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The trip to Bangkok was to be the last and a farewell trip organized by my local friend for this semester. And at the moment it looks like it...
The Retreat to Bangkok was intended for a group sized around 25 people that we know well and really want to travel and party with. Of course there is tons of more people but our accommodation price and size were to be kept within a reasonable limit.
The plans were made over the weekend, so some left on thursday and rest on friday. The flights back were also scattered due and according to school schedules. Some got back on sunday or monday and the last of us departed on late tuesday. Ps. I could have stayed till wednesday...
Our supposed departure time on friday to Bangkok was 6pm from the Changi airport. In the end we were allowed to board the plane around 7.15pm and departure took part around 7.30pm without any notifications of flight delay. We should have arrived to Bangkok 7.30pm local time, but finally around 10.15pm local time we were able to leave from the airport to our designated accommodation.
I'll admit that not all of the delay was because of the Tiger airlines, part of it came with the fact that one of us needed to buy a visa on arrival due to the country of his origin and nationality. We were almost leaving from the airport without him after 45min of no contact waiting and trying to call to the immigration service to sort out what had happened to him, but luckily we got all through. From the airport we took a private van to ride us to our accommodation with the cost of 150baht ~3.5eur per head for around 30min ride.
The first nights were spend in a hotel called
Happy House located in the backpackers area of Bangkok, close to the
Khao San Road district. The rooms were nice with private bathroom, hot shower and air-con with price around 300baht ~ 7eur per night if sharing a double or triple room with a friend.
The first arrivals on thursday and friday morning had already seen lot's of thinks like a big Muy Thai (Thai boxing) match in the central arena and lots of sightseeing around the temples. We had organized a get together with the group in the hotel bar around 9.15pm but in the end we made it there from the airport somewhat after 11pm! We had planned to see the State Tower with the Sky Bar on the first night but in the end we rearranged that for the second night due to the late schedule. The first night was just about chilling out and chatting. I never ever I had ever have to drink so much in the game of "never ever I had ever", but what happens in the game stays in the game! And of course by the night advanced we tried the local cuisines from the food stalls beside the relaxing backpackers route.
Part of the group, mainly the ones who arrived on thursday or friday morning left to check out a supposed party to be open till 6am. Normally in Bangkok, the clubs close at 1am or 2am, you can always find some differences between club cultures. In the end it looked like the club was open, cause the last of us chilled by the hotel bistro till 5am before hitting the bed and we didn't catch up with the clubbers...
We woke up around 10am and headed down to enjoy some breakfast from the hotels restaurant. The first of checked out from the hotel at 11am and headed to organize everything in our upcoming resort for the weekend in the serviced apartments. The roads were messed up with the traffic, but thats normal in Bangkok. A trip of 4.2km took almost an hour with taxi for the price of 150baht ~3.5eur. How can they make a living out of it?
The weekend was spend in a luxury serviced apartment in
Seven Place Executive Residences. We had one Type A residence and two Type E residences. We also had the luxury of using the hotels rooftop sky pool over the night!
Type A: Grand Suite 300 sq.m.
Spacious with 1 large living room, 3 bedrooms king-size bed with balconies, 1 large dinning room, 3 bathrooms with Jacuzzi & 2 showers and separated maid quarter.
Type E: Royal Suite 285 sq.m.
Spacious with 1 large living room, 3 bedrooms king-size bed, 1 large dinning room, 3 bathrooms with Jacuzzi, bath tub & shower and separated maid quarter.
Around 3pm almost everyone had arrived to the estate and a group of us left to have a lunch together to taste the local cuisines. I had the funkiest
Tom Yum soup ever! After that some headed for sightseeing, others to have a thai massage or to chill out by the poolside. Around 7-8pm we tried to gather everyone again to have a small get-together group party. If I recall correctly the first night in the serviced apartment was when we left to see the amazing views from the Bangkok's finest, the
State Tower Sky Bar, lebua. The view was amazing and really worth it. To pay a visit to the sky bar itself was for free and the taxi ride to the tower cost practically nothing compared to the prices in europe.
After catching our breath back seeing the breathtaking views we headed to eat some local cuisine and were else could we end other than the worlds famous Ronald's McDonalds! You know how it tastes, I think I really don't have to describe the feeling, it was the best... The rest of the night was a mixture of Jacuzzi, rooftop pool and some good chilling out with lovely friends.
Imagine waking up to a lovely scent of freshly baked toast and squeezed orange juice, yep, that's what happened next. By the day we headed to the biggest small stall market Chatuchak in Bangkok. The place was a shopaholics heaven as well as backpackers paradise, the variety in everything was just overwhelming.
Chatuchak Weekend Market is one of the world's largest weekend markets covers area of 70 rai (27 Acres) altogether divided into 27 Sections, contains more than 15,000 booths selling goods from every part of Thailand. Must to visit!
By the night we had another get-together party by our serviced apartments. First we headed as a group to have a supper. We headed to this small diner by the street, after the first table had ordered and 30min passed our table decided to head to find a different place. We had a group of six after my estonian bro left back to the hotel directly. We found a place I had saw cross the street previously. It was a goldmine! Buffet dinner of everything, seafoods, poultry, beef, pork, everything, some ready cuisines, fruits, jellies, salads, deep fried stuff like springrolls... everything you can imagine. We also got two grills to cook our food in the table, everything was fresh of course!
