Thailand: Bangkok Part 2: Rain, a Fixer and more Rain
ICONASIM next level shopping Bangkok style
The next day we braved the concrete jungle again. Our first stop was to find breakfast. At least the chaos of the night was dormant. But the tour spruikers and Tuk Tuk men were out in full force prowling the street and they smelt fresh meat and were circling us like sharks. As with the night before, diving into a shop offered some reprieve and our coffee shop was amazing, the food was cheap and plentiful. The coffee was hot, and life was good apart from the mild hangover from last night.
Breakfast done and dusted we opted to head off to do some shopping. So why not play tourist and head off to the biggest shopping centre in the area and the most expensive one mind you – a place called ICONSIAM, it’s a short ferry ride away. Now in order to get there you have to get to the ferry terminal and that my friends is a taxi or tuk tuk ride. Well you can’t go to Bangers without indulging in one of these so you just have to roll with it. Now our Tuk Tuk man was what’s best described as a fixer, meaning that if you wanted it he could source it legally or illegally he had no scruples and offered it all up on a platter. A smooth-talking bastard he offered us a ride for 5O Baht to take an hour long tour around the city. To me that seemed the deal of a lifetime so off we went. Five minutes into the ride he informs us that if we stop and have a look at a tailor, we can buy a suit and he gets a ticket (commission) just for taking us there. He assured us that we don’t have to buy anything just look. Fair enough I thought it is a small price to pay five minutes of our time for a cheap ride. What could possibly go wrong, besides Red indicated that he wouldn’t mind having a look at a dinner jacket anyway. So off we went. Well as soon as we walked into the tailors I sensed we had been bought here for our credit cards to be slaughtered. As soon as Red indicated he was interested in a dinner jacket we were whisked upstairs to the fitting room. Two cold beers magically appeared out of thin air and were thrust into our hands. I sat down and watched the shit show unfold. Red was measured up in a flash and before he could drink his beer, he’d chosen colours and a style. He was getting fussed over royally and the sales pitch was laughable and laid on thick and fast. It worked however, Red got a shiny new jacket made to measure, his wallet lightened, and I got a free beer out of it. Thanks, Red, for your generous contribution to my livers demise. Getting back in the Tuk Tuk we were whisked off before buyer’s remorse had set in. Arriving shortly thereafter at what we thought was the terminal to ICONSIAM turned out to be our fixers second bite at the apple to lighten our wallets. This time it was the hour-long tour to see the city sights, turns out it wasn’t in the Tuk Tuk but a private boat cruise. By now we were rightly pissed off and demanded to be taken to the terminal we'd asked for. I could see Red was about to unleash some Texan fury and perceptively the fixer saw it too and caved offering to take us to the terminal at no extra cost, of course.
one doesn’t come here with a credit card willingly
ICONSIAM is a massive flashy shopping centre on steroids, it’s got all the trimmings with brand names every way you turn. My daughter would have had a field day here at the demise of Dad’s credit card. I went into the biggest Apple Store I have ever seen in my life. Red had to get a pen for his Ipad. Two minutes in there was enough for me. I went outside to investigate; it was there I found a nearby toilet. Entering this really highlighted the vast disparity between the rich and the poor of Thailand. The bathroom was all decked out in flashy gold décor. The urinal of all places had a massive LCD screen hung above them that played flashy advertising for products you neither want nor to need all the time assaulting your senses when you were at your most vulnerable with zip down and doing your business. It truly was gobsmacking. I just stood there way longer than I expected half expecting someone to magically appear and zip me up.
talk about a captive audience
Growing tired of shopping we departed and just as we stepped outside the heavens opened up on us for their afternoon downpour. This made walking to the ferry interesting and somewhat treacherous walking on tiled floors of the jetty. To describe it as a torrential downpour was to do it injustice, it was proverbially raining cats and dogs, so much so by the time we got to the terminal across the other side it was already flooded, and we had to wade through 30cm of water to get to the street. The street outside was no better it was flooded as well. Though it wasn’t all doom and gloom, one sight that caught my attention and was novel, the children were using handheld butterfly nets and baskets to scoop up fish as they travelled down the gutter. These fish were quickly put in a bucket to be presumably cooked up by the street vendor, it would have made an excellent episode of farm to plate called gutter to grub Bangers style. Looking into the bucket there was a mixture of Tilapia and Catfish all plate sized too. Any way you look at it you got to hand it to them, they get an A+ for ingenuity and opportunism.
flooded streets
gutter to Plate, Street food - catfish & Tilapia washed down the gutters and collected by kids
Afternoon showers you can set your clock by
