Back From Thailand
I am finally back from Thailand. I wish I can stay there forever. The people in Thailand are warm and natural. Their aura of friendliness can be felt everywhere you go. Unlike Singaporeans who is friendly only to foreigners, the thais greet each other just the way they treat tourists, and with sincerity. Maybe the air is not that fresh, but apart from that, everything is simply wonderful. Contrary to my expectation, they have pretty clean toilets. The things are cheap even though I know they are trying to suck as much money as possible. But even then, the bargain is done with smiles. Of course, not every single Thai is friendly. I got shouted when I tried to take a photo of beautiful girls pole-dancing. Hahahaha.. thinking back, it serves me right.
I visited many places despite the short stay. The temples look immensly majestic. The Thais are a bunch of skillful lot. Carvings, hand-made souveniors, wreaths...
They sell great food too. Cheap, tasty and cute-looking. Their food are mostly barbequed and fried and they sell many sausages. The whole stretch of street sells fried sausages, prawns and many other sea food. Of course, there are genuine birdnest that cost only 100 bahts and sharkfins (I abstain from sharkfin 3 years ago), abalone, dim sum, mushrooms, thickly-sliced fresh sashimi, wonton noddle with super tasty char seiw sprinkled with sugar and chilli powder, duck meat bee hoon, fried oyster omelette, pattai and of course my all time favourite, Tom Yum soup and 100% pure fish balls with sweet Thai chilli. The breakfast buffet was good as well, but I prefer the stalls by the roadside.
Their McDonalds sells a greater variety of food too. They have 4 flavours for Mac Flurry but we did not eat at any fast food restaurants. Ronald himself looks cute too. I guess he is the only Ronald that has the Thai greeting pose.
The cups in Thailand facinates me. Being a more backward country, they definitely have more brains than the more advanced Singaporeans. their paper cup comes with handles that prevent us from burning our hands. And of course, they sell milkshakes that are not frequently seen in Singapore. Everywhere I go, I see fruits in push carts, drinks that costs only 10 to 20 bahts, and they have a lot 7 eleven franchises. You can find 2 7-elevens on the same side of the street. Familiar shops like Watson, Bata and other international brands can be spotted. Their Chinatown consists mainly of Hakkas and Hainanese. So the lauguage barrier is not that serious. All in all, everything looks more familiar there.
They are less perfect in terms of vehicles. I was lucky to escape from the notorious road conditions but I witnessed it. They must have bought a car and get another one at half price. The number of cars on the road is over-whelming. The Tuk-Tuk looks so cute that it is too hard for me to resist. It is so cheap. 40 baht for a long ride. The air was pretty bad but the thrill comes along with that disadvantage. we don;t even need to visit any Theme Parks for the thrill. The Tuk Tuk reminds me of the Visa advertisement. It was just so CUTE. We took the Taxi-meter too. That is equivalent to the taxis over here. The driver is so friendly and chatty and he apologised at every little jerks and slight congestion. Oh, and my family and Daddy's business partner and his wife, the 7 of us squeezed into a taxi-meter. 7 of us! It was not a competition but we were amazed by ourselves too. It looked so hilarious seeing Uncle Jimmy and his wife sitting in front with the driver. I felt like giggling but there was no sapce for it. It costs only 60 baht for us to travel from our hotel to Ma Boon Krong. Speaking of which, Ma Boon Krong is an extremely big shopping centre. It is the combination of Taka and Wisma. It took me 3hours to finish touring two storeys of the shopping centre! We went there for 2 consecutive days just to shop for gifts. the second time we went by skytrain. That is our MRT. I saw many Singaporeans and as expected, they brought our traditional let-me-in-or die custom to Thais' skytrain.
My one-day tour guide told us that 50% of a year is public holiday for Thais. That reminds me of school holidays. If 50% of their holiday is public holiday, then say 20% of the remaining is school holidays, thai students study only 30% of the year! Lucky them! I saw so many children playing soccer, running around, jumping onto boats like experts while I tremble at the thought of missing my footing. These kids lead such carefree lives. I went down at Singapore time 2am, that is 1am for them and I saw kids playing happily, some helping their parents at the stall, some huddled together with their parents, still begging for money. Even their dogs looked extremely under-nourished with mangy skin and flies. My heart goes out to the little animals, even, well, even the kitten. But their cats looked fat, real fat. So, no pity for them. The hotel was good. I managed to swim and sun tan. But the water in the pool was icy cold. That is an understatement. Nevertheless, the swim was extremely refreshing. My two brothers created big splashes in the considerably small pool, challenging the strokes. They are good and the foreigners at the poolside were impressed. Those entertainers. *roll eyeball*
I had a great time in Thailad and I wished that I am not back. There are too many things to face, too many things to settle in Singapore. I must be crazy because I felt strangely excited when our plane met with turbulent. The strength of not wanting to return beats my fear of death. The ending would have been more glorified, more natural, with happy memories. But, well, I got back safely anyway. My luggage was so heavy that the wheels came off. I am unable to get presents for everyone but I managed to get some. Guess who is the greatest shopper? My elder brother. He brought around 15 T-shirts, many many souveniors, Thai CDs and even a lamp! I am such a loser when it comes to buying things.
More unpacking to be done. Do take care folks.
That's my extremely small-sized tour guide.
I have more photos in my digicam but it has not been uploaded. So hang around.
Jacqueline
9:30 AM
