Off to Bangkok!

It was a lazy sunday afternoon on the 30/10/05, we boarded Tiger Airways to start on our Thailand - Laos Odessey.
We are headed for the City of Angels first!





Look how similar Bangkok airport is to Spore. Its just so Singapore. More on that later.

Bangkok and crappy guesthouse

Grace is the best! She booked for all the accomodations and arranged all the transport as well.
Here she is checking us into Suk 11, a guesthouse located at Sukhumvit Soi 11 in Bangkok.
The Guesthouse looks pretty typical and nice.















We were to stay on the 3rd floor. and thats where I thought we have a rather crappy place. The corridors on the 3rd floor are dark and orangey(from the light bulb).



Dark corridors and hairy stuff are just outside my house. Strange y they put such scary stuff outside






















The view when I step out of the room and look left. The hat looks like a man. Scared me a few times

My room ?!?!?!ARGH!

My room was the shocker, There is a flight of stairs leading to a bolted door in my room!
The view from my bed, I did not really had a good nite, my mind really when on overdrive about what may come down from the flight of stairs.
There! a flight of stairs beside my bed leading to the bolted door! how ridiculous can it get?
I requested a change of rooms and this is the only room they have available. yeah right, bastards...I dun think I would ever go back there.

Dinner at Bangkok

Immediately after we reach Bangkok, we checked in to our guesthouse and we are headed for Dinner at Khao San.
We met up with Grace's friends( Cynthia and Vippy) in Bangkok for our dinner somewhere near Khao San. We had a meal at a very dark restaurant that serves really good thai food! The restaurant has a live band(actually one singer only) as well, and it seems like its both a pub and a restaurant....

At the dinner place. Vippy(left) is a lecturer at a Uni in Bangkok. While Cynthia decided to leave Singapore and is currently looking for a job in Bangkok.

Khao San at its best, there was some rock concert there organised by some beer company and hell loads of people. Khao San is the infamous street favoured by backpackers (read: REALLY Cheap Ang Mos) and for its mess that possibly could rival Patpong.

Vippy sent us to Suan Lum Market in her Pickup.
Suan Lum also happens to be a very expensive nite Bazaar. Nothing much fantastic here except for the prices...

Breakfast at Guest House

Breakfast is included in our Package. Its just muffins, bread, some fruits and tea and coffee, pretty decent i must say.

Grace and me at the Lobby, which is also the place we have our breakfast.

Morning walk around Sukhumvit

I decided to walk around the area, to visit some temples, any temple in fact. So i walked to the nearest one alone for my mini prilgrimage to a Temple. Located one and took in some sights of the city.


Mangled wires, beautiful isnt it?

back at our guesthouse, ready to go take the Plane to Khon Kaen.

Khon Kaen!! Here I come!

On the Plane to Khon Kaen! Flying Thai Airways!Look even the airplane walls have designs..cool!
Wah have food( coz Tiger air have nothing!) But the food isnt great at all....cold and typical airplane food.
View of Bangkok, look at the amount of buildings! Compare that to Khon Kaen.
Khon Kaen is located in the heart of North East Thailand in the Isan region. Its where the real heartlanders of Thailand are from. Lots of rice and a poorer region. Nothing much to offer for the tourist but Its definitely more to see in terms of the living of the Thai Isan People

Khon Kaen!

Khon Kaen Airport is your typical small town airport. Many people and small.Strangest part of it is....there are no TAXIs! No Taxis, no Tuk Tuk....so we went on a hire bus with some other people.

The small mini bus we have to sit to get to the city centre.
On the way to Khon Kaen, if the door of the truck is anything to go by, this is pretty much small town and not too rich people here. But lots of really nice people

Roma Hotel in Khon Kaen

We took a room at Roma Hotel in the middle of the city. Pretty decent hotel.

View from the hotel of the city We took the tuk tuk to our next destination for our dinner appointment.

Foundation for Rural Child Development

We went to this place to meet some of Grace's friends who she had contact with when she was working in Thailand. This NGO helps rural kids have a place to stay and is also a halfway house for older kids.

When I was there, the kids rush up to me and held my hands. They were very friendly and started talking in Thai to me. We had to smile at each other and point at stuff to communicate.

My camera came in handy and the kids like having their photos taken. They practically pulled me to take photos of them. They were so good at posing, we had such a great time.

If i did not say Grace is inside, I do not think u can spot her. She looks like one of the kids. haha


Riding on the dog... The poor dog is hounded by the kids.


Posing at the cars


I taught them to make a star with their fingers.


I set the camera on auto and place it on the floor so we all looked down and took the pix







They kept saying " Tai Tai Tai"...i realised that "tai" means Take a picture. SO i Tai some pixs of the kids

Dinner with the crew from Rural Child Development

We had a feast with the Khon Kaen people. People who helped out at the Centre. Will Introduce them below.



This creature is a Slow Loris. It is called Malee. The owners loved it and it is said to take on human character. It throws a tantrum and sleeps all day. hah. Sounds like some people we know.


Slow Loris with Grace and Pi Ting (owner)





Too much flash and now its trying to sleep.


Pix with Kru Suriy(Light blue male) and Kru Noi (Blue female). Kru means teacher in Thai. They are both teaching at the centre and their 2 cute little kids are there too. The older man is called Pi Somphot and his wife Pi Ting (Pi refers to Elder in Thai) and Pi Somphot is in the borad of directors for the centre. The blonde hair girl is Their daughter call Mei.