12 days in Bangkok - day 1

in #travelfeed6 years ago (edited)

Hello everyone!

I decided to change the name of my blog according to the places I'll be staying at.

Let me start this first part of the blog by summing up my last couple of days in Fiji and my trip to Bangkok.

My new friend Lucie and I boarded a ferry from Taveuni to Suva on Sunday morning. The journey to Suva took us 18 hours. As the ferry is completely filled with people, there's no other option but to encamp in the first free spot you manage to get. Because Lucie was traveling only with carry-on luggage, she quickly boarded the ship and secured one of the premium positions - in an empty shop, where the floor is carpeted.

After arriving to Suva, we got an offer to take a shuttle to Nadi for just $5 FJD more than the bus would cost us. Of course we took the offer, as we couldn't wait to get back to Bamboo Backpackers to get a shower and some rest. Nothing interesting happened on our way except us being horrified by the driving etiquette among Fijian drivers; if you would drive like that in Europe, you would lose the license within an hour. Let me just say there was a lifetime of dangerous overtaking in the space of 4 hours - the length of the drive form Suva to Nadi.

When we arrived back to Bamboo, I decided to use my last couple of days for relaxation, since I knew there's an exhausting trip waiting on me, ergo no new content.

On Thursday morning I said goodbye to Fiji and boarded on a flight to Bangkok. I had a 7 hour layover in Hong Kong (it was supposed to be a 5 hour, but I got an e-mail just after landing that the plane will be additional 2 hours late), which I used to go to Kowloon, which is the most densely populated part of Hong Kong, as it is just 47 square kilometres in surface but has a population of 2 million (which is about as much as the whole country of Slovenija, where I come from). I made a couple of shots of the buildings and surrounding vistas, as I come from a rural area and this was by far the biggest city I've seen so far:

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I was especially fascinated by how busy the port is:

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While wandering around, I even encountered a Czech pub, it looked so out of place there, but it kind of almost made me feel like home :)

I bought myself a burger (which was really good) and headed back to the airport. I still had a couple of hours before boarding, so I took the time and put my towel on drying while occupying the space next to a power socket, where I was charging my phone.

Finally, the time to board the plane came. I couldn't wait to get to Thailand, as I was awake for about a day at this point. We already got into the plane, and were waiting for it to start, when the pilot chimed in on the speaker system and told us they're experiencing some problems with an onboard computer and they'll let us know shortly what's going to happen.

After about 20 minutes of waiting, they informed us that the computer is beyond repair, and that our flight will be additionally delayed for another 3 hours, which meant we'll be lifting off at 01:35 AM instead of 20:35 PM as we were supposed to originally. We got a free meal in any restaurant at the airport, at least, but too bad that the only open joint at that point was McDonalds.

I obviously had my free meal and after some napping they let us on another airplane. Because of the mess they made, I even got upgraded to 1st class, so I won't complain too much, the extra leg space was amazing :)

Because of all of the delays I landed in Bangkok at 4:00 AM on 7. 12., instead of originally planned 11:00 PM on 6. 12., which resulted in no free bed for me in the hostel when I finally arrived here, as I was unable to let them know, since I had no mobile data left. Which meant I had to sit in the reception with my stuff until 9:00 AM, when somebody finally checked out.

I can't complain about the staff though, the girl working here was very kind, she let me hit the shower and served me a breakfast. She even mentioned she knows Slovenia and surprised me with her knowledge of my homeland; she knew our Dragon Bridge in the capital city, the famous 3 bridges and even about our most well known poet, France Preseren. I was positively surprised, because I met an Austrian guy once who didn't even know Slovenija existed, and we're neighbouring their southern border.

This is the street I'll be staying on for the next 12 days, you can notice the iconic tuk-tuk in the forefront of the pic:

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After acquiring my bed, I went to sleep for 4 hours, and then it was time to take a casual walk in the vicinity of my hostel. Coming from rural area, I still feel completely lost and humble walking on the streets of metropolis like Bangkok. I took my camera with me and made a couple of pictures; the thing that fascinated me the most so far is the state of power cables around here, I can't imagine how the electricians can do any maintenance in this chaos:

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Of course I had to do a couple of classic shots from overhead walkways:

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And, last, but definitely not least, a couple of shots of details that caught my eye; the first one is this pic of a decaying building with a vine slowly creeping upon it:

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And this shaving paraphernalia someone apparently uses in the street, just around the corner of where I'm staying (it's also the first time I've incorporated myself in an image):

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I'm afraid that's it for today. I need to get the hang of moving around here, it's completely different to read about it on the internet than to actually go out and do it.

See you all tomorrow in the next report!

Update:

I went out in the evening to grab something to eat, and came back home with 3 photos, so I'll just include them in today's edition.

