The flight over was good, no drama, only managed to get about 4 hours sleep but actually this served a purpose, as I was awake for the second half of the flight so when I landed at 3.30pm BK time I and my body could kind of believe it was the afternoon. The highlight of the flight over was the descent into BK. It's rainy season here at the moment which basically means every day they see random scatterings of the most amazing thunderstorms. The descent through the clouds where the pilot was obviously given leeway to fly around the thunderheads was an amazing sight, never seen weather quite like it!
Got off the plane thinking about where I needed to go and the possibility of whether I was supposed to or not have a visa (which I didn't) and with my head full of journey logistics I totally forgot about one obvious difference between England and Thailand...the temperature! It smacked me in the face like a microwaved kipper covered in chilli sauce!
After a stroll through arrivals and what seemed like a 4 mile hike to immigrations I remembered my trip to Jakarta last year where to get into the country I effectively had to bribe the official due to a mix up in visas so off course not having any kind of visa this time I was thinking it could be tricky. Turns out Thailand is much more relaxed, straight through no issue.
So i picked up my driver at arrivals (well he picked up me) and after getting some cash out (which just looked like asian monopoly money to me) hopped in the BMW 7 series and enjoyed the blast or air con, complimentary cold water and wifi connection! dammit they know how to do service in this town!
On the drive to the hotel the driver who spoke some english was pointing out various buildings and parts of town to me. I never realised BK was so damn big! one thing I did spot was this...
It seems our recent hammering by barca hasn't affected the branding out here, sponsored buildings no less!
As anyone who follows me on these little jaunts knows for me the interesting bits and highlights are all the querky little differences between where I'm from and where I'm going, it's always the little things for example spotted this sign on route to the hotel...
Not sure why but I really like this sign.
So anyway we arrive at the hotel, I am staying at the Shangri La hotel in the south of the city...and as soon as we pull up I can tell 'I've done well' with this one, the staff are incredibly attentive and friendly, everyone of them says hello and smiles, can't do enough for you etc etc that kind of 5* service that someone like myself who stays in a lot of 3* middle of the road not quite a truck stop but nothing like the ritz kind of places, could get accustomed to! Plus the client has apparently negotiated a good rate so it works out at less than £70 a night! my first insight into money going much further in Thailand.
Check in was also an experience, Im greeted at the car by 2 people, 1 to take my stuff and 1 takes me straight to my room where they check you in there, talk about streamlined service!
My room was only on 6th floor (guess it was a stretch to far to hope for a 30th floor suite ;0D ) so the view from the window over the river was nice but not spectacular.
however what it did enable me to do was get a good look at some of the transport used in BK, seems to be 3 main areas, road (taxi, tuk tuk and motorbike taxis), railway (BTS sky rail type thing), but what I didn't know was just how much they relied on the river for transport, hundreds if not thousands of boats flying up and down all the time...
Now what actually happened as soon as I had checked in was that I had to go and work... I had to go setup for 2 simulations running the next day, luckily in the same hotel.
Once we had finished with the work stuff for that night the 2 colleagues I had been working with together with another who lives in BK and was meeting us went for a few drinks and a meal at the italian restaurant they have in the hotel complex. This was where I got my first view of the thai perspective to 2 things:
1. Food cost levels in reverse - what I mean by this, is in the UK if you want to go out for a meal but don't want to spend a lot of money and want something simple but tasty a typical go to is italian right? pizza pasta whatever... and if you want to spend a bit more and go for something really good a nice Thai restaurant would be a good way to go. At least in Guildford that is definitely the way I see it.
It seems obvious now thinking about it but still was interesting was it is the total opposite here. Don't get me wrong there are very nice / posh / expensive thai food places also but there seems to be a large premium paid for european food. Our meal worked out at close to $100 a head for starter and main and it was all fairly typical italian food (very nice though I might add) Angelini's is the name if you ever fancy top class Italian in BK.
2. Perception of 'spicy' - now this one may seem a tad obvious but their levels of spicy are somewhat elevated! so to help any budding thailand visitor out I have created a conversion table using a well known western chicken restaurant as the europe benchmark...
UK Thailand
Lemon and Herb Doesnt exist except in some deserts
Mild Won't kill you but you better like spicy food
Medium Mental, will contain at least 10 hot chillies
Spicy You'll be lucky to eat it all and survive
Hot and Spicy Your not coming home again.
And this is based on real field research, trust me! Those who know me know that travel is closely linked with food in my world and Ive been sure to try some of the best and most interesting food while ive been here but there is always a common theme - Chilli!
I learnt this lesson on the first night, I ordered a 'Bangkok' pizza and the waitress asked me if I liked it spicy, I having a few beers under my belt went, of course! This pizza could have powered the next nasa mission, i only got 2/3 the way through it before admitting defeat! However it was also covered in sushi which was a unique but delicious addition
After this meal I went back to my hotel room and crashed as the next few days were going to be long and hard work.
