BANGKOK

therealericchoi:

Touched down in Bangkok about three hours ago, got to Khao San Road, found a nice guest house and ate some linner. Now, for some heavy drinking.

Eat a few banana + Nutella street pancakes for me.  So jealous!

hostels/guesthouses: southeast asia

I had a request to list the places I stayed while on my trip.  I know that hearing about places from other people is way more helpful than trying to find one on your own, so I thought it was a good idea.  Keep in mind I was looking for places that were easy to meet other people in, so they weren’t necessarily the cheapest.  I always tried to stay in dorm rooms when possible, and I know this isn’t everyone’s style.

If you’re into booking stuff ahead of time, I recommend hostelbookers.com because they don’t charge a booking fee.  And some of these places aren’t listed online, but every single place I went to (minus Myanmar) had backpacker areas that were packed with guesthouses, so you can easily show up to any major place in SE Asia and find a cheap place to stay.

Here are the places I loved and would stay in again if I were traveling alone or wanted to be social:

Hanoi: Hanoi Backpackers’ Hostel One of the nicest dorm rooms I’ve ever stayed in, met a ton of people, and is a great place to book a Halong Bay tour.  It’s more pricey than other’s, but if you want to get drunk with fun people, it’s a good way to go.  Ha.

Hoi An: I stayed at a really nice place here, but don’t remember the name.. it was listed in the newest Rough Guides for Vietnam I believe, and if anyone wanted to know I could find out once I got back to Korea and could look through my stuff.

Ho Chi Minh City: I stayed at Luan Vu Guesthouse, and it was nice, pretty average.  There are a ton of places in the backpacker area of Pham Ngu Lao, so it’s really easy to find somewhere to stay.

Phnom Penh: Where I stayed was “meh”, but I guess the area to stay is near the lake.  I dunno.

Siem Reap: There are cheaper places, but I had a lot of fun at the Siem Reap Hostel.

Vientiane: This city is hardly worth staying in for more than a day, so it really doesn’t even matter where you stay, ha.

Vang Vieng: One of the coolest places I’ve ever stayed—Spicy Laos.  Def, def, def recommend it.  I stayed at their sister Spicy Laos in Luang Prabang, which I also recommend.  It’s not as nice, but a good place to meet people.

Chiang Mai: I tried to stay at Julie Guesthouse, but it was full.  It had been highly recommended.  I ended up staying in a $3/night very basic dorm at the Same Same Guesthouse down the street.  By that point, I was incredibly low-maintenance so anything with a bed and shower was fine.

Bagan: May Kha Lar.  The owner is so, so, so helpful and friendly.

Yangon: This is also one of the better places I stayed.  It’s called Motherland Inn 2.  It’s not in the best location, but the staff was amazing, and I met a ton of awesome people.  It was almost full when I came, so if you go in high season, it might be best to try to book ahead if possible.

Bangkok: I stayed in two places.  The first was called the River Line, and it was near Khao San Road.  It was a quieter place, though, being a few minutes’ walk away from the madness.  It was kinda “meh” because I really just wanted to go out and party, and it wasn’t the best place to meet people.  The second place, though, lub d, was awesome.  The nicest hostel I’ve ever been to in my life, and lots of cool people.

Koh Phi Phi: Golden Hill Bungalows (also known as Bungalow Dave’s).  It had pretty bad reviews online, but I had to book something ahead because everything fills up.  There are probably better places—the whole island is just restaurants, bars, and accommodation—but it was fine for me.  They have dorm rooms, and I met some good people.  It is the farthest possible place from the pier, though, so carrying all my shit back and forth in 90 degree heat was probably the worst thing ever.

Sooo, I hope that is helpful for someone! :)

bangkok, part 2

Sawadee-ka, Ronald!

Sky Train

The night market.  So nice!

bangkok, part 1

More of my Bangkok pictures.  I love this city!

So much street food.  Heaven.

Khao San Road, the place for all the foreigners.

Ellen and Marlene.  Marlene’s got a banana and chocolate pancake, one of my favorite foods, mmm!

Try to find all the white cats.  There were about five at my guesthouse, maybe more.

The night before the king’s birthday.

Muesli and yogurt breakfast with Marlene.

It’s the king’s birthday!  People were lining up all over, even though he wasn’t supposed to come until the evening.  This was about 10am, ha.

