Bangkok - Thursday

9/18/2008 10:30 AM

Jet lag and heat may just be getting the best of our intentions to do a lot of sightseeing today. Again, slept late – about 11 am – and about the time we were dressed and sat down at the table, breakfast was long over. So … at that point we decided to walk to the touristy mall again and had breakfast (one pancake with a banana on top and one pancake with a piece of pineapple on top). This diet thing might not work, since I was so hungry, I ordered a hamburger with French fries, too. Portion control is definitely practiced here. I’ll never feel too full.

After lunch/breakfast, we took a bus to try to get to the doll factory and the zoo. After waiting for far too long for the wooden-floored, rickety number 43 bus (10 baht/person) it arrived and soon we were on our way back to near where the hotel is, so that we could continue towards the zoo. That wasn’t happening. We walked past the palace, but it was hot and Karina was getting too much sun, and I was sweating like a hot summer shower. So … we turned around, and headed back to the hotel.

At the hotel it was baths for all. (Well, showers, actually). They have two shower heads on the wall, one low and near the toilet, the other head high. The floor is ceramic, causing Karina to fall on her caboose more than once. It is suggested on the hotel’s bathroom note that to save on toilet paper and on water, the lower shower head be used to wash, and paper be used to daub dry, as Thais do. Well, having breathed in the equivalent of a lifetime of toxins from the tuk-tuk, motorcycle, and automobile exhaust over the past few days, I agree. We need to do everything we can to help protect the environment here. Karina isn’t willing to “shower” because she doesn’t want water on her hair, so Nana rounded up a yellow plastic bowl used for laundry and turned it into the mostest coolest bathtub around. She was happy, happy, happy to be in the tub with cool water – and didn’t really want to come out for about ½ hour.

Apparently the Thais bathe at least 3 times a day – considering us foreigners to be “dirty and smelly” for two reasons: first, we eat meat and drink milk causing a distinctive odor; second, we don’t generally bathe as often – particularly most of the foreigners who are hanging around the touristy places on a very very low budget with not enough money to buy the deodorant to protect their reputations.

After bath, it was off for another adventure to the Flower Market. We looked so refreshed, cool and composed as we left the Guest House (Shanti) and felt so for at least the first block we walked, wilting far before we got to the Flower Market about two blocks away. We came in the back way to the Flower Market – on the wrong side of the muddy and rubbish-strewn river – walking through the vegetable and meat markets as they were closing for the day. We were, nonetheless treated to the sights and smells of fresh pineapple, rambutan, coconut, leechies, garlic, and many, many other fruits and vegetables that I still don’t know. The fish, eels looking very snake-like, squid and other delicacies were, at that time, not emoting “yummy” to me. Through the very narrow corridors of vendors’ goods motorcyclists with one two or three passengers were put-putting, causing those in their way to get out of the way or ….
A walk up the river, over the bridge and down the river on the other side brought us to the Flower Market. Oh, George! You just don’t even want me to go on about the open stalls full of orchids of nearly any variety, crotons, spathiphyllum, fishbone cactus, roses, jasmine and …. on and on and on. As rank as the other side of the river was, this side breathed freshness and flower scent into the air. Did I mention that the Shanti puts one or two orchids on each dish they serve? They are, by the way, edible. I tried one. It’s slimy and without much taste. Oh well – looks skin deep and all…. By the time we were done with dinner, Karina was eager to hit the bath “tub” again. Then – our first Skype call via internet camera.

Tomorrow Chiang Mai – after we pay for the guest house and all the meals we’ve eaten over the past few days. I think I’ll enjoy Chiang Mai’s less hectic, noisy, polluted air better. I remember Bangkok from my trip in 1975 – when I found out I was pregnant with Mika and in 1994 – when she was finishing up a year as an exchange student - as being a place I didn’t much like. Too busy. Too polluted. As they say here, “same same”.