Tuk-Tuks and Prostitutes

Saturday, December 24, 2016
Bangkok, Thailand
We started our day with breakfast at the hotel. The fruits and fruit juices were amazing -- a favorite part for me of the Thai cuisine. We were all pretty excited for our first day of proper sightseeing in Bangkok. We got ourselves sorted and then made our way via boat to the Grand Palace, which really is grand! The King of Thailand had recently died and the Thais so revere him there is black with ribbon literally everywhere! Many locals were at the palace to pay their respects so we could not see the main building of the Palace but it was not a problem. It is so large we saw many beautiful parts. That day Anna had worn a dress with a scarf which was not good enough for entrance so we had to rent a shirt. Each person got his deposit back but the shirt was used by other people and it was dirty! We had come so far to see this Palace, we just wanted to get in and the heat was starting to be stifling! We had been told to go to Thailand at Christmas as it is the best time to visit. It is the coolest time of the year (VERY relative) and the start of the dry season. All I can say is that I would never make it in August! It was very humid. We finally entered and got to take our time, when we were not being surrounded by Asian travelers with their selfie sticks! Once we were done, due to the numbers of people and the heat, we took a cab back to the hotel. You have to agree on a price before you get in the cab or they try to rip you off-we were careful.

We arrived the hotel, had a snack and then went for a massage . This became a ritual as it was so cheap and really nice when we were exhausted. Everything, even the tea, at a Thai massage is so well done.

We took a rest and got back on the boat to go down the river to see the famous reclining Buddha. He is a huge statue! His toes were under repair, so it looked like he had a giant stubbed toe. Since we were getting good at the boat thing, we all then went to a beautiful temple on the river, Wat Arun. We took wonderful pictures at dusk and then went to eat at a very pretty restaurant on the river looking at the temple. We seemed to all do okay with the food and we were careful to only use bottled water. We went back to the night market after dinner, but only for a short time. We decided to take a tuk-tuk back so we could say we had done it, but I thought for sure we would all die!!!.   As we were getting in the tuk-tuk, I saw two large rats! We also saw a lot of prostitutes that evening. I think I was experiencing Asian overload -- too much assaulting my senses at once!

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2025-02-07

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