Bangkok first impressions

I’m not really used to going somewhere I don’t know any more. I’m pretty familiar with most of the major cities in Europe and to a greater or lesser extent feel at home in them. Strange for me, then, to be somewhere completely new.

My first impressions were not great. I was very tired, it was very hot and humid and noisy and there was traffic everywhere and it all looked drab and ugly in the orangey smog.

After a shower and a good nap, I put my best foot forward and went to explore.

Everything was very different or so it initially seemed. The sights and sounds and smells were not the same as I was used to. I felt out of my element, I was desperately searching for a way to connect myself to this great metropolis so that I could start to understand it, start to enjoy it.

I wanted to head into the heart of the city and it seemed the best way to get there was by boat. I went to the nearest pier to catch the water taxi. The long wooden boat soon appeared and approached the pier at speed. The engine slammed into reverse, the boat banged into the tyres on the jetty. A deckhand threw a rope, looped it quickly around a bollard, helped people speedily to disembark and then to embark, he unwound the rope with a flick of his wrist. The engine roared and we were off. I knew all about this. This didn’t feel unfamiliar at all. In fact it felt very familiar.

Jumping on and off the vaporetto in Venice was just like this. I started to relax. All along the canals were wooden homes built on pilings. There were all the signs of everyday life. A chair placed outside, a cat curled up, a balcony bedecked with flowers. Somebody tinkering with an engine. Washing was hanging up. Suddenly this city didn’t feel so alien to me.

I jumped off the boat and onto the jetty and set off to explore the historic part of the city. Everything was colourful. There were beautiful flowering trees everywhere and their fragrance went into battle with the stench of the drains and won. All around me were gorgeous flowers, orchids, water lilies and frangipani trees.

There seemed to be a war waging between beauty, fragrance and tranquility and ugliness, stench and chaos. I was confused but starting to enjoy myself. I must have looked confused because a man stopped, asked me where I was from, told me he was a professor in political science at the university, and gave me a list of things I should see and do. He was the first of many genuinely friendly and kind people I met.

Following his advice, I walked a short distance to my first Buddhist temple, there would be lots more over the coming days. I walked through the gates of the temple into another world, and an overwhelming one of colour and sound and scents.

Walking up the winding path to the Golden Mount temple was just beautiful. There was the sound of running water, there were beautiful images of the Lord Buddha in little grottoes surrounded by greenery and flowers. In the air was the resonant bass of a gong being regularly struck. It was a profoundly calming sound.

I continued walking almost in a trance, climbing up to the Golden Mount for a view over the city. As I reached the top I was one again confronted with the modern metropolis, a heaving city of ten million people, polluted and noisy and chaotic.

Looking at that view, I was reminded of Naples, smog, lots of poor cramped housing, sky scrapers and people everywhere. I remembered how intimidated I had felt the first time I went there and how quickly I fell in love with it. Perhaps I could find the same joy in the noise and colour and madness here in Bangkok.

I was starting to find a way into this city. It wasn’t actually so alien. I had managed to find things that were familiar I had found similarities with other places I knew. I had spoken to local people and they were just like everyone else! I was starting to feel a connection to this place.

I was enjoying myself now. I wanted to familiarise myself with as much as possible before my group arrived the following day. I left the area around the Royal Palace and the Golden Mount and set off on foot for China Town. Each street I walked down had a different character. There was the street of Buddha salesmen, the street of carpenters, there were food shops and junk shops and barbershops and shops that just seemed to sell everything. There were stalls selling coconuts and the evil smelling Durian fruit that was banned from my hotel. There were smoking woks on carts. I didn’t know where to look next.

China Town was buzzing with life. There were street food stalls everywhere with a huge variety of tempting things to eat. I tried lots of wonderfully tasty things , prawns, soft shelled crab, skewers of pork and for dessert amazing deep fried banana pancakes. Down side streets there were long dark narrow alleys selling every kind of fruit and vegetable imaginable, some were familiar others I had never seen before. It was just great.

By now I was getting tired. It had been a long day after a long flight. I decided to take a Tuktuk back to the hotel. A price was quickly negotiated, it was way cheaper than I had expected and we sped through the packed streets weaving in and out of traffic. It was an exhilarating end to an exhausting day.

Over the next few days my feelings for Bangkok evolved quickly. Between the peace and beauty and the noise and squalor there was also a sophisticated city with luxury hotels, restaurants and shopping malls, cultural centres and museums. I came to realise that these elements weren’t at war with each other, they were all part of a great city, embracing its past, its present and its future. I was hooked. I’ll be back!