Later that night I had a french wine and cheese tasting party on a balcony over Bangkok with two lovely french girls while others headed to have crazy time by the rooftop pool.
Happened later that night around 2-4am... By the night I had my first bad allergic reaction, anaphylaxis, after eating some spicy seafood nuts noodles my friend had ordered previously. Luckily that night I got a french nurse to take care of me and I immediately took my antihistamine allergic pills and albuterol ventolin inhaler. The reaction stopped after the rapid part of turning red and a huge pressure in my hands and legs, I didn't have any problems to breath but I think it was because I took a doze from the albuterol inhaler. We were thinking about getting me into a hospital but in the end we decided to look if the antihistamine helps, the redness and pressured started to ease a while later and I went to rest on the bed for the night. In the morning I was ok, nothing to worry! It's always nice to check the treatment proceduress afterwards, adrenaline and immediate hospital care required...
We checked out from the serviced apartments around 12pm and headed to leave our stuff again in to the Happy House hotel where some of us would stay for the last night from monday to tuesday. From there we went to have a nice lunch with the group of five that was left. Actually there were still six of us left but the german guy had decided to do a day trip by bus to a local village.
On monday we tried to visit the royal Grand Palace inside the Bangkok but were denied accessing by the palace guards due to the reason that royal family was arriving there later on. By the gate we also met a local senior police officers who explained the reason for us and after that he was very helpful about pointing us all the places to visit and how to get there. In the end I got a feeling that he was a Tuk-Tuk ride organizer rather than a real police officer, but can't really say in the end... He was nice, although we didn't not visit any of his recommended places.
Around 6pm we headed back to the Happy House. We had the nicest collision of minds on that night, me from Finland, my bro from Estonia and our lovely nurse from France. Image the meeting of minds just loving the same music, videos and showing them to each others and laughing their brains out for 6 hours! The german guy returned from his day trip around 11pm and joined us for a while. The estonian and german had to leave for a plane earlier in the morning and they went to sleep while we continued for a while before hitting the bed too. I can recall my estonian brother leaving and hugging his bro (me) in the morning! The rest of us woke up around 10 and headed for breakfast, after the breakfast the german guy was already so late that he had to take a 450baht ~11eur taxi to the airport.
The last and the best day.
With my french friend I had the best and relaxing day in Bangkok. We just walked around the backpackers area for 4 to 5 hours sightseeing some riverside buildings and narrow roads that had treetops hanging over the streets as roofs. It is just something so beautiful and calming for me. After some walking and shopping we decided to go for a massage. I had never had a paid massage in a massage pallor and I was about to have my first now. I took the Thai massage and she took Oil massage. She was escorted to a private room for a massage while I changed into massage pants and shirt. The massage started by the masseuse washing my feet. After that I relaxed on the bed and just closed my eyes to enjoy the overcoming feeling of the full body thai massage. By the way the ones with the dirty mind back there, the real thai massage doesn't come with the "happy ending" you perverts.
Thai massage is just a full body massage and I can promise you all that I will have it every time I visit Thailand or Malaysia at least once. In Bangkok the 1 hour massage cost 180baht ~4eur!
Ps. After my friend had also finished her massage and we had left from the massage pallor she told me that she thinks that the oil massage might end up with the happy ending for the guys...
The relaxed feeling of the body and mind was amazing. After the massage we both got the same feeling to find something to eat. We headed to a close by hostel bistro where I had a three cuisine set meal with dessert for 160baht and she had a local cuisine of a
Pad Thai noodles with mango yoghurt shake. After the delicacies we wandered through the booths of incredible nice and relaxed style clothes. I can recall thinking about one girl that I had met previously in finland before leaving to Singapore and imagining her matching the clothes on her, the style of the clothes was just made for her! Maybe we'll see each others in Bangkok later, just tell me if you are doing the trip later this year!
Around 4pm we arrived back to the Happy House hotel to catch up with our ordered minibus ride to the airport, the ride was a bit late due to the reason that they were gathering people from lot's of different hotels and hostels. We left around 4.40pm but it was ok for our schedule. The price of the ride was 140baht which is very cheap compared to the 450baht taxi ride our german guy had to made. Our plane left in time at 8pm and we arrived to Singapore and home just after the midnight.
Amazing trip with a new country and city to love!
Also one of the evenings was filled with unexpected excitement, when my Danish friend and I were surrounded by five Thai mafia guys. They threatened us with taser pushing it almost on our face and skin. They also knocked me with a club to the back of my head, and smacked with open hand to my face and stomach, even though we weren't resisting. They were demanding 3000 bath (100 USD) as ransom to let us go. Some Swedish guy came to the scene and started to bullshit us too, saying that he can take care of this if we just pay. He was threatening us by saying that these guys can take you to the jungle and smack you to dead etc, I didn't feel like they could but still, why take the unnecessary risk. In the end we ended up paying 1700 baht which was all that we carried that moment.
