Bangkok 18th July - Part II

Okie.. after Chatuchak, we went to the Farmer's Market which is just nearby. Go down the Kamphaeng Phet MRT station, and go towards Exit 3. The Farmer's Market is also known as "Or Tor Kor" or some say, "Aw Taw Kaw". Apparently, it is a high-end market where the price of the product is said to be 3 times higher than normal. It's very 'HC' (high-class), you know. Haha! Can read more here.


go inside this station, and towards Exit 3 to go to Aw Taw Kaw...


Interesting to note that going inside the MRT, you will pass by scanner for security check. Inside the MRT, there's some sort of space with seats where you can rest your tired feet. There were some shops around too. That relax space does have our Youth Park vibe...


resting tired feet, and showing off purchases from Chatuchak


cool lightings


outside Farmer's Market


exotic red fruit, and durians that has no smell!


impressive array of mangoes


There were many stalls selling similar fruits/dry goods, so take your time to look around. Think the prices will hover around almost similar range too. You can try the dried goods before buying. Bought a pack of dried anchovies flavored with curry leaves for 50 baht. Many cuttlefish goods too.


feel free to look around


looking at dried goods such as durian crisps...


The Farmer's Market was quite clean, dry and spacious. So it was nice walking around there. After that, we decided to go to Yaowarat (Chinatown) for dinner. As usual, our preferred mode of transport.. take cab!




many shark fins and birdnest restaurants...




this section felt like pasar malam but selling food


Went around shopping for porky food stuff to buy back as souvenir, and having done that, Jasmine suggested a restaurant for our dinner. It was a small shop, with a French chef beckoning you to go into the restaurant. A French chef, in a Chinese restaurant, in Thailand?? Haha, interesting enough!


peculiar manner to arrange the bowl


restaurant interior


The waitresses seemed to be of Thai national but speaks Mandarin. We ordered sharks fin (2 claypot 500 baht each to share amongst 4 of us), a small plate of roasted duck (120 baht), kang kong (morning glory) small for 100 baht, crab bee hoon, 2 small bowl of birdnest and chrysanthemum tea. Total bill was less than 3000 baht. About SGD$25 per pax. Word of caution, the chrysanthemum tea if you want the sweet one, was overly sweet. So do tell them to go easy on the sugar next time!


add the tau geh




morning glory


yummy roasted duck


crab bee hoon


firm flesh, beautiful color.. but tasteless...


The crab bee hoon was very tasty as the essence of the crab and all flavors were absorbed into the bee hoon. However, the crab meat itself was quite bland thereafter. But towards the bottom of the pot, the bee hoon was very very salty! They used pork fats to cook together with the bee hoon. Heheh, that's why tasty!


bird nest


After dinner, we went back to the hotel and had coffee at the cafe, called "Bakery". It opens from 8am till 10pm.


inside the cafe


We were there at about 930pm, so not much cakes or breads left. Prices for coffee starts from about 150 baht onwards. I liked the Thai iced tea. Nice!


Thai iced tea


After that, we retired to our respective rooms. Tired...coz we have been awake since the wee hours of the morning...

Bangkok 18th July - Part I

Woke up at 430am to catch the 715am plane. Flying by Jetstar so gotta reach Changi Terminal 1 by 620am latest. Of course HS and Cherlyn can saunter in slowly as their house is just 15 to 20 minutes away from the airport... hahaha!


travel light!


Reached airport at 620am. Ade and Jasmine was already queueing up to check-in. So very soon, we were onboard the plane.






Quite liked Jetstar seats, because I felt it is meant more for Asian build. At least my head can rest nicely on the headrest... Had some delay though. So the aircraft didn't get to take off till about half hour later.


waiting to taxi out


Nothing much to see outside the window. Cloudy day, so mostly surrounded by fluffy white.




It's a 2 hour flight from SG to BKK, so we reached Bangkok at approximately near 10am SG time.


land ahoy!


Went to take metered taxi, but was told that 5 pax need to get 2 small cabs or 1 big one. So of course we chose the big one, and hence, we became acquainted with Peter (Pithuk). He's quite a nice chap and speaks quite good English (plus he's cute too! Waahahaa!). Our cab fare costs 700 baht from airport to hotel. He took one highway toll less ('coz it's Sunday, so no traffic), so our total fare was 655 baht. Then he offered to take us from hotel to airport on our day of departure for 500 baht. He said, "No deposit required. Just based on trust." Haha!

Reached Amari Watergate Hotel, and we managed to check-in to 1 room first, as the other 2 rooms were not ready yet. As we waited for our rooms, our bags were myteriously taken away and we were not given any tag to identify our bags. I've been wondering how they'll know which room to take it to later on... and haven't been able to figure that out yet. But yes, our bags were indeed taken to our room #1 thereafter. Cool! So gave the bell-boy a tip for bringing our bags up.

