World Thailand Bangkok

David and Natalya's Around the World Tours David and Natalya's One Year Trip Through Asia

The World's Biggest Party in Bangkok! - Hong Kong-Singapore to Thailand Apr 16, 2005

Hong Kong-Singapore to Thailand

Dave - April 16th, 2005 - Bangkok, Thailand

Today we flew from Hong Kong, then after a brief stop in Singapore on to Bangkok. What was really interesting flying into Bangkok was how flat the city looked. Coming in by air we could have been arriving in Saskatchewan. It was much different looking than I would have expected. Once we had touched down though there was no mistaking it, we had definitely arrived in Thailand.

The air was thick with smog and humidity and it was steaming hot. This is also a city of 1000 smells, and every corner you turn it can be almost overpowering.

The architecture was quite different then anything I have seen anywhere else, although both Natalya and I said that parts of the city reminded us of Cuba and parts of it of Southern Russia - Sochi, where Natalya grew up. There are brand new Asian style skyscrapers, next to crumbling slums, next to 1000 year old temples.

We have arrived in Bangkok at about the best possible time we could have, the annual New Year's Songkron celebrations. We first heard about Songkron from a waiter at a Thai restaurant (Khao Thai on Clarence Street) in Ottawa. He described it to us as the biggest celebration in Thailand and said if we were ever planning to come to Thailand, April 13-15th during Songkron would be the time. We took his advice and booked our plane tickets a few days later, and he couldn't have been more right, it is absolutely amazing. Thai's celebrate their New Year, by visiting local temples, dancing in the streets and putting on the world's largest water fight. What started as a Buddhist tradition of splashing small amounts of water on people has turned into a massive street party that puts Mardi Gras and Spring Break to shame.

The largest celebrations are supposed to be in Chaing Mai in Northern Thailand, but I don't know how anything could be much larger than the celebrations we experienced on the streets of Bangkok. As we took our Taxi from the airport to our hotel we started to see the celebrations, with people spraying water guns at each other and a few trucks with people with barrels of water and huge sound systems driving around the city. We quickly checked into our hotel and asked our concierge where the largest Songkron celebrations in the city could be found. She was reluctant to tell us, but suggested we go to the area around the Democracy Monument on the other side of town.

We headed downstairs and tried to get a taxi, but found the taxi drivers even more reluctant than our concierge to go anywhere near the Songkron festival. It took some negotiating but we finally found a tuk-tuk driver (a small 3 wheel motorcycle taxi) who was willing to take us into the middle of things. Seeing he was soaking wet from head to toe we knew he likely knew the best places to go.

As the Tuk-Tuk brought us across the city we started to find a few people along the way who would spray small water guns at us, say "Happy New Year" and smile. As we got closer to the centre of the action it changed to pick up trucks loaded with every type of water gun bombarding us. Luckily we had just bought an underwater case for our digital camera so we were able to capture some of the action as we went. At one point our tuk-tuk driver saw a group of people standing with massive buckets of water on a street corner, and drove over and stopped. If any part of us was dry at this point, it wasn't any more. As the tuk-tuk driver stayed at a stop and laughed bucket after bucket of ice cold water was poured over top of us. A few blocks away the tuk-tuk would go no further. Our driver smiled pointed down the street and simply exclaimed, "Songkron that way!"

Heading out on foot into the country's biggest party we were now even bigger targets, and soon discovered that people did not just spray water on each other, but also cover each other in soap, and a white chalky powder mixed with water. Many Thais walking down the street looked like ghosts covered from head to toe in white powder as we moved towards the centre of one of the world's biggest street parties.

A block further down the street we saw something very interesting that taught us a lot about Thai culture. As we rounded a corner and came up to the Democracy monument we saw the largest crowd yet with hundreds of thousands of people lining the street, but all standing there in almost complete silence, and with many police and military around. At first we had no idea what was going on, but after asking a young Thai, he told us in a very quiet voice "My king is about to drive by". And a moment later the King did just that, with a large Royal motorcade coming down the street with hundreds of thousands of people standing in silence showing the deep respect Thai people have for their royal family.

