Bangkok, with over ten million inhabitants, is one of the most visited cities in the world. Many tourists visit the Grand Palace of the Royal Family, the famous temples and shrines, the museums and shops, and take in the night life. We did very little of that. Mostly, we ate. Boy, did we eat. I had made reservations for no less than four city/food tours (packed into three days) on the With Locals website, which turned out to have been the best possible way for us to explore this amazing city, sometimes referred to as the street food capital of the world.
Day 1 - Morning
On our first day we went on a longboat tour in the canals with Tuangtip, our lovely local guide,
On this trip, we did see a famous Reclining Buddha from the water and we did visit a couple of temples. I’ll show you some photos but I am not going to spend any time describing them -- by now you have heard enough about temples and Buddhas, as had we.
What was fascinating to us was getting a glimpse of life along the canals -- everything from estates with gorgeous gardens to ramshackle buildings about to collapse.
The longboats, which are really long and quite colorful, are water taxis whizzing up and down the canals with their noisy, repurposed, monster truck engines.
Tuangtip wanted to take us to the “Artist House” an older building which has been refurbished into a coffee shop, gift shop and artists’ workshop.
We had a refreshing iced latte and snooped around. Upstairs, there was a display of traditional masks used for Thai dances. The ancient art of shadow puppetry is also taught and performed at the shop -- unfortunately not when we were there.
On our way out, we noticed a sign above a doorway -- Museum of Klong Bang Luang (the name of this neighborhood) -- and we asked if we could go in. We stepped into a charmingly haphazard and poignant display of artifacts contributed by local families -- hand tools, teapots and chamber pots, heirloom and everyday dishes, and outdated technology. Mementos that indicate how quickly life is changing in this mega-city along these ancient canals.
For lunch, Tuangtip took us on a tuktuk ride to a small market for a Thai favorite, mussel omelettes. We had to squeeze down a very narrow alley to a tiny lunch place. We could see all the ingredients at the cook station just outside the door. The omelettes were extremely delicious and made a great start to three days of feasting on Bangkok street food.
Day 1 - Afternoon
After making it back to our hotel, we had a brief rest before heading out for our second food tour of the day with Piaporn.
First we had a little snack at a street food stall. The street was lined with pink awnings selling all manner of fruit and fried things, none of which was identified in English. Thank goodness for a local guide.
However, the main attraction on this tour was a modern, air conditioned and very clean market selling organic produce and a variety of cooked dishes. Apparently, the King of Thailand sponsored this market to encourage better growing practices in the rural areas and healthy food in the city. Piaporn seemed very proud of this market and very fond of the king. He and his wife have been active in promoting modern ideas regarding women and in improving the lives of the people in general.
Piaporn wanted us to taste of a variety of fruits which were completely new to us. The prickly red ones are rambutans but the others I don’t remember (should have taken notes). But they were all juicy, sweet and delicious.
There were many, many stalls in this market with delicious-looking dishes. One could go back every day for a year and try something new each time. Piaporn chose chicken skewers and an unusual version of pad thai for us. Again, absolutely delicious!
I had to take a picture of this display of homemade chili pastes. All of them say, “Original, No Preservatives Added”. It boggles the imagination to think what one could do with these in the kitchen.
To top off our day, Piaporn took us to a nearby street market for a refreshing dish of coconut ice cream -- totally unlike anything we would get in the States -- I think the ice cream was made with coconut milk straight from the coconut; it had freshly grated coconut on top and a crispy wafer underneath. It was incredible.
If we had had any more appetite, we could have also tried fried shishamo fish, fried squid eggs or fried quail eggs, as well as dozens of other strange and tasty dishes.
Day 2 - The Water Market
The next morning, after a long taxi ride through busy, noisy streets, we met Tuangtip again, this time at the weekend water market in a different part of the canal network. We arrived about 9:00am and watched as local farmers lined up their boats and scows along the pier and arranged their produce for sale.
However, not all of the water market is actually on the water. Dozens of vendors on the land were busy preparing colorful, tasty-looking (and sometimes strange-looking) dishes.
We would get to try some of the food later, but first, Tuangtip had a surprise for us -- another boat ride on the canal, but this time it was a small wooden boat paddled by an elderly lady, a friend of Tuangtip.
As the boat lady paddled slowly away from the noisy market we began to enter a different universe, completely removed from the bustling, dusty, noisy city.
I took a little video so that you could hear the birds and get a sense of the serene beauty of this magical place. Towards the end of the video, you can hear Tuangtip explaining something to us in the background.
Tuangtip told us that she herself was born and still lives in a house on the canals and her mode of transportation is also one of these lovely old wooden boats. This is very likely a life that is disappearing as modernization takes over.
We turned into a wider canal and passed houses with porches and gardens draping into the water.
Our destination was a lotus flower pond where a “farmer” harvests the lotus roots for sale. It was exquisite.
Tuangtip picked one of the seed pods for us and showed us how to extract and peel the edible little “peas” which we nibbled on during the return trip to the water market.
Back at the market, we saw that more booths and vendors had been busy setting up. We couldn’t resist trying a skewer of grilled crocodile, even though Tuangtip said it wasn’t traditional Thai food. The young girl who served us wanted her picture taken with us.
By this time, throngs of people were arriving for lunch time and we could barely squeeze down the aisles. But Tuangtip, found us a place to sit and brought us a delicious noodle dish and some dumplings. We ate by the canal and watched a woman preparing pad thai on her boat.
That afternoon, we rested in our air conditioned hotel, too tired to go out in the heat again.
Day 3 - The Night Market
The next day, we explored the area around our hotel a bit but it was rather disappointingly touristy after our trips on the canals and to the various local markets. So thankful for our local guides who showed us other parts of Bangkok.
That night, we went to another amazing market with Moddy.
This time we met at about 6:00 in the evening to go to a night market. At first, we had plenty of room to walk around watching the vendors and taking in the aromas. However, as it grew dark, it got increasingly crowded and noisy. Moddy said that about 80% of the visitors were Chinese tourists and she seemed to be correct. Apparently they enjoy this particular market because of the emphasis on seafood. As we wandered the aisles, Moddy selected various items for us to taste (seafood custard tarts, pork skewers, scallops cooked in their shells, noodles with seafood) until we were thoroughly stuffed.
Our time with Moddy was scheduled to last three hours but by 8:00 we were tired, hot and very full and the crowds were getting to be just too much for us.
We had seen only a small fraction of the whole market but that was enough. We headed for the exit. It was a good decision -- as we left, dozens of tour buses were pulling up to unload hordes more tourists who streamed past us into the market. We escaped just in time.
We enjoyed our time in SE Asia immensely (especially the food), but after all the heat, dust, noise and chaos, we needed a rest. So, the next day we were in the air again, headed for paradise -- the beautiful Maldive Islands.
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