{"id":788,"date":"2014-02-03T09:10:32","date_gmt":"2014-02-03T01:10:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/radcopter.com\/brianandmarisa\/worldtrip\/?p=788"},"modified":"2022-02-10T15:14:18","modified_gmt":"2022-02-10T15:14:18","slug":"bangkok-part-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/2014\/02\/03\/bangkok-part-i\/","title":{"rendered":"Bangkok: Part I"},"content":{"rendered":"<p dir=\"ltr\">In the interest of bandwidth and the convenience of both readers and authors, I split up our Bangkok post into two parts. It&#8217;s a very image-heavy post and is tricky to work with for those of us here in the Land of Subjectively Amazing but Objectively Pretty Bad Internet. Marisa also mentioned this, but let us know if there are any issues with the new way we&#8217;re loading images.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">First of all, let&#8217;s get this out of the way:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/P9mwELXPGbA\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Okay. On to the post! Bangkok was a lot more interesting the second time around. It was nice to be there for a day to get a taste of the city but we didn\u2019t get to explore at all. Five days was actually not enough to completely explore the place. It is easily comparable to any other major city in both size and development. It has 6 million people within the city itself and another fourteen million in the surrounding area, which means that the Bangkok metropolitan area contains within it almost a third of Thailand&#8217;s entire population.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">We stayed near Khao San Road, one of the most (in)famous backpacker ghettos in Asia. It has a long history of attracting travelers and has a reputation of being one of those places where crazy stuff happens. That may have been true at some point. It might have been more interesting\/edgy\/dangerous than it is now, but today it mostly consists of tattoo parlors, bars full of cheap alcohol, a wide range of accommodation, and a few dozen stores and stalls selling the same shitty merchandise that you see everywhere else in Thailand\u2019s tourist areas. Basically, it&#8217;s just a cheap place to get trashed, tattooed, and hook up with others with similar interests. There are the occasional offers from tuk tuk drivers to take you to a &#8216;ping pong show&#8217; (which we did not take them up on). Other than that the area is surprisingly family-friendly. There&#8217;s even a Starbucks just around the corner.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ua0ctcUhFc1hjSmM\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ua0ctcUhFc1hjSmM\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1695\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1695\" style=\"width: 1024px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1695\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-1-1024x678.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"678\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-1-1024x678.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-1-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-1-768x509.jpg 768w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-1-1536x1017.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-1-2048x1356.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1695\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Some classic t-shirt designs available in most tourist traps.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uejBTTVJiZF9sM00\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uejBTTVJiZF9sM00\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1697\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1697\" style=\"width: 2560px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1697\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-2-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1696\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-2-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-2-300x199.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1697\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Looking north up Khaosan Road on New Year&#8217;s Eve, just a couple minutes after midnight.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">We decided to experiment with booking the cheapest place available online, just to see what we\u2019d been missing. We found a room with a private bathroom for 400 baht, which is about $13. This is crazy cheap for the area. We arrived from Phetchaburi fairly worn out and immediately went out to get something to eat. Marisa noticed a bad smell but I didn\u2019t really notice anything signficant. It wasn\u2019t until we got back that we realized that 400 baht was waaay too good to be true. There were huge moldy patches on the wall in the room and in the bathroom and the smell, which had been relatively mild when we first arrived, was almost overpowering when we came back after eating. We decided to find another place in the morning. Thankfully, our new friend Sam was able to hook us up with her room in a much, much nicer place that cost only $10 more. We decided that we wouldn\u2019t test our luck with the bottom of the barrel again.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uRHBfRWlXbHB0VHFMdGFzazg4WVZHMEVpZ3Uw\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uRHBfRWlXbHB0VHFMdGFzazg4WVZHMEVpZ3Uw\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1699\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1699\" style=\"width: 768px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1699\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-3-768x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"768\" height=\"1024\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-3-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-3-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-3-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-3-1536x2048.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-3-scaled.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1699\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">It was pretty bad.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ud2VDeUx3UGprUndVMG5mcFNLa3VZaUk4Z3Rj\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ud2VDeUx3UGprUndVMG5mcFNLa3VZaUk4Z3Rj\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1700\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1700\" style=\"width: 768px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1700\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-4-768x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"768\" height=\"1024\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-4-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-4-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-4-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-4-1536x2048.