantip Plaza was the first real building I stumbled into, it was full of cheap gadgets and huge amounts of DVD’s (all no doubt perfectly legal). I moved onto Siam Square next and watched a game of street football which was cool. The temperature was edging 35 degrees at this stage and this seemed even more surprising when I looked up and spotted a huge dark cloud forming right above me. After a nice dinner, I did some more looking around. I found some cool t-shirts and plenty of great presents for when I eventually got back home to New Zealand. While haggling over prices was new definitely new to me, I ended up enjoying it. It’s not something I could really be bothered with all the time but for that one day it was really fun. My 24 hours in Bangkok was nearly over. I had to get some sleep before my early flight to London, especially after missing out the night before. It was a shame I had to leave so soon but I’m looking forward to coming back another time and exploring more of Bangkok, especially their many beautiful temples and other tourist attractions. 24 hours certainly wasn’t long but it was enough to give me a taste for Thailand and all the fun and excitement it offers.
