The
Journey Begins:

My flight finally reached Bangkok
by 3:30 am. I took a meter taxi from airport desk to my hostel which was in
Bangrak road and the taxi fellow was very obedient, never took advantage of the
fact that I was a foreigner. The landmark to the hostel was hotel Manohra and
taxi driver dropped me at right place, even though the hostel was just few
steps away, I was searching for an hour to find it. It was 4:30 am, and I found
it very challenging to manage with few people awake and even more challenging
was they cannot speak/understand English. After several rounds, I was
embarrassed to see that the hostel was just next to me. I went inside and found the receptionist sleeping, after several shouts he woke up, after completing few formalities he told me to get settle in the last dorm room, but the beds were full, but was super lucky to get a private room instead
of the dorm I had booked and I dozed off by putting alarm after 4 hours.
Day
1- The Bangkok
9:00 am is when
the alarm started ringing, I woke up, took a bath, packed my bag and left to
the reception for check out. It was 10:00 am and I was asking the receptionist
for the places to look around, but unfortunately she didn't understand
English either. She just showed me the local bus numbers which will take
you to the tourist attractions, I noted some and then left the hostel seeking a
proper vegetarian Restaurant to have my breakfast. I was damn hungry as
previous day my appetite was not proper, was lucky to find an Indian restaurant
nearby. To my rotten luck it was just opened and he told it will take
another hour to serve the food. I had already lost time, so took some
suggestions from him ab the places? He advised to take bus no. 115 and get down
at the last stop which will take me to some zoo. I obeyed him and had some
pieces of the pineapple on the street and waited for the bus to come. Finally
the bus arrived and I told the lady conductor to take me to the last stop. She
asked me to relax as it would take 1 and a half hour to reach the destination.
Finally around 12:00 pm I reached the destination. The conductor did not take
any money from me, she just smiled at me and asked me to get down. When I got
down, surprise surprise, there was nothing apart from one amusement park. I
traveled 35 kms to the extreme east of Bangkok to find one amusement park?

They suggested me to take bus
no 70 which will take me to Wat Arun, and then I asked them for some veggi
food stalls, they asked one of the bus conductors to drop me at the Buddhists place where
only veg food is served. Even this conductor didn’t charge me and dropped me to
a place called “Saphan Sung” on the Bangkok eastern outer ring road. Happy to
see finally a veg stall in Bangkok, I eagerly went to see what was she
offering? As usual, she dint know English and I repeatedly asked her is this
vegetarian and she was looking at me with a question mark on her face. Finally
one of the locals understood what i was talking about and he told yes it is vegetarian. I told her
please make one for me as well, it was kind of soup with varieties of boiled
vegetables, spices, noodles and the name of the dish was Ko Pak Pha. I thought I had to take 4 of these to fill my tummy looking
at the size of the bowl. I started eating one and by the time I finished it, my
tummy was full. It was tasty and filling and it cost just 35 Bhats. I thought
of packing one for my dinner as well, it was that scarcity of veg stalls in Bangkok, so waited for the bus no 70, and finally I
could see the bus coming with board 70 on it. It was an a/c bus, but I didn’t
enjoy its ride as the windows were tinted and it blocked the city view. This
conductor finally charged me and I came out of the myth that local buses were
not free for foreigners, I reached place called Wat Arun by 4:00 pm.
Stunning
monument it was but we need to cross a small lake to reach Wat Arun through a
ferry which will charge you 6 bhats (to & fro) I went inside to see the
exquisite monument, took few pics of the surroundings. To enter the main
monument, you need to take an entry ticket which will cost you 50 bhats,
observing the monument closely which was entirely made up of a stone, the entire
structure was sculpted by a fine Thai art. It’s a treat to see
such minute carvings. Reaching the monument you have to literally climb on
an inclination of 80deg through steps to reach the monuments top which offered
beautiful views of the surrounding establishments, resting for some time, and
capturing few more pictures decided to leave the place.

On my way back to ferry, I found a cute Thai girl with beautiful attire who was also a tourist. I decided to capture her natural looks and approached her for a picture and she readily agreed following which I left Wat Arun by 5:30 pm.
But the day still had many surprises to offer with many new places to visit many new experiences to capture. Stay with me to get a glimpse of the Thunderous Thailand with me.
Shravan
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