Outside the Grand Palace.

Wat Pho, and I think this is the biggest reclining Buddha in the world.

This is me in Bangkok.

Happy birthday!

Free food for the birthday.

At Wat Arun

Wat Arun from the ferry.

All the pretty colored taxis.

Bangkok weekend market.  So awesome!

The night of the king’s birthday.

So many people in pink.

Ohhh, Khao San.

grand palace, bangkok

The palace was awesome, and I took a lot of pictures.  All of my Bangkok posts are here.

So many Koreans in straw hats.

I was wondering what they were all taking a picture of…

Oh, it’s that little Buddha, which turned out to be the Emerald Buddha.  I was expecting it to be way bigger.  You can’t take pictures inside, which is why everyone crowded around outside.

Crazy trees

Last night at the hostel I talked to an Italian guy who was in Bangkok for a week on business. He is launching an Italian men’s clothing line and had meetings with different people in Asia. He was a very silly person. He has lived “all over the world” (western Europe), and could not adjust to Asia at all. The way he talked about BKK was as if he were describing Congo or something.

“I saw FIVE rats and got poison from two foods,” he said. Wow that’s terrible. Here I am, eating cold noodles off the street, having long ago given up on the no ice rule, and I’ve been perfectly fine for five weeks now.

Then he kept talking about cab drivers and how they speak no English (!!) and he told a story about how his roommate at the hostel got really drunk and puked in a cab so the driver demanded he pay a few bucks for cleaning. The guy’s wallet had been stolen and he was barely conscious, so the Italian saved him and gave the cabbie money. “Thank god I was there or he would have killed him for sure.” Right. Because Thailand is such a dangerous backwards country where men who drive pink taxis kill foreigners over five dollars.

He couldn’t wait to get back to Italia where he would be “treated like a human being”. Barf.

I’m back in Bangkok for an extra night. I was going to spend one night each in Ayutthaya and Lopburi, but I loved BKK too much and wanted to go back.

So yesterday I took an early train to Ayutthaya ($.60 for a 90min ride), checked in at a guesthouse then hopped on another cheap third classer to Lopburi. That ride was only an hour, but the train was crowded and I was standing, and every 2 min ladies would walk by with trays of food yelling. They all seemed to be the only overweight people in SE Asia too, so I was constantly being squished against the people sitting by me. Fun ride.

Then in Lopburi, I just walked around and avoided all the nasty monkeys that have taken over a part of the town. It was a really small place, and minus the Internet cafes, it probably hasn’t changed a whole lot since when my dad was there.

Then I went back to the train station to catch a 5:40 train back to Ayutthaya. 5:40 turned into 7:40 (you can’t rely too much on transportation here but it’s so cheap you can’t complain). Luckily a Greek/English scuba instructor happened to be waiting as well so we talked the whole time.

Then today I decided that I should get up and see at least some of Ayutthaya before catching a comfy bus to BKK. The city is known for temples and old stuff, which I’ve seen enough to last a lifetime, and had no real interest in seeing more. I went to one temple, got sick of wearing pants in 90 degree weather, and went back to the GH to change and eat.

Now I am back in the fabulous city of Bangkok, where I’m staying at the coolest hostel I’ve ever been in. When I booked it, I thought how it was such a splurge to stay at a nicer place in a dorm room for $10/night. I’ve gotten so used to barebones rooms that are $3-6/night so this feels like a big spending spree. Tomorrow I will sadly be leaving Bangkok to head to the beach! “Vacation” time of my trip has started! I can finally laze around, shop, have a lot of pancakes and milkshakes, and not have to go see more temples. Ahhh.

confession

I ate McDonald’s fries while in Bangkok.

I was really craving them, so I went in and ordered fries and a Coke.  In Korea, that’s all you have to ask for because there is only one size.  In Bangkok, though, and the rest of the world I guess, they have options???  I forgot.  The sizes in Korea are also very small, and I’ve gotten used to that.  So I ordered a medium fries and a small drink.

They both seemed HUGE.  Oh my god.  They also had different options on the menu.  Like a DOUBLE Big Mac.  I suppose that’s old news that I missed while being a vegetarian, but geez.  I’m really terrified to see what people are eating in America if this is what’s available in Thailand.  Yikes.