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-4-scaled.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1700\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gross.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Our first proper sightseeing in Bangkok was our trip to the Chatuchak Market. This was also our first adventure on Bangkok&#8217;s public transportation and we found it very enjoyable. The cost difference between public transportation and hiring a tuk-tuk was fairly massive. The bus cost 17 baht round trip, while a tuk-tuk would have cost around 150 just to get up there. Even though the tuk-tuk rides top out around $5, making it pretty affordable, we decided public transportation would be our first choice whenever possible.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The Market itself is huge and completely crammed with goods and people. According to the website, the place is over 27 acres and has more than 15,000 booths! It was easily the biggest market we&#8217;ve been in so far. There was a good mix of locals and tourists though I think the latter might have dominated. A lot of the more interesting stalls (art and pets) had \u2018No photos!\u2019 signs plastered on them. These are usually a good sign of lots of tourists that tend to take pictures instead of spending baht. We enjoyed seeing the market but we don\u2019t have the inclination or the room in our bags to buy stuff, so our enjoyment was limited. We had some incredible Thai tea made by a guy that spins while he mixes the tea and some delicious sugar\/butter bread along with it. It would have been more enjoyable if we were more into buying stuff but it was still a fun experience.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uaTI1MGZpQmFuU2s\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uaTI1MGZpQmFuU2s\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1701\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1701\" style=\"width: 1024px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1701\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-5-1024x678.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"678\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-5-1024x678.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-5-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-5-768x509.jpg 768w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-5-1536x1017.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-5-2048x1356.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1701\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">One of the open walkways in the market.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B9-ctBQjVivkbk9jN0MzNGJaWDg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B9-ctBQjVivkbk9jN0MzNGJaWDg\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1702\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1702\" style=\"width: 685px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1702\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-6-685x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"685\" height=\"1024\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-6-685x1024.jpg 685w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-6-201x300.jpg 201w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-6-768x1147.jpg 768w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-6-1028x1536.jpg 1028w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-6-1371x2048.jpg 1371w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-6-scaled.jpg 1714w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 685px) 100vw, 685px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1702\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A typical aisle in the market. Some had more stuff, some had less, but they were all narrow and filled with people browsing.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B9-ctBQjVivkNlVPaTRJRTdBQ2M\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B9-ctBQjVivkNlVPaTRJRTdBQ2M\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1703\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1703\" style=\"width: 1024px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1703\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-7-1024x685.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"685\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-7-1024x685.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-7-300x201.jpg 300w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-7-768x514.jpg 768w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-7-1536x1028.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-7-2048x1371.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1703\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Some goofy white guy we found at the market.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B9-ctBQjVivkbl9lVG1HYUJyOWs\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B9-ctBQjVivkbl9lVG1HYUJyOWs\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1704\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1704\" style=\"width: 685px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-1704\" src=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-8-685x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"685\" height=\"1024\" srcset=\"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-8-685x1024.jpg 685w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-8-201x300.jpg 201w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-8-768x1147.jpg 768w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-8-1028x1536.jpg 1028w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-8-1371x2048.jpg 1371w, https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/Bangkok-1-8-scaled.jpg 1714w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 685px) 100vw, 685px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1704\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Puppies! Most places had &#8216;No photo!&#8217; signs up but Marisa found one that let her get away with it.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The next day we hit up the two core tourist spots: the Grand Palace and Wat Pho. The buildings are beautiful but both of them were extremely crowded and not particularly enjoyable to be at. The Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho was pretty cool but, again, it was extremely crowded and not actually much fun to see in person. I don\u2019t want to harp too much on the crowd so here\u2019s some nice pictures.