So yesterday we had to buy new toothpaste as the good old Aquafresh we had brought from home was finished. We went with the familiar Colgate but to our surprise the Thai version has salt in it! Copious amounts of "natural salts"! As you're brushing your teeth there is this horrible taste in your mouth as if you used sea water - not fun.
Today we decided to start our day off with a trip to China Town (and avoid tuk tuks). We caught the bus and managed to get off at the right stop. There we're hundreds of little stores selling everything from hair accessories to hand held sewing machines the size of staplers (Luisa was tempted). There were also shops selling herbs and spices; they had these huge packets of saffron, cinnamon, star anise and dried chillies. We had our first glass of sugar cane juice over ice - delicious and refreshing. Some of the streets were really narrow and the shops were making the most of their space so it meant that if two people were going in opposite directions it was a tight squeeze! Even more so when you throw scooters into the mix.
The best thing about it was that most of the people shopping there were locals so none of the shop owners were badgering us. I had an amazing lunch of some sort of sausage in a red BBQ sauce on rice. We then caught the boat taxi to our next stop - Wat Pho. The boat taxi was fun, it felt like you were on a really jam-packed sight-seeing cruise (without the cocktails). The best part was you didn't have to worry about Bangkok's hideous traffic.
Wat Pho is a Buddhist monastery that is famous for it's Reclining Buddha - a 40-metre gold plated long buddha that's lying down. It was huge! Buddhas smile alone was 5 metres and you couldn't fit the whole thing into one picture. It makes you wonder how on earth they constructed it. The feet were really beautiful as the bottom were black and inlaid with Mother of Pearl. We strolled around the monastery for a bit more and admired the colourful buildings but eventually the intense heat wore us down and we headed back to our guest house. Later in the day I had to go pick up my suit which I was really excited about. I left Luisa at a shopping mall as she wanted some retail therapy. My suit fit me like a glove and was really happy with it. It didn't need any adjustments and the tailor had done a great job. I killed some time watching a some Thai boxing and then we headed back to our guest house. We decided to walk the streets to look for some food and found a bustling street kitchen. With full bellies, we were relieved to get into our beds after a busy day.
Phil
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