Well Wazza's trip was a huge success. He turned up in Bangkok a few hours ahead of us so he decides to see some culture and head into town on the train in stead of a taxi. He is sitting next to a monk and some old shoeless guy and winding his way through the slums enjoying the culture and realises he has to actually get somewhere useful so he jumps off the train and is somewhere in Bangkok.
We had given him the name of the hotel (the Tower Inn) and he tries to find it on the map he has. A lady stops him, asks him what he thinks he's doing wandering around without booked accommodation and forces him into a tuk-tuk and the driver agrees to take him to the hotel for 10 baht (too cheap). The guy tries to take him to a temple first, which is much closer but Warren stands firm he wants to go to the Tower Inn. Half way there the tuk-tuk driver stops off a one of the billion tailors in town who seem to run some sort of tuk-tuk racket and is nearly forced into buying a hand made shirt. Somehow he manages to avoid the salesmen and get back outside where he forces the tuk-tuk driver to take him to the Tower Inn. They arrive at a hotel called the Grand Tower Inn and Warren pays 20 baht (60c) for his troubles, this is double what he agreed but he's just glad to be there.
Warren then decides to give me a call and ask if the hotel is called the Grand Tower Inn, Marg and I are in koh Samui Airport at this stage waiting for our flight and we tell him that the hotel is is fact called the 'Tower Inn' not the Grand Tower Inn. We give him the address and he realises he is on the wrong side of the river.
So he is a little weary of tuk-tuks by this stage and decides to use the hobnail express and walk. Bangkok is not a city where anybody walks anywhere for long. Warren worked this out when he found that there was no way for a pedestrian to cross the river. Feeling a bit trapped Wazza heads hails the nearest bus (an act of utter bravery for someone who has been in the country only 1 hour). So he gets on the bus and can't find anywhere to buy a ticket right away as the doors are in the middle of the bus not at the front near the driver. he eventually finds a lady who looks like she is selling tickets and asks for one across the river. The lady can't speak English (which is fair enough it is her country after all) and she says something to the rest of the passengers who all laugh. So a ticketless Wazza jumps off at the next stop over the river and starts walking to the correct hotel, which is much easier to find with the correct address.
He makes it to the hotel finally and checks in.
We arrive about an hour later and all have a drink in the lobby, we each head off to have a shower in our respective rooms and agree to meet up for a walk to the markets and some dinner.
It was the weekend and the markets had blown out of their usual area and filled the streets around for ages, we all made some purchases and I must say by this stage Marg and I are getting really good at haggling we paid no more than 25% of the asking price for anything. Waz wasn't so good and almost paid $30 for a teeshirt but we helped and we got 2 for $7 instead.
Now Marg decides that we shoud all go and see some girly show as we are in Bangkok afterall. as soon as the words are out of her mouth a guy approaches and leads us to a place called Super Pu$$y. We can't really say a lot of what we saw on the bar on this blog as our families read it but it was very... educational. Warren was propositioned more than a few times and so was Marg! I mustn't have been looking to hot or rich I guess as they stayed away from me ;)
Feeling suitably cultured after 15 minutes and having seen things we can't forget (no matter how hard we try). Luckily we had eaten before the show as we didn't feel like it after ;)
We headed home, on the way I picked up an Aussie Rugby shirt for $5 which I am assured is official. Once back at the hotel 2 drinks of our $3 bottle of Mekong whiskey and we wera all ready for bed.
What a day!
Below arde some photos of warren's stay with us and our trip to the Grand Palace and Emerald Budda Temple.
Note: the silver store at the markets is not where I bought the ring -Wes-
