After Mandalay, it took a minute to be able to trust street food again, but now Im back (knock on wood) ! On our first day back here Penny and I ate at restauraunts, but then I remembered how good the street food was and that it is about a tenth of the cost of the restaurant food (which is already pretty cheap).
On my outing this morning, I sampled grilled chicken from a couple different street vendors and it was simply DELICIOUS. I dont usually eat much meat, so every time I push myself to try something that I ordinarily wouldn’t, and find that its GOOD, I get emboldened to try more stuff. By the end of the trip, who knows, I may even try sea cucumber (at this point, its probably one of the last things I would ever try).
For the grilled chicken, you just point at the piece you want (its grilling right there on the street) and they put it on a cutting board and whack it 3 times with a butcher knife and put it in a little plastic baggie for take away.
Although Bangkok is a great city for walking (sidewalks are in great condition, its clean, and its totally flat), hardly anyone walks unless its in the shopping/market areas. So theres LOTS of traffic and traffic noise and the air quality is poor. So after the previous nights megamall experience and my 2-hr stroll down Sukhumvit Rd, I was ready for some peace and quiet and greenery this morning. I made my way across town to Bangkok’s central park, Lumpini Park, one of the few options for greenery in the city. I had to pass through Chinatown on the way and from there I took the MBT subway the rest of the way (different from the BTS Skytrain).
Lumpini was a pretty small park compared to GG Park or NYC Central Park. It takes up just a few blocks, but it was a great place to chillax for a few hours and stroll around and read my latest book (“The idiots guide to the middle east conflict”). It has 2 large ponds where people boat around in white swan-shaped paddle boats and lots of open meadows shaded with big trees throughout. The views of the surrounding financial district were pretty spectacular too (see pix).
After Lumpini, I ate lunch at the noodle shop across the street from my hotel again. I tried a different soup than I had last time, but it was basically the same thing except it had some wontons and some different veggie/fish balls thrown in. It was still red and still delicious though.
Back at my room, I booked a different hotel in the more “happening" part of town for the next day. My other big reason for switching hotels is that, and I know this is a Thai thing in general, the bed is as hard as a slab of granite and the pillow is as thick as a tree trunk here. The thais have great hospitality but I honestly dont know how they sleep very well.
Being my last night in the Khao San area, I thought I’d pay another visit to the magical flower market (which Penny and I went to before and is within a 40 min walk). Due to not checking the map enough, I ended up in a completely different part of town which was a bit of a bummer because I was really looking forward to the flower market. I did find a fruit market though, or rather a mango and pineapple market— Ive never seen so many of one kind of fruit in a single place before (see pix). I also ventured to have crispy pork and rice for dinner from a street vendor which, as usual, was delicious. It came with a garlicky/cilantro-y bowl of really good broth. I think my faith is only getting stronger in the street vendors— you can pretty much blindly choose anything they have and chances are it will be REALLY GOOD (knock on wood).
On my walks Ive noticed that in Bangkok there are lots of very chill street cats lying around and I haven’t seen a single dog. The cats are super calm, friendly and pet-able. It just adds to the vibe of Bangkok being a very friendly, hospitable place! In Myanmar we didn’t see many cats, but there was a virtual dog and puppy epidemic. The dogs there were a little anti-social-- mostly they just minded their own business looking for food.
