Day 67: Chatuchak Markets

First day in a new city is always exciting. And Bangkok is enormous - not quite as populous as Jakarta, but definitely as dense, as sprawling, as clogged and easily more interesting. So much history here, and it was time to get out and explore. Though after our long day yesterday, we had a bit of a sleep in and relax first over a hotel breakfast!

Since it was Sunday, we decided that we'd head for Chatuchak Markets which only open on weekends. The market is spread over an enormous area, with probably thousands of stalls selling everything - the usual food and drink, but clothes, homewares, pet supplies, trinkets, souvenirs, hats, sunglasses, crockery. It's just a fascinating place and with almost endless variety too. There's a lot of stalls selling the same junk you get everywhere, but then you'll round a corner and find an antique clock shop. Or a stall with Native American dreamcatchers.

We arrived via the Skytrain, which is a two-line metro system that instead of being dug underground, is just plonked on top of enormous concrete pylons. Not the most attractive, but it gets the job done! I guess the area probably doesn't have good soil for tunnelling.

I'm not sure how long we spent wandering the markets, but it was quite a while. Shandos bought a couple of things - a couple of dresses and a new calico bag to replace the one bought in Ubud which was getting a bit tattered. I considered buying a couple of t-shirts but they didn't have my size in the right designs, annoyingly. For lunch we went to a Chinese cart selling duck - it was basically the same as Hainanese chicken rice, except with duck instead. Not quite as tender as the chicken breast, but still delicious. Also bought a couple of juices and stuff.

Since Bangkok is at sea level and about 50km from the coast, it gets very hot and today was no exception. The temperature was pushing 35 and several areas of the market were outdoors adjacent to roads, making it even hotter. So by 2pm we'd had enough and hopped back on the SkyTrain which had a station right near our hotel.

Before heading back up to our room we checked out the Western-style shopping mall at the metro stop, and as ridiculous as it sounds, I've never seen a more impressive shopping mall. Unlike the Grand Indonesia we visited in Jakarta, this had gone full-on with the theming in an airport style. So the signs for the escalators had things like "Departures for Level 1: Paris" and so on. Each floor was themed after a different city - London, Istanbul, Paris, San Francisco, Rome, the Caribbean, and Hollywood. The themes were reflected in the shops sort of (eg menswear stores all in London, Istanbul for local retailers, SanFran for food etc), and with the ceiling, areas around the shops, floor tiles, the works. Just crazy.

We walked around gawping for a little while, and I went up to Hollywood level to the IT stores and bought a SIM card which I'd been itching to do for a while. We also visited a gourmet bakery on Caribbean level for a very fancy cupcake. Back to the hotel where we relaxed, enjoyed the air con and freshened up for dinner.

Since we hadn't had dinner the previous night in the area, we didn't really know where to go. Shandos did a bit of googling and found there was a well-regarded night food market a couple of SkyTrain stops away, so off we went. Had a couple of great pad Thai dishes and a mango sticky rice which the market is famous for. After dinner we got the SkyTrain back and for a laugh headed to nearby Soi Cowboy (Cowboy Street), one of Bangkok's famous red light districts.

This one is apparently the tamest; just one short street packed with strip clubs and go-go bars. After walking up and back we got convinced by a happy hour special at one venue and dragged in. The inside was actually pretty depressing though - the girls on stage were all fully clothed in bikinis and weren't so much dancing as mildly swaying and looking bored. Some were even just standing there chatting! A couple of girls tried talking to us but drifted away pretty quickly when it became clear I wasn't going to buy them a drink. The people watching was good fun, since the crowd is about 50% dodgy old Western men on a sex tour, and 50% young backpackers on a night out. Though watching the girls disappear out the door with scantily-toothed old geezers isn't much fun. All in all a bit depressing, so we drained for our beers and headed back to the hotel for the night.Read more