Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
What a day to be in Bangkok. Songkran, Thailand New Year!! We arrived off the train, got to our hostel called Mile Map. It had only recently opened and the reviews were right, it was a great hostel. Had an Australian feel to it weirdly enough. Communal cooking area, places to do your own laundry, computer and a common room with lots of sofas. We all really liked it, I remember researching about this place when I was looking for somewhere to stay a few months back when I was travelling alone but unfortunately it was fully booked. Maybe I would've enjoyed myself more if I had stayed here. Anyway, we were all starved and needed food because we had skipped dinner the night before from being on the overnight train. We walked for ages and couldn't find anywhere open, and then, there they were, those bright Golden Arches. McDonalds breakfast had to be done and I have no regrets. Mind, it didn't stay down very long, food still isn't agreeing with my stomach. Definitely have some kind of bug. After we'd had a chance to shower and write down our shopping lists, we went to the MBK centre which is like Westfield's shopping centre x10. The size of the place is ridiculous, luckily we were short on time and money and only allowed ourselves to buy the bits on our lists. I bought a battery pack for my iPad so that it can charge it when were on long journeys and went to boots to stock up on toiletries, medications and antibacterial gel for India. Oh and a scarf to cover my shoulders because I lost my one on a bus journey to the other week, doh! Our plan was to go home, dump our stuff then go celebrate Songkran because the streets were lined with water fights, and people getting hit buy water balloons and drivers getting their cars floured, BUT, the people of BKK had another idea for us. They absolutely drenched us as soon as we walked out, luckily we had tied up our electricals in plastic bags because we did expect to get a tiny bit wet. We wanted to go for lunch at the amazing veggie restaurant that I basically lived in when I previously stayed in Bangkok, so we after two attempts, we managed to persuade a taxi driver to drive us to Khaosan Road. He wasn't to pleased about the distance of the journey because of the New Years traffic but he overcharged us to make up for that. When we arrived on the edge of the madness that was the Khaosan mass water fight. In all honesty we didn't expect it to be that crazy. Walking into the crowds of people, with locals passing us, stroking our arms and faces saying "Happy Songkran", we were soon to realise they were stroking us with the clay. We were then targeted by water guns, which would wash down the clay, then more people would put stroke us. It was an on going cycle of mayhem, 100's of people walking in, what seemed like a parade formation. Bunting hanging between buildings, girls dancing on tables, music blaring. Had a definite carnival feel about it; writing about it now gets me so excited for Notting Hill Carnival this year!! We managed to slip off into one of the side roads to go to the restaurant, which in the end was closed but fear not this was like vegetarian alley so there were a few places of similar cuisine. I couldn't wait to sit down, absolutely shattered, and fighting through that crowd used my last energy. I was thinking to have a plain lunch due to my stomach still not sitting right but then I thought I'm going to be ill anyway, regardless of what I eat, so I may as well have something yummy. Ordered me up a Panang curry, yum yum yum. Sadly I couldn't join Kate on drinking a Chang beer though, I was definitely not ready to test drinking yet. Once we had eaten, we made a plan of action to get through the mayhem. Kate wanted to buy a water gun so we broke our way through the crowd and got to a stall that was selling them. We were all getting attacked while Kate was exchanging money, one guy even squirted the water pistol up my skirt, I was obviously completely taken by shock and screamed my head off. We started off the march down the road, and it all started again, people touching our faces and smearing the clay over us. Some were softer then others, one guy even wiggled my nose afterwards haha. I definitely felt targeted by the water guns because of my height, and lets be fair, I am an easy target with my height comparison in Asia. By the end of the road we were absolutely drenched, including our bags, and struggling to walk in our slippy-slidey flip flops. Deciding to go home, we got in a tuk tuk, armed with half a tank of water let in the gun; we were in a for an interesting journey home. Anytime we stopped at traffic lights, we would get ambushed by people standing in the streets with buckets of water or get into combat with other tuk tuks near us. Even when we was driving, our driver slowed down when we went passed people so they could soak us, we thought it was hilarious but sometimes the water was icy cold so it really stung as it clapped us in the face.
That night we had many jobs to do before we departed for India the next day. Lots of packing and unpacking, throwing away clothes we won't be able to use, catching up on Admin bits, emailing friends and family before the big move to a new country and uploading our photos onto the SnapFish account - so feel free to have a snoop.
Due to Songkran, we was warned to get to the airport 4 hours before our flight because of the busy time of year which meant we had to leave at 4am so up at 3am. As much as we tried to get an early night, midnight was not early. I'm sure you can imagine all three of our faces when it came to the alarm ringing through our ear drums after minimal sleep. I don't think we spoke to each other properly until we got out the taxi at the airport. Turns out the airport was empty, we didn't need to be early and the check in wasn't even open for another hour so we did the only possible, we went to Starbucks. After we checked in we went straight to the gate which luckily had a coffee shop next door, we snuck onto some of their chairs, kicked off our flip flops and had a little snooze. Luckily Liv had set an alarm on her phone to wake us when we was due to board otherwise we would have 100% missed our flight. As we was dragging our ankles to the gate we noticed it was already on final call, opps.
We were flying with Jet Airways to Delhi and we weren't sure what to expect from the airline, turns out we was pleasantly surprised. Before we had even taken off they had moved us to the emergency exit seats, extra leg room for me!! And we all had a row of seats to ourselves because the flight wasn't full. What a luxury, they even gave us a little pillow and blanket to lay down with. I was planning to sleep for the duration of the four hour flight but then the TV's started and guess what was on. JAMES BOND SKYFALL. I had waited to watch this film since the moment it came out before we left home. I didn't have a choice but to sit up and watch it. And it didn't disappoint, what a brilliantly British James Bond. Breakfast was served and it was our first taster of Indian breakfast, I couldn't even describe to you what it was but I do know, it did not taste good. All I know is that it was vegetarian. Just as I was about to give on the dish, I found a hair buried in it, vom, I pressed the attendant button and got them to take it away, I suppose they did give me another two fruit salads to make up for it. By the time I laid down for a nap, I was nudged to sit up and put my seat belt on for landing. I put up my window shutter and looked out at the view, there it was, Delhi. We had made it to India. Time to wrap ourselves up in our scarfs.
- comments