Sojourn a journey through life

Bangkok – Day Two

Next morning, we woke up bright and early to grab a bite to eat, and then we caught a ride from our hostel to the famous weekend market (Chatuchak market, more commonly referred to by the Thai's as JJ Market). We began our wandering, and after a while I didn't know which end was up anymore. Carly, however, seemed to know exactly where we were at all times as we zig-zagged through endless reams of merchants, food, clothes, bags, antiques, trinkets, lamps, decor, etc. etc. Knock-off North Face, Oakley, Abercrombie, American Eagle, Levi's, and was easy to spot in every other shop.

We didn't end up buying very much, Carly got one shirt (after trying on about 400 that just didn't really work... Asian sizes don't seem to quite cut it for girls who are 6' 1"), and a couple other gifts and things.

We stopped to try a bit of food, grabbed some noodles from Mr. Noodle man here, and also managed to find some home made coconut ice cream, and probably some other stuff I've forgotten by now.

After a few hours of this meandering we were easily convinced by a lady offering foot massages that she could sign us up. So Carly and I sat in some nice comfy chairs and got about a 40 minute foot massage for about 140 Baht each (S$5.50). No complaints from me in the peanut gallery on that one.

When we were sick and tired of shopping at the market, we jumped back on the SkyTrain and boldly headed back into the downtown area where we stopped at Starbucks for an obligatory Caramel Macchiato and to purchase a sweet 16oz Bangkok City Series mug that I could add to my now-growing collection - and carried on to more shopping over at the night bazaar. Carly wandered while I sat looking at our Rough Guide to see where we would eat some dinner.

Carly completed her roundabout, and we jumped back on a train and headed to Phrom Pong which was just a couple blocks away from Lemongrass (the restaurant we wanted to grab dinner at). Now, I'm usually pretty good at reading maps, but we didn't seem to be able to find this restaurant for the life of us. The map clearly indicated that the restaurant was on Soi 24. So we walked up and down (what we thought was) Soi 24 (and a rather seedy looking street it was), and then continued to walk up and down Soi 26. Then up and down 24 again. By this time, the infamous grumpy-hungry-ness had set itself deep (in both of us), so we decided to forget it, jump in a cab, and head to one of the other restaurants on our list that was about 1.5Km away.

This is when the english-speaking-taxi-driver-of-love-joy-and-all-things-pure-and-good magically came to our rescue. We hopped in and asked him to take us to the other restaurant, and then on a whim I just asked him if he knew where Lemongrass was. He said "Yah, right down Soi 24 here", and he took us to the front door of the place. The street we had been walking up and down was not on my map, and was called Soi 24/1. I don't know what the heck that means, but it was a mean mean trick that the engineers of Bangkok had played on us, we wanted some freakin' food.

At any rate, Lemongrass was fabulous. Absolutely awesome. We sat in a quiet corner of the restaurant right by a large window that opened onto a beautifully lit outdoor garden. We enjoyed some Coconut chicken soup, and some super spicy chicken skewers that were fantastic, as well as some fabulous green curry. This restaurant is super highly recommended. Although it is exhorbetently expensive by Thai standards, Carly and I paid 1300 Baht (~CDN$36) for all our food, and we had each had a drink (Gin and Tonic for me, Rum and Coke for her).

So with some excellent food in our bellies we headed on back to the hostel to rest up for tomorrow's day of sight-seeing. More to come!