Bangkok Day 1

Darwin and I decided there is no time to waste in Thailand and although we both didn't sleep well because of still being jet-lagged, we woke up early to have all day to explore Bangkok. Our first stop was MBK, a huge shopping center which Kevin recommended to see as apparently you can buy there literally everything you can think of (and unthinkable as well). The distance to MBK from our hostel ir around 0.5h and on the way we had some breakfast consisting of various fruits from a food stall, with few of them completely unknown to me. The name of one of the fruit I had: green, pear shape and tasting like a sour, green apple remains a mystery.

When we reached MBK we quickly realised that it is not quite what we were looking for. It covers a massive area but it happened that we entered a building full of cheap 'chinese' clothes/handbags/shoes and we couldn't find the exit. On top of that by that time we were really hungry and we could smell the food hall somewhere but we couldn't find it either.

View from one of he bridges in MBK:

Overall, apart from meeting our old friend:

first visit to MBK was a bit disappointing.

Finally when we reached a place to eat, I thought that at least I don't need to feel weird making pictures of food we ordered because Asians do it on regular basis.

And that's what we saw in a bakery (!)

After MBK we decided to go to the very famous (or infamous) Khao san Road. For the first time in Thailand I took a crazy but organized bus ride:

Khao san Road is considered a 'backpackers ghetto'; it offers budget accommodation and buzzing western-style night life. We definitely were not the only foreign people in the area, and I'm not sure if that's a good or bad feeling. All the food stalls and market style shops are targeted into tourists which means high prices and sellers not willing to haggle. I still managed to get a pair of nice flip flops for equivalent of £3 and few other things.

And the Road itself:

Khao san Road is also a center of travel agencies and tour pick up points, so when we found a reasonable priced deal we decided to go for it and book a tour. Tomorrow we are going to the floating market and we plan to visit a Golden Palace as well if we still have energy for it, and on Sunday evening we are leaving Bangkok and heading to Chiang Mai in northern Thailand by overnight bus.

Another very pleasant surprise on Khao san Road was a real Buddhist temple freely available for visiting (but only in appropriate clothing):

While coming back to the hostel we stopped for some Thailand specials: fried scorpions (taste just like burned, crispy and salty thing)

and street pad Thai to which a very interesting 'topping' was available:

If someone has any doubts what is this, that's tiny (dried? fried?) baby prawns. And I actually liked them and regretted I didn't add to my pad Thai some more.

What will tomorrow bring? Can't wait!