Thailand

When it comes to crossing borders in Asia, Derek is one troublesome boy 🙂

First, he was not allowed to cross the border between Cambodia and Thailand at Poipet, as this particular border crossing doesn’t issue visas to Polish citizens. Unfortunately Kama already went through the passport control and got stamped out of Cambodia, therefore she had to get stamped into Thailand, get stamped out of Thailand, then re-apply for a brand new visa to Cambodia. All this trouble just so we could drive back to Siem Reap, buy airline tickets and fly into Bangkok.

Now, one would think that it would be the end of troubles – but you couldn’t be more wrong. It turned out that to issue a visa in Bangkok one has to show an onward ticket out of  Thailand – kinda hard to do when you buys the tickets as you go and you don’t know where would will go next.

All in all, after a lot of smiling, talking and explanation Derek was finally let through into Thailand.

We stayed in the close proximity to Khao San Road in Bangkok, where street vendors, performers & tourists all mingled together. The beautiful harmony was often broken by police raiding unregistered stalls – technique which could clear the entire street in mere minutes 🙂

We ate, drank and enjoyed some of the cheapest food so far, with prices like: Pad Thai w/egg – 25 Baht, Fried Rice w/Veggies – 40 Baht, Sliced Guava/Pineapple – 10 Baht, Freshly Squeezed Orange Juice – 25 Baht. The exchange rate is in the 45 Baht = $1 range.

At night we visited the infamous Patpong – internationally known as the red light district, but also a location of the Night Bazaar. Also a place where shows like Ping-Pong and Banana take place (sorry, can’t provide more details :-), and everything imaginable happens. Kama really enjoyed the boys district, as they were more interested in Derek 😀

Nang decided to head home instead of continuing the trip to India with us, so we put him on a plane and waved goodbye.

Couple of days later we left busy Bangkok (as we have received our Indian visas) and headed to northern regions of Thailand, specifically Chiang Mai. We made a short stop in Ayutthaya, former capital of Siam, covered with old temples and ruins,  like Wat Phra Si Sanphet  (row of stupas) and Wat Phra Mahathat (with tree that has grown around Buddha’s head).

Then we took a tiring train trip to Chiang Mai, beautiful city surrounded by mountains and covered with hundreds of temples. Night filled the smells and sounds of a Night Bazaar, where we hunted for souvenirs and dodged the rain 🙂

On Saturday we have celebrated our first wedding anniversary (yay!) with a cake (extremely sweet), food (hot pot) and movie (G.I. Joe) – it was great! To make it even better, we had a full spa package the previous day 🙂

We left Chiang Mai on Sunday, this time by plane and are now heading to India, where we are planning on seeing Taj Mahal along with few other places.

All in all – Thailand was an amazing place to visit and I wish we could stay a bit longer, who knows, maybe on our way to Australia 🙂