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uaVlHRU1BUHQxUXM\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uaVlHRU1BUHQxUXM\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uSzI5VWpxb3FvSGc\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uSzI5VWpxb3FvSGc\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 604px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uMzIyNVUxZUFXdW8\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uMzIyNVUxZUFXdW8\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A detail of the architecture. The Thais have a lot of detail in their temples and other important buildings. It&#8217;s really pretty in person.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure style=\"width: 604px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uR3VoZFdWQW1aV0k\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uR3VoZFdWQW1aV0k\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">One of the stone guardians at the major entrances to different parts of the temple.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure style=\"width: 604px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-udHpydUU1NFE2X00\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-udHpydUU1NFE2X00\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">One Buddha of many.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ucjFvT0pSWGdqbGs\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ucjFvT0pSWGdqbGs\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 399px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-udjBnVFRVdThTb2s\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-udjBnVFRVdThTb2s\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Emerald Buddha from outside the temple. No cameras are allowed in but you can get a pretty good view through the doorways and windows.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uLVU2amozNUtqNVk\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uLVU2amozNUtqNVk\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 399px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uaWNSTUNQTTdoWlE\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uaWNSTUNQTTdoWlE\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">More Buddhas.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure style=\"width: 604px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ueGtHQ2x0U2tVQWM\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-ueGtHQ2x0U2tVQWM\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The crowd gathers&#8230;<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure style=\"width: 399px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uS1JtSFM2WmttdjA\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uS1JtSFM2WmttdjA\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">&#8230;and pounces upon its prey.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Between seeing the two main sights we visited the City Pillar Shrine which was a lot more interesting and much less touristy. Cities in Thailand are \u2018born\u2019 on particular days and at particular times according to what is astrologically auspicious. Each city in Thailand has a shrine in it, which contains the city\u2019s astrological charts and its horoscope. Bangkok\u2019s is very near the Palace but seems to attract mostly local residents. Besides containing the city&#8217;s horoscope, the shrine is also built to house the protector spirits of the town. People come there to pay their respects to those spirits and to Buddha (I think that\u2019s what was going on, at least).<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 399px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uLUlJaEF2ZGVxUWc\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uLUlJaEF2ZGVxUWc\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The shrine with the pillar that has the horoscope inside.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure style=\"width: 604px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uSTA3Rndqb29RNUk\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uSTA3Rndqb29RNUk\" alt=\"\" width=\"604\" height=\"399\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">I&#8217;m pretty sure these are the five guardian deities of Bangkok.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Though we enjoy the historical stuff, Bangkok is also known for being an extremely modern city. We caught a taxi over to the main downtown of the city to check out what people meant. Bangkok has a massive amount of shopping and the malls there have to be seen to be believed. We went to CentralWorld in the middle of the city to see Catching Fire, a goal of Marisa\u2019s since we were in Europe.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 399px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uOVBRNENtbmZza0E\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/drive.google.com\/uc?export=view&amp;id=0B-tXlK2Jwv-uOVBRNENtbmZza0E\" alt=\"\" width=\"399\" height=\"604\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Seriously, the malls are huge.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The movie theaters in Bangkok are top-notch, plus you get the bonus of having to stand through the King\u2019s Anthem after all the ads have run and before the movie starts! The tickets were cheaper than in the US and so were the snacks. It really seems like the USA is the one place that really rips you off with the concessions, whether it\u2019s in a movie theater, a bus station, or an airport.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">To be continued&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the interest of bandwidth and the convenience of both readers and authors, I split up our Bangkok post into two parts. It&#8217;s a very image-heavy post and is tricky to work with for those of us here in the Land of Subjectively Amazing but Objectively Pretty Bad Internet. Marisa also mentioned this, but let [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,16,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-places","category-seasia","category-thailand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=788"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1706,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788\/revisions\/1706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/texandtia.com\/worldtrip\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}