What I did on Sunday

Short Version:  Went to Bang Pa In Palace (in Bang Pa In) and temple hopped in Ayuttaya.  It wasn't my idea nor did I partake in much planning.  A Korean woman staying here, Sun, spoke of her plans and seeing as her shit was together and mine was not I was all like...




  
...내가 갈 수 있나요? 







 
(...can I come?)


Long Version: 

Didn't sleep all night, just kinda waited there till my alarm went off at 530 to get up and go.  That means I every time someone so much as rustled a sheet I could have clocked when it happened.

Despite this, I got up at 530, popped a pair of Dayquil regardless of how I thought I felt, as a precaution, and we headed out for the 7am train to Bang Pa In.  The Dunkin Donuts coffee I bought at the station was so hot a cattle branding iron to the tongue would have been an icy relief. 

The train took a little over an hour.  We past miles of nothing, slums, and suburbs, click-clacked over bridges, under bridges, across streets, past dozens of wild dogs, one horrific site that was a dog presumably hit by a train, the homeless, and choked are way semi-out of Bangkok's pollution.

My mood shifted from high to low to high again but with a reality check I needed.

In Bang Pa In we took a Songtheauw, which we later found out come in small, medium, and large, to the palace.  A songtheauw is like a tuk tuk but its seats run lengthwise.  This Songtheauw was medium, a pickup truck with side seats, and a forward viewing gap for passengers.

The palace was neat and there was even a ceremony commemorating *I think* the current king's father building the palace we were at.  There was even a little equivalent of what I'm just going to call a Thai BBQ.  It seemed that Sun and I were the only wandering foreigners that happened across and a few Thais were eager to shove tasty food in our faces and tell us about the goings on. Sun took all the pictures of the food.  In fact she took pictures of EVERYTHING.

The Bang Pa In palace used to actually used by Thai kings.  Now it's a place for Thais and tourists to enjoy.  Thais get in for free, foreigners pay.  There's even a sign that reads this.  They're an honest people.  Here's a smattering of photos.

Afterwards we jackassed to where we could find what ended up being a large songtheauw to take us to Ayuttaya.  This consisted of dealing with some tuk tuk drivers that took us for a pair of idiots, some very friendly locals, a fair amount of walking, and me possibly braking a toilet.

The Toilet

In Bang Pa In on the way to our transport to Ayuttaya I finally found a bathroom after kidding myself for sometime that the hurricane pushing its way through me would just go away.  When the eye of the storm came, I put my plan into action of finding a bathroom just as that moment we've all been in arrived. 

You know it; it's when your someplace public and you're thinking o god not now, not now anytime but now.  For the record, it wasn't the street food's fault, it's just uh kinda a side effect of traveling, sometimes things become irregular and unscheduled.  Especially when your body is as jet lagged as it can be.

Soon a bathroom is found, praise Allah, I open the stall door and I'm faced with the Thail toilet.  Fortunately I knew to carry my own toilet paper.  That much I got right.  Everything else I got wrong.  Everything.  I wont detail it, but let me tell you the cards I was dealt.

Ohhh heyyyy yeaaa Sun I'm just gonna mmmm yeaa I'm gonna use this bathroom we finally found hmmm okay brb! ^.^ Tehehehe.......Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit keeeeeeeep iiiittt together Adam keep it together,

**Open stall door**

I see a squatter toilet (basically a standard toilet only about 8 inches).  NO flusher even a part of it. VERY low water.  I thought Eastern toilets at least had a flusher.

**Eyes start darting around, trying to piece the puzzle together**


To the side there's a cement, professionally made box filled with water that refills when the water level lowers.


Floating in the water is a blue plastic bowl.  (The fuck??)


To it's side a trash can for paper waste.

Behind it all a 2 inch or so wide channel that was maybe 3 inches deep.

I felt like some half-wit MacGyver failing on every level.

OKAY I CAN USE THIS FOR THIS AND...NO THAT DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE...WHAT IF I PUT THIS HERE, MOVE THAT THERE...OH GOD I'M RUNNING OUT OF TIME

I won't detail what the hell I did in there but I found out I did everything wrong.  Like REAAAAALY wrong.  Here's what you're supposed to do....The actual method

That bathroom was, however, immaculate.  And this was in the middle of a bustling, densely populated part of town.

After such a bittersweet victory Sun and I fumbled around looking for the right bus to Ayuttaya.  Just to note, Sun did pretty much 90% of the heavy lifting since she planned it all and did a great job.  The bus turned out to be a large songthauw.  It was like a gardener's truck this time.  Again stolen from Google.


Not stolen from google,




We rode it and three people hopped on throughout.  It was a very dusty ride and it took about 30 minutes

In Ayuttaya, Sun's plan was for us to rent bicycles and ride them from temple to temple.  But we ended up taking a songtheauw for 3 hours.  One driver offered to drive us around for three hours for 600 Baht.  Sweet tap dancing Christ that's a lot of cheddar for a songtheauw/tuk tuk  (Speaking of cheddar, a few days ago I saw a Thai woman wearing a sparkly shirt that read "CHEESE" across the breast.  Wat?? (Sepaking of Wat, Wat in Thai means temple)).
 

After walking away a few times, genuinely not interested, I got him down to 380 for 3 hours and felt like an asshole since that's $13.50 for 3 hours of driving.  What that got us was a different driver, I think he said his brother, his brother's I-don't-know-how-year-old daughter as our cabin buddy for the trip, a small/mini songtheauw, which was our personal taxi driving us around from temple to temple for 3 hours, and a ride to the minibus that would take us back to Bangkok for 60 baht a pop.  A small/mini sontheauw is frankly a tuk tuk with sideways seats.

Here's just a few photos from the day.  Once I things sorted out on this account I can just share albums.  But for now, just a small few...

 ^^^That's the tour guide's daughter.

This is a very meager few, but if I kept at this, I'd be here for a really long time.  This post alone has taken me hours.  It's a combination of slow load times and inexperience.

By the way, want to know what the world is like when Bob Barker isn't warning you to spay or neuter your pets? Come to Thailand. Dogs and cats, dogs and cats everywhere.



Once back in Bangkok I stuffed two plates of food in my face and a random jug of chocolate milk because chocolate milk.  Then there was scrubbing my body with soap for awhile.  I never mentioned it was very hot and humid because it's just that season, the sun was intense as ever (not like it's gonna take a break), and riding around in an open back truck when you're sweaty makes everything stick.