Anyway, on to recap the past two days. Saturday was Andrea's last day with me- so sad! We booked a tour to see the floating market, river Kwai, and the tiger temple. We were picked up bright and early at 7am. Drive was so long! We drove for a total of probably at least 6 hours there and back. Our first stop was the floating market. Don't even remember what that one was called since there are a bunch of them near Bangkok. It was super touristy and crowded! Way too many boats in the river at the same time. There were shops along the sides of the river that sold basically the same things as all the other tourist areas, so I didn't buy anything. The sides of the boat were very low so we kept getting splashed with the nasty river water! Ew! We circled around to a village area and saw this HUGE reptile lizard thing climb out of the water onto the wall on the side! Creepy. It was probably at least two feet long. Actually maybe bigger.
After that exciting ride through the market and village, we took a speed boat through the same river to some other random place where we waited for our driver. He then drove us to grab a quick lunch, and we were off to the river Kwai. I guess during the Japanese invasion during world war II, the Japanese built a bridge over the river for the trains to transport supplies and ammunition. Not really all that exciting...plus I was too hot to really even care. After the bridge, we finally got to go to the tiger temple, which is what we were looking forward to the most. They only let us stay for an hour, which was kinda lame. There were also lots of other animals there, like deer, buffalo, boar, and not sure what else we saw. There were so many bugs there! We first went to take pictures with the tigers. They had like maybe 10 of the, in this one area where everyone waited I line and the people who worked there grabbed your camera while another literally held our hand and led us around to a bunch of the tigers for pictures. It was interesting holding some Thai boy's hand. Heh. Andrea and I ended up going around twice so we could get more pictures. We mostly just got to stand near the tigers' behind, except for one where we got to touch one of their heads. A girl got to hold the tiger's head in her lap! That would've made an awesome pictures, except I was wearing white pants and didn't want to get them all dirty. Oh well. After taking pictures there, the staff led one of the tigers out and everyone got to take turns holding the leash and walking the tiger for a quick picture. Then we got another picture with a monk bottle feeding a tiger. That was basically it for the tiger temple. A little disappointing because I thought we would get to do more with them. It also would've been fun to see the cubs. Too bad...after that it was a 3 hour drive back to Bangkok.
That night, Andrea and I went to Khao San Road since we lived near it. It is known as the backpacker's street. We got some dinner there for super cheap! $2 each for green curry and stir fried veggies, and ONE dollar for a big plate of pad Thai!! Our whole meal cost $6 for the both of us with a ton of leftovers! Why can't America be that cheap?! Everything really is so cheap here! It's so much fun shopping. After dinner we walked down the street for a bit of shopping. I got 3 cover up/ dresses for $10!!!! We have found some super good deals here!
As we were walking down the street, I see a guy holding a tray full of scorpions on sticks. And since Andrea said she would eat bugs, I chased after the guy so we could buy one from him so she could make good on her word (that she forgot she even said). I wasn't planning on eating no scorpion! But since Andrea finally had the courage to take a small bite, I did too (although it took us both a while). We got it all on camera too and it is hilarious! But the scorpion really didn't taste that bad. At all. In fact it was kinda tasty. Ha ha ha. Really just like the BBQ chips we ate that morning! We were gonna throw away the rest of the scorpion after our little bites, but we decided what the heck. And we each took another bite and finished it off. Afterwards we couldn't believe we actually did it! To be honest though, I really didn't think the scorpion looked as bad as the other bugs- even crickets. We saw a bunch of other nasty stuff they were selling, including giant grasshoppers and cockroaches. Now those you can't pay me a million dollars to eat. The scorpion seemed to me more like a crawfish or something, really. S if I had to eat another one, I probably would. That was quite adventurous and brave of us though, I've got to say. On our short walk back to our hostel, Andrea decided it was safer to have some sort of weapon to protect ourselves with, so she found a big rock to carry the rest of the way back to ward off any potential bad guys. It worked pretty well!
The next morning, Andrea left bright and early at 4 am for her flight back to HK. So sad! No more Andrea to eat bugs with or to protect me with rocks :( I was quite sad when I woke up and she was gone. That morning after laying in bed longer than I had intended (I was too tired, plus didn't want to face the heat again), I finally got up and got ready to go to Ayutthaya- where there are a bunch of temple ruins. The receptionist at the hostel suggested going by bus and train, although online people said by minivan was easiest. I had a hard time deciding, but finally went with the bus and train. Big mistake! The bus ride to the train station went smoothly enough, but the train....oh that dang train! There was no a/c first of all. And at the first stop, the train broke down or something and stopped for over half an hour. I was getting so frustrated and annoyed, I finally got fed up with waiting and took a taxi to where the minivans left. Good choice! It took less than two hours total to get there. I was met by a nice tuk tuk driver lady who offered her services to me. I picked out 5 temples I wanted to visit, and we were on our way! She really was very kind. Let me borrow an umbrella as shade since it was so hot out, and even gave me a free cold water bottle. I liked her. The temples were pretty neat. I expected them to be in the middle of nowhere-like the Mayan ruins- but they were all right
In the middle of the city. Again, it was too hot to really be able to properly enjoy the sites, so I only briefly walked around each one and snapped a few pictures. After the five sites, I took the minivan back to Bangkok and decided to go to a mall this girl in krabi recommended called terminal 21 . Walked around a bit but didn't see anything worth buying. Decided to grab some food since I didn't really eat lunch. Went up to the food court where they had so many selections for super cheap! I got this pork dish that wasn't that great though, and the another fruit smoothie. After eating I went to the bottom floor and bought some treats and headed back to the hostel to pack.
Got up at 4 am this morning and caught a taxi to the airport, which only cost less than 200, instead of 350 like when we arrived. And it only took 20 minutes to get there rather than 45. Right now I arrived in Malaysia waiting for my connecting flight...have a four hour layover. What to do, what to do....I downloaded the second book in the seven realms series so i shall read!
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