Tourist – natalie b. compton

Wats and a Water Taxi

October 20, 2014 NatBCo2 Comments

I write this holding back tears, the tears of an idiot. I’ve been in Thailand a month now, I can handle Thai spice [eats Thai chili and immediately regrets it. Eyes water. Mouth burns.] 20 minutes later, my mouth is still on fire are I am dangerously low on water. Kill me.

Anyway, despite the physical suffering, the weekend was a great one filled with sightseeing, galavanting, and not losing a single thing. I woke up Saturday on a mission to see some sights. I hadn’t had my fill of temple visits, so I decided on heading to Wat Arun, the Temple of Dawn.

Pro tip: Wat means temple.

After renting a long skirt (for modesty), I entered the hallowed grounds of the riverside Wat. I was immediately overcome with awe. I’ve been to religious sites before, but I’ve never had such a physical reaction to a place. I felt calm and was filled with respect for the beautiful grounds. I’m not a sappy person, but it was really special. I stalked a monk and took his photo, because that’s what a tourist does at a Wat.

I wonder wat he would think if he caught me being a creep — I wonder Wat he would think if he caught me being a creep

I spent about a 45 minutes touring the incredible place. To get to the best vantage point, you have to climb up narrow stairs that are essentially a ladder. Very nerve-wracking, but totally worth the experience. I couldn’t help think about all of the teeth I would knock out if my foot slipped. Positive thinking!

One thing that really stood out beyond the splendor of the holy temples was the presence of the guys pictured below. I’m sure they are really wonderful to some people, but I was sort of like, why are these giant-headed baby monks here? They’re a little off putting and way less majestic than the rest of the area. I mean, those heads!

I don't even know Wat I'm looking at — I don’t even know Wat I’m looking at

I took a tuk tuk to the nearest BTS station and spent the rest of the night enjoying the nightlife of Bangkok. Beervana’s anniversary party, dive bars, and street noodle soup were the perfect end to another great day in Thailand.

That's a cat on a pool table! — That’s a cat on a pool table!

I woke up late on Sunday with a mean hangover, but still wanted to get my Wat on. My mental capacity was a little less sharp due to said hangover, but I managed to wait in only two wrong lines before figuring out how to take the Chao Praya river taxi.

I got off at the taxi port across from Wat Arun near the Grand Palace. Having been to the Grand Palace in 2013, I didn’t need to go back before seeing the other sights of Bangkok. Instead, I wandered in the direction of glimmering temple roofs until the sun went down.

Without a destination, I wasted a lot of time wandering through less eye-catching areas, but still enjoyed seeing Thais go about their sleepy Sunday.

Ended the day with some Szechwan food while it poured rain. I can’t remember the names of all of the Wats I saw, or even the names of the neighborhoods I walked through, but still a win in my book. I’m getting better at my Thai numbers, and getting used to Thai people laughing at me when I practice.

My weeks are spent keeping up with the hustle of working at a startup, and weekends exploring this massive city. Breathaking, confusing, sweat-inducing – I am falling deeper in love with Bangkok with each passing day.

Cliché Bangkok

October 3, 2014October 3, 2014 NatBCo1 Comment

It’s been about two and a half weeks since I moved to Bangkok, so I still have a free pass to do cliché, touristy things. And touristy things I have done! Haley and Amber (the friends I flew over here with) ended their jaunt through Cambodia, Vietnam, and Thailand with a visit to Bangkok. First item on the agenda: take them to a rooftop bar.

We headed to just the place after eating at a tourist-focused restaurant near Cheap Charlie’s. At Above 11, a bar on the 3oth-something floor of the Fraser Suites, we met up with my coworker and his group. The view was fantastic, and we had a great time hearing about their travels and swapping culture shock moments. Also great: the wild maze (literally, a hedge maze) leading to the bathroom.

After work the following day, Haley and I intended to find a night market in Chinatown for street food. Instead, we ended up stopping at the night flower market on accident, a very sweet-smelling accident. We walked around and ate some fried street snacks before stopping at a food stall as it started to rain. Although we wanted the most touristy dish on the planet (Pad Thai, of course), we settled for for mixed vegetables and rice (and giant beers).

