Thailand

Time: 9am

Location: on the bus from Bangkok to Aranyaprathet and then Siem Reap

Weather: 27C

My first Christmas spent in a tropical place and I even get to be in two countries on the day! Growing up, Christmas has always been associated with snow and cuddling up with a warm drink, I have to say that walking around with a t-shirt and shorts in the sweltering heat is quite a novelty. Thailand is a predominantly Buddhist country, so no national holiday here, which is probably a good thing for us as all the businesses and transportation still run as usual today. That doesn't mean there's no holiday atmosphere! Bangkok has some amazing Christmas lights and jingles are played nonstop in the shopping malls. 

We arrived in Bangkok last Saturday night, stayed near the infamous backpacker's ghetto that is Khao San Road for two nights, which with the open air bars blasting deafening music every night, was already too many nights. 

On Sunday we spent the morning at the Grand Palace (of course), and then browsed through Chatuchuk Market before catching up over dinner with my friend Lilly. 

I have to admit that Bangkok is not my favourite place in the world, as it's not particularly scenic and the constant touting gets tiring, so on Monday we took a bus (the cheap kind that locals use, which was slow but interesting as there were no proper bus stops along the way but the driver would keep honking when it got to a town and people would somehow know to wait there to get on) to Kanchanaburi. Upon arrival we rented some bikes from our guesthouse and set off on a cycling excursion checking out the beautiful riverside town. Kanchanaburi (also the name of the capital city) is a province to the west bordering Myanmar (we were within 25km of the border at one point!), most well known for the railway and along with it, the Bridge over the River Kwai, which the Japanese built during World War II in order to send supplies to Burma and India. It's called the Death Railway because something like 90000 Asian labourers and 20000 prisoners of war from western countries were killed during its rapid construction, oweing to the treacherous working conditions. Quite a terrible event in history, and the Hellfire Pass Museum, which we went to on a tour on the second day in Kanchanaburi, does a really good job recounting the events. On the same tour we also visited Sai Yok Noi waterfall, went to a village in what seemed like the middle of the jungle for a delicious lunch, some elephant riding and bamboo rafting, and, rode on the train which today only runs for tourism purposes as a large part of it through to Myanmar has been stripped off. 

On Wednesday we took the bus to Ayutthaya, historically the second capital of Siam and filled with ancient temple ruins that were destroyed by Burmese attacks. I have lost count of how many wats we visited and some of them are still being used for worshipping today. They all have a similar design with a main central pagoda and surrounding chedis, and the scene of thousand year structures surrounded by modern architecture is truly fascinating. One of my favourites is Wat Yai Chaimongkhon which you could climb up into the prang for a bird's eye view of what the entire complex could have looked like. There just happened to be some sort of a festival when we were there and at night we got to enjoy some performances, more night markets, and even a very cool light show in front of the ruins featuring everything from fireworks, projecting screens to horses and elephants. Too bad we couldn't understand any of what they were saying as it would have been great to learn more about the Ayutthaya history. 

Yesterday, Christmas Eve, we started the day with a visit to the Ayutthaya floating market, which unlike more traditional floating markets where things are sold on boats, was set up on wooden platforms. Some more wats and a million photos later we returned to Bangkok where we rounded off our time in Thailand with some drinks at the Red Sky rooftop bar.

Final thoughts about Thailand:

-Tuk tuks are such funny vehicles and always brightly decorated. 

-The king is omnipresent and I learned the longest reigning monarch in the world?

-Everything is spicy! "Real" Thai food is not as rich as the Thai food I've had in other countries, but always filled with fresh vegetables, coconut something, and peanuts.

-Temples, temples and more temples, not one failed to impress!

-Bangkok is super well developed and quite similar to Taipei. The cosmopolitan atmosphere is very unlike the other places we went to, so many foreigner tourists and expats

-Thai people seem to generally take things at a slower pace, driving, cleaning, eating...

Will definitely be back to check out Thailand's northern mountains and southern islands, laagorn for now!