Passing Through Bangkok

3/26/2010

I woke up the next morning still on the train, watched the scenery until I realized it was ALL rice paddies, houses on stilts and a few temples, and started talking to Angie, the Malaysian woman I'd met the night before.  Graciously, she offered me some of her snacks for breakfast since I didn't have anything to eat, and the food vendors who came on the train came along only rarely.  I had some pastry thing with a strange hard jelly type filling and one small pastry with what Angie said was bean curd inside.  I believe her, it just didn't taste like it- it tasted like almond meal.  She was from Penang and was shocked when I said I hadn't been impressed with the food there, despite the great food in the rest of Malaysia.  Oh well.

I worked on my beading for a bit longer and eventually we made it into Bangkok.  Since I was leaving by train for Siem Reap the next day I wanted to stay near the train station, so I looked up a hostel in my guide and wandered over slowly.  Baan Hua Lamphong was actually a pretty decent place, all plants and wood in the middle of a dirty city.  I splurged and got a single room ($2 dollars more than a dorm room for a total of $8) since I'd spent some much time around people lately, much as I'd enjoyed that.  I was hungry, but even more tired so I took a nap from about 2 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.  It was nice but I was even more hungry when I woke up so I went out and got a Diet Coke, two satays of flavored meat (chicken? pork?- I don't know) and rice.  I gobbled them down, ignoring the scratchiness of the skewer at the back of my throat, and was still hungry. 

Nearby was a little restaurant advertising odd combinations of noodles, crab meat- real crab meat, I checked, pork and dumplings.  I got a smallish portion of all four together for 50 baht ($1.50).  On my table were several sauces and condiments to add to the food.  I tasted all the ones I didn't recognize and decided that I really liked the deer head sauce.  I'm not sure that's what it's really called, but it had a picture of a deer's head on it.  It tasted kind of like a heavy soy sauce, almost like a non-smoked steak sauce, but still very liquid.  I was very happy with my choice overall and wanted to walk around Bangkok for a bit, but while my area was safe and well lit, the areas around it, which I'd have to go through, weren't great so I didn't want to take the risk, and again, I was tired. 

Instead, I used my time wisely to finish Season Two of The Inbetweeners.  I've been watching it out of order for no discernible reason, so I watched an episode in the middle of Season Two first, then went back to Episodes 1-6 of Season Two and now I'm going through Season One in order, from Episodes 1-6.  Sometimes I think this blog makes it seem like I spend a lot of time doing nothing, so I just wanted to clarify with this achievement that I really am accomplishing a great deal: I've finished three books and an entire season of a tv show in three weeks!  That's efficiency in action.