Firstly, the place where I went for dinner; they put up everything in the evening and the square is full of restaurants, bars, shopping stands where you can buy pretty much anything, and it's packed with tourists. The dinner was excellent, and from what I've heard they come there every night, so I guess I have a regular place to eat now:

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After dinner I was walking to the hostel, when I spotted this man selling fruit on the street, so I took a quick snap and I like how the photo turned out:

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Literally 100 metres before my hostel this guy came towards me on the street, and I managed to set my camera fast enough to get a pic of him. I present to you The Balloon Man:

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That really is all for tonight, see you tomorrow!

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Hi phobo,

This post has been upvoted by the Curie community curation project and associated vote trail as exceptional content (human curated and reviewed). Have a great day :)

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I really love this. I'm hoping to see more of vibrant colors of the great Bangkok. Great travel report you have here, as always :)

Thank you! More photos coming up tomorrow, I think I'll visit the floating market in the morning and some abandoned skyscraper in the evening. I hope it goes according to plan :)

Yeay! Floating market is awesome!!

Aw! You make me miss Bangkok so much! I was there for a couple of years before moving to Kuala Lumpur in August. You have truly caught the place in your words and text even as you are so new to it.

I was drawn to the wires too. I have never seen such an amazing sight, and it is everywhere in Bangkok. I hope you gt a chance to see some work done on them. Gangs will come and pull them down the street by hand! How they know which one to pull is a complete mystery :)

Thank you, that means a lot to me, especially as I'm so new to it :) sadly it's raining today, and that messed up my plans a bit, but I'll be well rested an set to go tomorrow morning, there's more stuff coming :)

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At this time of year there is rain most days, but luckily it passes quickly. Don't forget to blink sometimes while you are gawking:) I was never at a loss for things to see and wonder about in Bangkok.

I wonder what airline you had from Hong Kong. I had a delay experience like that fore more than 24 hours and it was sooo… forget it. The consolation I got was that it was a domestic flight.

I can't help laughing about the power cable wiring. I call that spaghetti-style. 😊

From your overhead walkway photos, it looks like traffic volume in Bangkok is not as bad as I heard or have been seeing on social media. Other than that and the tuk tuk, I can very much relate with the others that we also have in our country. 😊

I like that photo of the night market where you had your dinner. I like scenes showing life in by default dead night.

I was flying with Cathay Pacific. Thankfully I'm staying in Bangkok, if I had another flight to catch, I'd be in a pickle :)

I think I'll make some more nighttime street photos in the next couple of days, when I'm meeting some friends here and we'll go out. I'm not really interested in bar hopping on my own, especially not since I stopped drinking :)

Thanks for the positive critique, it's much appreciated :)

I haven't tried Cathay Pacific but I hear good things about it. I wonder why you got messed up. Anyway, charge it to experience.

Night time photos would be great. But I am also wondering about the floating market because we do not have that here. 😊

Comprehensive diary of the trip to Thailand with some adventure that people on and off have in airports. You were lucky that airline provided you with some food and that you did not need to wait too long and that later on you have been moved to First class that is really good treat. I can imagine how exhausted such time can be. Like the pictures, the most amazing that wire salads. Have never see such before :)

Yes, flying can be tiring :) thanks for positive feedback, it gives me motivation to make more content :)

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Another trip to another place in the world thanks to my time in steemit and thanks to a steemian who decided to share with us all his photographic work.

I really like this type of posts. As I always say, they make me travel to the place I am seeing.

thank you travel to Bangkok

I'm very glad there's people who like to read my posts, it's very rewarding and it leaves a nice, fuzzy feeling in me :)

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Oh man, continue doing those "classic overhead walkways please! Cuz they look amazing! Hmm that's indeed pretty surprising that the girl knew so much...and regarding austrians...man,don't tell me.I'm from Slovakia and study in Innsbruck. And these austrians have no idea what the capital of Slovakia is and Slovakia-Slovenia is basically the same shit for them. I literally couldnt believe it when I came here. But like proper smart people and classmates just dont know this stuff. IIt's aaabsolutely mindblowing.

Enjoy ur time in bangkok :)

I'll take some more overhead walkway classics at night with long exposure, I wanted to do it yesterday but it started to rain. About slovakia and slovenia - did you know that our governments have to exchange diplomatic mail once per month as so many people don't know which is whic XD

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:DDD no way really ? :D that's absolutely hilarious hahaha :D

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:DDD no way really ? :D that's absolutely hilarious hahaha :D

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Dear @phobo,

Thank you for the submission for our project – 1001 Places to Remember. Hooray, your story is now listed in our project publication, you can check through our progressive report either from our @fundition project page or @archisteem account. We will be sorting out the seasonal shortlist authors and make an announcement soon for the seasonal reward.

Stay tuned and Steem on!

Sincerely from,

@archisteem and team

Wow those buildings are really impressive. You had a wonderful day, I liked it a lot as you were writing your experience in detail and you captured beautiful photographs along your route, a big hug from Venezuela @phobo .. !!

Thank you, I'm glad you like what I'm doing :)

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