After the meal, we took a tuk tuk to meet up with a new friend Jeff, a British expat fluent in Thai. He suggested Khao San Road, aka “the center of the backpacker universe” and I was excited to go and see the infamous area. You couldn’t take a photo without three plastered tourists attempting to photobomb your moment. Instead of a bucket of cocktails, Haley and I had fresh coconut ice cream served brilliantly in a coconut.

We fought through the hoards of drunk tourists and pushy vendors until we found Jeff. A few minutes of weaving our way through the neighborhood, we settled into a bar away from the chaos of the main road. We learned a lot from Jeff, who is expertly versed in the Thai language and culture. The night was great, even after being swarmed by the laughing gas salesmen of Khao San Road. Another item checked off of a standard Bangkok bucket list.

On Thursday, Haley met me after work for a Vietnamese dinner with my coworkers. I didn’t realize that the Vietnamese did flan, you learn something new every day! As tourists do, we walked to the Patpong night market after dinner. The red light district is not necessarily my favorite place to go, but we wanted to see a night market and the one at Patpong was nearby. It had the usual suspects: elephant-print clothing, ping pong show hawkers, and bizarre trinkets that you would truly never need (I’m looking at you, Coca-Cola clock). We spied a tattoo parlor and I decided to go for it, having thought about the idea of getting another tattoo for a few days. Thai culture seems to have a soft spot for tattoos, and “When in Rome” seemed like an easy justification for a bad idea.

I walked up to Billy’s Studio (billystattoo@hotmail.com for any interested takers) and grilled the men about the cleanliness of their needles. Feeling convinced that the transaction would be clean (although still ridiculous), I went in and sat on the black leather bench and showed the men what I wanted. Feeling nostalgic for San Francisco, I went with the coordinates of the city I left just two weeks ago.

The tattoo artist turned on Pitbull to accompany the experience, but he motioned for us to pick the music from YouTube ourselves. DJ Haley took requests and played some favorites to ease the pain. The playlist included, but wasn’t limited to:

STRKFKR – When I’m Alive

STRKFKR – Girls Just Want to Have Fun (obviously)

Santigold– Pirate In The Water

Little Dragon – Shuffle A Dream

When it was over, I looked down at my new, permanent addition to my body. It sort of looked like a prison-esque tattoo which was definitely not my intention. I probably should have thought a little more about what exact coordinates of San Francisco I would like to see forever, instead of an apartment building for the homeless in the Tenderloin. When making forever decisions, maybe throw some thought into it – or not. I paid my 1,000 baht ($30) and left.

Haley and I walked around a bit more before finding some street mango and sticky rice being prepared with the utmost care by an old Thai woman. We waited patiently as she carved our favorite Thai dessert, then ate it on the side of the road. We watched people walk by, passing the lined up prostitutes waiting for customers. The sheer volume of sex workers in Bangkok is mind-blowing. We left feeling sad and full.

Haley packed up her belongings and e-checked into her flight for Bali. It was great to have her and Amber as houseguests, even if it was just for a short period of time. After her Indonesian getaway, Haley will be moving to Chiang Mai to do an epic internship, and I can’t wait to visit as often as possible.

I doubt this week will be the end of my cliché activities in Thailand, but it was nice to get some of the most touristy things out of the way early. Up next: ride an elephant while eating Pad Thai.

New to Bangkok

September 16, 2014September 16, 2014 NatBCo3 Comments

How is this real? I woke up a few times in the night, but made the official decision to stop sleeping at 9 am. I couldn’t believe that I was not only alone in a hotel in Thailand, but starting a life here. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE?!

I spent the morning scourging the Internet for apartments. There were a lot of great ones in my price range, but I decided it may be better to go to a real estate office in person. At noon, I hit the streets anxiously and thought I would try getting to the Re/Max real estate office on my own. I had looked up directions ahead of time, and headed for the BTS station to start the adventure. I proudly got off the train and at street level, I thought I would reward myself with lunch. I had green curry and shrimp, as that is one of the only things I know how to say.

After lunch, I went back to the street and walked toward my destination. Weird, that McDonald’s looks super familiar. Maybe they all look exactly the same? NOPE. I had made a loop back to my hotel’s street. Extremely flustered and without WiFi, I decided I needed someone to just take me to my destination. It took me a solid 10 minutes before I had the courage to approach a motorcycle taxi and ask for a ride. At the time, I didn’t know that Thai people only take motorcycle taxis for very short distances. They automatically charge more for idiot tourists who don’t know that, so I paid him a good 3x the going rate.

