As the song goes by Murrayhead goes they called it a "crowded stinkin town" and they aren’t too far from the truth.
We touch down in Thailand and head for the capital Bangkok by shuttle train and after some negotiation check into our hotel in what appears to be an Arabic part of town mainly due to its proximity to the hospital used by most of the middle east and Asia for check ups and treatment.
We’re both feeling a little unwell which we decide must be due to the expensive “breakfast” we had in the departure lounge of Hanoi airport. We meet up with Dom as pre arranged at 3pm in the hotel lobby and venture out to explore our immediate surroundings, which appear to be a mixture of mainly Arabic restaurants and take-aways and a few sleazy bars. The "river" is nearby
and we’d earlier read in our guide books that it was possible to take boats up and down the length of it (which to be honest is literally an open sewer) we jump on board the first boat that arrives and are sped off at break neck speed up river.
An Aussie ex-pat school teacher on his daily commute warns us of the perils of the “river” by saying “whatever you do don’t get any of the black water spray in your mouth or you’ll be sick for a month if you get it on your skin you’ll have a bad rash if you don’t wash it off immediately”.
On each side of the boat is a tarp attached to a cord which is pulled when a boat approaches to stop the water from splashing on to you.
we take his warnings on board and it’s standing room only for our journey on the boat upstream, it’s at this point that the earlier food poisoning must have kicked in because I can remember saying to Jo that “I don’t feel to good”, next thing I awake on the floor of the boat surrounded by concerned faces, standing up I said I was fine, only to find that two minutes later I was gone again, this time being violently sick on all three of us as both Jo and Dom battle to prop me up. We get off the boat at the next stop and Jo is immediately sick all over the pier, in a bit of a state we agree to get a taxi back to the hotel which takes an age, as by this time it’s rush hour.
Next day still feeling a little tender Jo and myself take a journey across town to the old city for a day of sightseeing round the temples
this is a 5.5 tonne solid gold statue of Buddha
and this is a 45m long 16m high gold plated reclining Buddha
we wander down by the river
and through the markets of china town
Still not quite recovered completely from our sickness the next day is spent on a local train from a district in the city called Wongwian Yai
to a place an hour away called Maha Chai, the journey on the Maeklong commuter train costs us 10 b each (20p) and is worth every penny as it takes us through some amazing scenes of suburban Bangkok.
On reaching Maha Chai
the daily market is strewn across the rail tracks and station and is one of the most amazing experiences to date,
meat is being prepared and sold right on the platform
and vegetables right on the rail tracks.
Around the town we stumble on a local “farmers market”
complete with some Thai garden gnomes
There’s some video of the train journey and the market on our youtube channel.
Bangkok probably has the worst air quality I’ve ever encountered, the atmosphere at street level is stifling, the heat unbearable and the aromas out of this world, one moment repulsive the next invigorating, you feel beaten up and spat out.
The hotels’ rooftop swimming pool is an airy refuge to survey the city from, at least there’s some oxygen to breathe at this level.
Maybe it would have been different if we hadn’t been so ill and was able to “enjoy” it rather than tolerate it.
We’re relieved to be leaving and heading for the island idyll that is Phuket.
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