After that, it's off to find food! Platinum Fashion Mall is just opposite the hotel, so we went there.


yummy food for early lunch


flattened chicken satay


raw salad doused in sugary vinegar


Platinum Mall Food Center

Too bad didn't take any picture of the tom yum and beef noodles... After lunch, we went to Chatuchak market to walk walk. Took a cab from hotel.


Sunday traffic, overhead bridge towards Chatuchak


First impression of Chatuchak was that it looked quite cramped. No offence but it feels almost like squatters area. Many many stalls inside.


inside one of the lanes


from outer 'main' street


food and drinks vendors


interesting vehicle with i think tourist on it? not sure...


At some point in time, we decided to split into 2 groups to look at different things. So we made the clock tower as the landmark to come back to.


clock tower


However, we still managed to lose our way... Hahaha!


scenaries when we were lost...


passing by more than 1 time...


public toilet


Luckily the public toilet was not as bad as I thought it will be. Better than some public toilet in Malaysia la... cost about 2 baht per entry I think.


found a secret world! Which in fact, was a shop selling nice smelling stuffs.. but more importantly, we borrowed their seats to sit for a while haha


----------------------- to be continued ------------------------

off to bangkok!

Ok, luggage packed. Passport, wallet, hotel vouchers, jetstar itenary... all in hand-carry. Early morning flight, at 715am. So needa be at the airport by 615am.

So... that means, waking up at 430am? Wah... should sleep now!

one more time, Paul!

Just amazing this World Cup 2010. Spain is meeting Netherlands in the finals! What a sham... Germany lost 0 - 1 to Spain.

Here's a wiki to Paul the Octopus.

Moral of the story from World Cup 2010, no matter how talented you are, no matter how well you work with your team, no matter how good your track record (or the team's) is, the final outcome still depends on that moment. Either you perform or you don't.

And when we lose, we say, "The other team was better..."

chanced encounter

Was at Heeren when the sound of the chinese lion dance was heard. Thought it was in conjunction with the Courts opening near CentrePoint (didn't know Ian Rush was there at Courts!).

So went out to kaypoh kaypoh (because I wanted to check out *Scape anyway), and saw there was a mini parade going on!




storm trooper


cute


they seemed to be enjoying the jumps!


predators on the prowl in Orchard Road...








SMU also came out to play





poor gundam that had difficulty walking, and his costume looks about to fall apart...


Watched the cosplayers, lion dance and mini parade for a bit, then proceeded to *Scape building.


*Scape


they had this contraption outside of the building


We were exploring around the outside of the building, and saw the parade and cosplayers coming back.






fancy an asian wolverine anyone?


Everyone had DSLR, and what do I have? A compact. Ha ha. Felt a bit paiseh also. Approached some cosplayers and they were quite obliging.


green ranger


he actually had quite nice eyes, but he put on the goggles when posing in character... wasted siah! haha


Went into the basement of *Scape building as they were having some fair there. Gundams were on display, and I told YT that my sis would love this!






Think, someone inside there told me that there's going to be a Gundam fair coming up in September.


hehe, ping pong and beer anyone?


There are retail shops inside the building, which sells clothes, lomo cameras, figurines, and a few restaurants (there's a maid's cafe also). There's also a KBox and Ocean Butterfly Music School. As it was still early, we went to the corridor outside of Camp Pong, and took a few shots of the happenings downstairs.


this was shot nearer to the cafe and food kiosks


nice costume (purple and red)


Merly and Lyo also came


V for Vendetta


so cute


Nothing much to explore after that, so we went to Raindrops Cafe for dinner... at 5.30pm, can you imagine? Because we were kiasu, and the indoor dining only had a capacity of 15 diners. Was told that most tables were reserved for 630pm onwards, so we were offered to share a table with 2 other diners but it was actually an area with 3 tables meant for 6 pax, so not too bad because there was a one table gap in between of us.



window seat


Ordered tataki tuna for starters because it was written on the menu board as recommended.


tataki tuna


I think it was seared too much. YT said it tasted like beef!




mushrooms quite yummy but some were bitter! (probably was in close contact too long with the rocket leaves.. )


For our mains, YT ordered ribeye steak, while I opted for meltique beef (prime cut). The meat is from Australia. Both of our dishes came with the exact combo, with the exception that mine has cherry tomatoes. Even the sauce is exactly the same red wine sauce.




i like this picture!


ribeye


ribeye, medium rare


meltique beef, medium rare


The beef was tender and has a nice flavour, and I liked it! We didn't have any desserts because I think we had too much meat.. hahaha!

On our way to Taka, once again, we passed by the cosplayers, and I took this picture:


masked rider amongst mere mortals


Then went to Takashimaya to walk walk, and what do you know... they had food fair in the basement. So, we do what we had to do.. which was, to check it out of course! Saw this cute cute mochi, so YT bought to try.


ringo, kuki and momo


mine was red bean paste inside, while the other 2 had peach and chrysanthemum flavoured fillings..


Then, there was this shop from Tampines One was giving away pork buns for free. We do, what Singaporeans loved to do. Queue up for free food!


piping hot buns, for free!


Ate so much, gasps.. more rounds in the stadium!