My last few
days in Thailand: Bangkok – Pattaya –
Jomtien
In
hindsight, I probably could have spent an extra day on each of the islands to
make best use of my time; however I decided to head back up to the Bangkok area as I needed to fly to Phnom Penh. When I arrived at Bangkok airport I still
hadn’t quite decided where I was headed. As it turned out the next bus to
Pattaya was quite late so the decision was made for me.
I headed
back down to the Khao San Road
backpacker area of Bangkok
as I know the area and I knew I’d be able to get a cheap room. Up till now I’ve
paid between 750 and 300 Baht a night. This time I found a room for 200 Baht
(or GBP 3.59 / USD 5.92). OK so you don’t get much for that - a single room
with a fan, a window onto a corridor and a shared bathroom, but it was clean
and perfectly adequate for sleeping. The downside of having a really cheap room
is that you spend as little time as possible in the room and you end up spending
any savings outside in the bars.
I felt I’d
spent enough time in Bangkok,
so the next day I travelled to Pattaya in a shared minibus taxi. Pattaya is the
second or third largest tourist destination in Thailand
and yet is omitted from my Rough Guide to South East Asia.
The authors have (probably quite rightly) decided that Pattaya has few
redeeming features as a backpacking tourist destination.
Pattaya
itself existed only as a small fishing village up till about 40 years ago, at
the time of the Korean War, when it became a R&R destination for American
troops. Thai entrepreneurs who saw the opportunity to relieve thirsty and horny
troops of their dollars and Pattaya was born. There is little to Pattaya apart
from the bars, go-go girls, beach loungers and tourist tat, not too dissimilar
to certain areas of Bangkok
and Phuket.
The
neighboring town of Jomtien is slightly more
upmarket in outward appearance and is not too dissimilar to parts of Dubai in terms of ongoing
developments. There too, the entire economy revolves around beaches, booze and
babes. Some of the Pattaya malls rival Dubai’s
maybe not in size, but do in terms of splendor.
The Thai
people are incredibly resourceful. Any spare piece of pavement, rear of a truck
or motorcycle side car becomes a place of business. How everyone gets by amazes
me. The markets are filled with curious looking fruit, veg and other
foodstuffs. I was a little saddened to see a few hundred live baby turtles in one
market, and I’m sure they were not destined for a local aquarium. Some were as
small as a large coin, others around the size of a fist. There were also
several hundred small live fish at the same stall so maybe he is the local pet
shop.
I had the
most severe Thai massage so far, I was wondering if I’d make it through the
hour and how I was going to continue with my travels with fractured limbs. I
could have sworn I asked for a gentle head and shoulders massage but was
treated to the full Thai torture treatment instead. I’m sure I’ve lost most of
my body hair (some of which won’t be missed), but managed to keep all bones
intact. I felt surprisingly good afterwards but I’ve decided I’m not going to
use a masseuse who weighs more than 50 kg from now on.
It’s hard
to believe that I’ve been in Thailand
for almost a month. Time has absolutely flown by. I’ll definitely be back at
some point to explore northern Thailand.
I head to Cambodia
next.
Photo's on facebook at:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=318773&id=744675149&l=5b7b2ed6db
