Oct 21 2012

It took about 30 hrs going from door to door from LA to Bangkok. We woke up at 4:00 a.m. about 30 minutes before our alarm went off. We arrived in Bangkok around 11:00 p.m. and got to bed around 2:00a.m. We went to our favorite breakfast place in a garden setting and discovered it had moved out of the neighborhood, a big disappointment. We settled for a muffin at Starbucks.

We took it easy as we hadn’t slept well and it was a short night. We ate lunch near our hotel and then had an hour long foot massage before taking an hour long nap. We met Marilyn Prekup, a friend from the Rep of Georgia who now works in Bangkok at the US embassy. It was fun seeing her again.

Today is now Sunday and we ate breakfast (chicken slices with rice and stock) at an outside stand next to the hotel. We walked around trying to find a Jim Thompson shop but it also has left the neighborhood. Now we are heading out to see a Thai friend and her daughter whom we befriended when she did a high school year in the Portland area about four years ago.

We went to a Chinese restaurant with Nutt and Noone and they opted for the buffet. OMG Nutt ordered dim sum for all of us and her eyes were bigger than our stomachs. Much food went uneaten. Afterwards Ron and I headed to Wat Pho to have our fortunes read but realized we had forgotten to bring our exact times of birth so headed back to the hotel, then realized we were still having jet lag and rested. After our rest we went to the Jim Thompson Outlet Store in search for a particular scarf a friend asked me to pick up for her if I could find one. The shop was five stories high. We enjoyed a mango lime smoothie before heading back to our hotel. YUM! It is quite hot here and extremely humid so no matter what time of day it is hot or very warm.

After having eaten a mega lunch we opted for a light dinner then headed over to our neighborhood massage parlor and enjoyed a relaxed foot massage for an hour. We went to bed early.

Monday

 Today we went to Wat Arun with Noone and Nutt. Arun is named after the Indian god of dawn and is a striking Bangkok landmark. In 1767 King Taksin arrived here at sunrise from the sacked capital, Ayutthaya. He later enlarged the tiny temple. Later kings, Rama I and Rama II further enlarged the temple then in the 19^th century King Mongkut (Rama IV) added the ornamentation created by broken pieces of porcelain.  The architectural style, deriving mainly from the Khmer architecture is unique in Thailand. It was fascinating to see the millions of pieces of porcelain embedded in the exterior. Much of the porcelain was donated by local people.

We spied little dishes as well as many pieces of broken porcelain. I could just imagine a family choosing which pieces to donate then being proud once they saw part of their china set on the temple façade. Afterwards we walked to a nearby eatery and enjoyed pad Thai. Next we boarded a ferry that took us to Wat Pho across the river where Ron and I have gone many times when we are in Bangkok to have our fortunes read. We always go to the same man, Mr. Sawong Kontong. He is 83 this year and unfortunately while reading my fortune he got distracted and started on Ron’s. He then came back to me and kept going back and forth between the two of us and never  finished Ron’s. While we were with him, Nutt and Noone went over to the massage school housed here and enjoyed a massage. Afterwards we met up and said our goodbyes.

Ron and I got on the river taxi then on to the sky train and went to Jim Thompson’s biggest retail shop and bought a scarf for a friend in Portland. We next rode the subway home and decided we prefer the sky train over the subway. As it had been quite hot today we came back to the room and showered before heading out to a fine dinner at a nearby Indian restaurant. We ended the day with another massage! Life is good.