About two minutes later, with the King now safely down the street the party started back up as quickly as it at stopped. Everyone now poured back into the street, as did cars and tuk-tuks and the water fight was back on at an even more frenzied pace.

We had heard that the largest of the celebrations could be found on Kho San road a mecca of cheap guest houses and restaurants filled with backpackers from around the world, and started to work our way towards that area just a few blocks away. Those few blocks became almost impassable with people jammed in one against the other and chalk paste, water and soap being thrown everywhere. Finally the celebrations where becoming even a bit much for us, and Natalya seemed to be a big target, with lots of people coming up shoving chalk paste all over her face and hair, and her starting to get progressively more angry.

It wasn't until she had a better idea that all of this was being done by people as a local way to wish happy New Year and good luck that she started to enjoy it more again. We also figured out it was a lot more fun and we would be a lot less of targets if we fought back! I bought two large bottles of ice cold water, and Natalya bought her very own bucket of chalk paste, and now rather than running up and attacking us with chalk paste and ice cold water, most people would walk up and respectfully say "Happy New Year" or "Happy Songkron" and put a little bit of chalk paste on our cheek. The few who would still run up and blast us with chalk paste we would now nail right back with both chalk and ice cold water, and everyone was having a great time.

After a few hours we were having a great time but were exhausted and started to work our way back towards the hotel. Along the way we came up to one section of a canal with a huge crowd and a big dance party in the middle of the street and spent a few more minutes celebrating Songkron before working our way back to the Hotel.

Dave

Natalya - April 16th, 2005 - Bangkok, Thailand

For our first few days in Bangkok we pre-arranged our stay in the luxurious Westin Grand Sukhumvit. The taxi ride from the airport was absolutely amazing with both of us staring out the windows and taking it all in. On the way to our hotel the taxi driver negotiated with 3 or 4 guards explaining in Thai that he is just dropping us off. As soon as we arrived, 3 or 4 doormen came to help us and we were greeted by a Thai lady who showed us where to check in. The front desk was located on the 7th floor and the lady who checked us in spoke almost perfect English. She gave us our keys and escorted us to the room and stayed for a few minutes to show us our room amenities.

I was stunned by the décor and attention to detail. Our towels were neatly folded in the bathroom with several orchids tucked in between the folds. Bath salts were placed in a really heavy stone disk right beside the oversized tub. Our shower had a really nice bamboo floor that made the entire bathroom look very Asian.

Our room is located on the 21st floor giving us a spectacular view of the Sukhomvit district of Bangkok. Even though we are so high above ground I was able to hear the birds chirping their morning songs at 5am (I am still adjusting to the time change).

We had a delicious lunch at a small restaurant just off Sukhomvit Road. I ordered Thai soup with noodles and chicken and it was so good. The broth was really flavourful, noodles were tender, chicken was thinly sliced and well cooked. I really enjoyed different herbs and spices in the broth although I have no idea what they were and have never had them before in Thai restaurants in Canada. We also ordered green papaya salad, which had a lot of white cabbage with really neat green beans and lots of fresh red chilly peppers. We asked the server to recommend another dish and without hesitation he recommended pad thai, which he called by a different name. The dish was absolutely delicious and it was served wrapped in a very thin egg omelette. Bean sprouts looked strange, but tasted almost the same as in Canada. We also had the spring rolls and two drinks for a total cost of $13 CND.

Tomorrow we plan to go to a large outdoor market. We bought a Nancy Chandler map of Bangkok today and it is by far the best map I have ever seen. It is geared to English-speaking tourists and is written by Nancy Chandler, an American woman who came to Bangkok in 1969 and now calls it her second home splitting her time between Bangkok and San Francisco. One of her daughters runs the business and the map is updated frequently. The version we have was published in February 2005.

Natalya