We got to the address and my heart sunk. It was massage parlor with giant lips on the sign that I was 100% sure was not Re/Max. I showed him the address again, and he motioned for me to call the phone number on the ad. He graciously waited as I called and sweat in the street. An American man told me that the office had moved. I wanted to crumple up and disappear.

The American gave me directions and I scribbled them down in my notebook. I told my driver where to go in broken Thai. He didn’t turn when I wanted him to, so I panicked and asked him to turn around and go back to “Lao Sai,” or turn left. He did, and we ended up going down another street I thought seemed wrong. Why the f am I giving anyone directions? I have no idea where I am! We came to a slow stop and we brokenly communicated. I didn’t want to waste his time, so I got off the motorcycle and tried to thank him and go it alone (or give up and cry). He asked a few people around him about the address, and urged me to call the Re/Max number again. On the phone with the agent, I realized that we were just a few buildings away! I almost leapt for joy and thanked the driver excessively.

Being one million degrees here, I was sweating pretty heavily when I walked into the Re/Max office. The agent, Siri, looked very concerned and asked me if I was okay. She power walked to get me some filtered water, and seemed genuinely worried as she turned up the air conditioning. I tried to laugh it off and vowed to get used to the tropical heat ASAP. We talked budget, location, other wish list items and made a plan to meet the next day to look at available condos.

After fulfilling my main task for the day, I realized I had nothing else planned to do. I had developed about 10 blisters from all of the walking I had done in the first 48 hours. As someone sans thigh gap, I was getting a pretty intense leg chafe and was cringing with each step. Despite not wanting to spend a lot of time walking around in pain, I chose to head to a cool neighborhood and walk around.

I had read that the neighborhood Ari was essentially the Brooklyn or Hayes Valley of Bangkok, so I got back on the BTS to explore. Almost immediately after I got off the train, it started pouring rain. I ducked under a plumeria tree until I decided to wait out the storm with a foot massage. Second massage in less than 48 hours… Only God can judge me!! The woman gave me some amazing shorts to change into that I may have worn backwards (unintentionally):

Coming from the California drought, I was blown away by the torrential downpour. You could have told me that this was a monsoon and I would have believed you. Post massage, the masseuse gave me hot tea and some dried fruit to snack on. I waited for the rain to stop and applied a thousand bandaids to my blistered feet. Two days of tromping through Bangkok had really ruined my barking dogs.

I walked into the drizzle and tried to find street food to eat. It’s a challenge to find street food as a pescetarian. Most of the stalls seem to serve pork and chicken. If a vendor does sell fish, it looks like it has been sitting out a while, and I have been so wildly paranoid about traveler’s diarrhea that I refuse to take that risk. Giving up on food, I kept walking around checking out the area. Ari had many similarities to the cool cities it was compared to online. There were a number of restaurants that could have been plucked out of San Francisco or New York that I’d love to visit for dinner (when I actually have friends here).

I got back on the BTS and headed home in case the rain started again. Like an idiot, I didn’t bring an umbrella out despite it being the rainy season. Back in my temporary neighborhood, I walked around looking for food. I turned down a busy street and found myself in the midst of many bustling bars. Signs advertised Buttery Nipple cocktails and I noticed that the white people were mainly single, white males. The bars were teeming with beautiful Thai women, and more lined the street. My chest tightened and I was instantly depressed when I realized that I was in some sort of red light area and that these were prostitutes. I kept walking down the street hoping to escape the sad reality and got out as quickly as possible. I know I will have to get used to seeing the sex tourism that goes on in Thailand, but it was hard to take in the first time around.

I ordered a Chang beer at a tourist-y pub called Bully and the bartender gave me some free popcorn. I happily gobbled up the popcorn, two beers and watched golf on mute for a good 30 minutes. After warily chatting with the two men in the airline business next to me, I beelined back to my hotel. I’m mandating a two beer limit whenever I’m alone to avoid the whole “lost drunk in a foreign country” thing. I cringed when I realized I had beer and popcorn for dinner. Americans, am I right?

Tomorrow marks a new day, hopefully one filled with apartment leasing and good food eating.