Back! But… Sick.

I’m back from Bangkok! Finally after 6 long days of suffers from the dry heat, messy traffic, dark nights, and noise pollution from one of the hyperactive kids throughout the tour. Nevertheless, fun and enjoyable moments still rules over those sufferings!

Killing my time while waiting

Day 1
Arrived at the airport with smiles but left with frowns when we got stucked at the VISA area long enough to miss the original tour group that we’re supposedly to be in. Fortunately it’s free and easy day on our arrival day, so we reached our hotel after all. A mini exploration around our hotel for the night; asking the locals the places we’re at along the way to understand the road more. Not bad for a start of the trip with some self-located Dinner place around Bai Yoke Suite Night Market place. Since we’re at the Night Market, surely we won’t miss the shopping time! Walking around, we went into Bai Yoke Sky as recommended from Sam & Baby about the lovely night scenery up the tower. Well, maybe I’m still not the scenery type, the only thing that I like about going up the tower is the free alcohol and popcorns that we can enjoy while looking at the erm, okayyyy, beautiful night scene of Bangkok.

It's drizzling on the way to our Hotel in Bangkok

Purple Raincoat!! *Love*

Complimentary drink for visiting Bai Yoke Sky

Day 2
The day when the official tour begins! Waking up 0430 Bangkok time (0530 Spore time) is no joke as I had only like 3 hours of sleep the night before, G-chatting with baby. Dragging our luggage to the breakfast place, we were glad that the food was good enough to make up for all the tiredness we had. First itinerary in the day’s tour was to their popular attraction, the floating market and Wat Arun Temple. I felt a little dismay when the tour guide commented that floating market is soon going to be a cold spot as people are conveniently going to 7-11s now. Poor thing for those staying beside the river; who’re trying very hard to earn for a living. However, something that’s not going to change is the fact that they’re indeed a Buddhist Country. There’re 400 temples in Bangkok out of the 40,000 temples in Thailand! But one thing different is the Buddhists there are allowed to consume meat. The monks are highly respected there, and many times I see the locals kneeling, heads down to the monks who stopped in front of them. Zoo and Safari is next, and I love the baby tigers and naughty apes there! They are simply too adorable not to miss hugging and playing with. Then it’s finally time for the long bus journey to Pattaya! It was funny when the tour guides term Pattaya as “where the bad people resides”. Haha! Why? Because Pattaya is an island famous for illegal shows like Spiderman show & Thai Girl Show as well as the clubbing and hooking around. So, how can we missed being bad for a few days at Pattaya? The maximum we can go to being bad is catching their Thai Girl Show and Alcazar Show (ah-kua show). The Thai Girl Show is erm, not impressive. Their performance was numb, and yah, we were numbed too. But the Alcazar Show is AWESOME!! I feel like I’m watching some GRAND stage concert. The ah-kuas are SO pretty and their dancing is so professional! Love them!

Our breakfast before we leave for mini tour around Bangkok

Bangkok's floating market

These "Buddhist" fishes are toothless and they feed on bread

You can always see temples along the river

Wat Arun Temple

A forced smile for a lunatic Photgrapher. =x

Zoo and Wild Safari Time!!

The best buffet dish of the day - Tomato Macaroni

So good to have such a BIG portion of cheap and yummy ice-cream on a hot day!

Like one of the silly games I used to play

In the wild life now!!

Day 3
Off to Coral Island on a SPEED BOAT!! It’s really speedy!! So fast that I felt my blood pressure rose on the instances when the boat made speedy turns! I didn’t try the Parasailing despite the enthusiasm I had before the trip; nobody to blame but myself? I watched Final Destination 5 before the trip, have phobia with the sea/ocean and I freaked out instantly when I see a lady soaking herself in the sea in the middle of the fly! Anyways, I still enjoyed the soak on the surface of the sea which I gained by bringing a tanned skin back home~. Chang Siam Elephant Park is next up! I anticipated it to be fun, watching the monkey show, riding the horses and elephant, but I left the Park feeling remorse for the animals. The monkeys were pulled with the metal chain throughout the performance, horses were skinny and many times the elephants were forced to move when all they wanted was to pause and have a sip of water under the hot sun and rocky pathway. I gave no tips even though the people DEMANDED for it. Not a single cent I will give for “supporting” these doings. If I had known it would be such cruel, I won't opt for this to be included in our itinerary. We were brought to another show, Thai Alangkarn show of Thai tradition performing arts. This show is really killing my time man. I only woke up during the parts when it’s time for the elephants to perform. =x The night ended really late with authentic Thai Body Massage. Goodness gracious me! I felt like dying when the massager tried “splitting” my body into parts! I seriously don’t feel relaxed and comfortable after the massage.

I found my turtles on the beach! Not.

Photography angle adapted from one of the postcards I encountered

The beautiful sand and beach

Love note spotted.

A little fantasy for this cool guy~

Our Bitch-ing time!
 

Horse Carriage Ride at Chang Siam Elephant Park

Pattaya Floating Market in a non-traditional way

Having our little tea time by the floating market with the MUST TRY! Thai Milk Tea recommended by Kelly

And their traditional famous snack - Mango Sticky Rice (NICE!!!!)

The show that made me ZzzZzzz

But the adorable playful elephants added a little credit to the show =D

Day 4
Woke up with aches over my body; must be the massage last night. Still in Pattaya during the day for a visit to the Tiger Zoo and Crocodile Farm as well as to the jewelry factory; the zoo is so deserted! But we were amused by the pig racing. Little pigs rushing from one end to the other were really adorable and hilarious! We had another short shopping time after we went back to Bangkok in the evening and a night for us to rest early after enjoying some Jacuzzi time.

The Waiter and Waitress at Royal Dragon Restaurant

Not interested in other Channels? Why not visit the Hotel's CCTV Channel? =D

Post Office just around the corner!

Sushi Flavoured Lays Chips for Supper~

Day 5
It’s our free and easy day! (and the day I fell sick with running nose….) After digesting the maps and observing the route we can use over the past nights, I am the shopping “tour guide” of the day! 3 places that’s a must to go in spite of the short free and easy time we have are The Platinum Fashion Mall, Central World and Big C. We managed to conquer Big C with the cheap necessities and Central World for our Naraya products. But we didn’t really finished The Platinum Fashion Mall because it’s really big, the products are repetitive shops to shops (like our Far East Plaza, but 3 size of it), and the mall closed quite early at around 1900. Foreseeing this won’t be our last visit to Bangkok, we left the place with an open mind.

The yummy Mash Potato for Breakfast!

Traffic in the Morning

Our 1st Shopping destination - Big C Hypermarket

Next, Centerpoint for our Naraya!!

Carrying our heavy shopping bags back to Hotel for a rest before we continue to...

... the Platinum Fashion Mall (with 3 BIG zones!!)

Our legs screaming "HELP~~!" so we decided to give them a break while we try out the famous Korea Cafe

Time for Dinner, finally!

Day 6
Nothing much we can do but walk around the Duty-free shops in Bangkok Airport. *Poofs*

Bangkok is really a shopping paradise, with all the cheap products. I expected myself to grab loads of shoes and bags instead of clothes as I was told that the sizes were generally small. But I got myself 4 dresses, 4 tops and a bottom! I bought 3 shoes and only a bag (from Naraya) out of expectation. Maybe because of the constant comparison of the S$8 bags I bought online with the S$15 bags in Bangkok that stopped me from buying. I now understand why Oppa once upon a time told us that she feel like going there for some shopping every year before Chinese New Year. =D