The first full day in Bangkok Thailand was a full one. The only real plan we had was to visit the beautiful Wat Arun temple, but we ended up doing much much more than just that.
Breakfast was the first thing on the list. We left our little guesthouse and started wandering down to find someplace to eat. We walked west toward the Chao Phraya river which is where we needed to take a river taxi to get to Wat Arun. We found a small little secluded area and got breakfast. I got an omelet with rice, the other guys got garlic chicken with rice, and something else. We all tried each other's food. Mine was tasty, but I really enjoyed the garlic chicken and rice.
The river taxi was quite the adventure. There was a whole herd of people hanging out at the docks when we got there. As soon as the taxi got to the stop, the whole crowd began frantically trying to make their way on board. The river taxi was already jam packed with people, and the workers on board recognized that there were going to be too many people. They fought to curtail the rest of the crowd from getting on. With strenuous and admirable effort, they succeeded. We didn't make it on the first river taxi which actually ended up being in our favor. We ended up talking with some young French women who gave us some advice about going up to Chiang Mai and Pai. Our luck has been exceptional on this trip thus far (knock on wood).
The river taxi was akin to a packing a down sleeping bag into a stuff sack (couldn't think of anything better to say): too many people and too little space. This was, however, part of the adventure, and I couldn't help but laugh and smile. It reminded me of being on a crowded micro in Chile.
After a lot of confusion as to where we needed to get off, we followed the advice of some English ladies and got off at the Tha Thien stop, and then we took a ferry across the river to where Wat Arun was located.
There are no words beautiful enough to describe Wat Arun. From a distance, it looked like a massive black volcano, but even more fascinating. As we got closer, we could see people climbing up the extraordinarily steep staircase to get to the top.
We paid 50 baht to get in. I had an amazing time climbing up the staircase to the top of Wat Arun. The view from the top was spectacular. The whole experience was exactly what I was looking for. If anyone reading this blog ever goes to Thailand, you must go see Wat Arun. It is breathtaking.
Here is a wikipedia description of Wat Arun:
"Wat Arun (Temple of Dawn) is a Buddhist temple in Bangkok Yai district of Bangkok on the Thonburi west bank of the Chao Phraya river. The temple derives its name from the Hindu god Aruna, often personified as the radiations of the rising sun. Wat Arun is among the best known of Thailand's landmarks and the first light of the morning reflects off the surface of the temple with pearly iridescence."
After visiting Wat Arun and meditating in a nearby temple, we took the ferry back across the river to go see Wat Pho, which is another Theravadan Buddhist temple. This one has a massive buddha statue that is 15 meters tall and 43 meters long. It was quite impressive.
Chinatown was our next adventure. If you've ever seen the movie Inception, Chinatown is similar to that movie. It's a foreign country within a foreign country. We were totally and utterly lost in translation. Not only that, but we were also literally lost. We ended up finding a 711 and finally bought a map of Bangkok so we could get around. Utilizing the handy-dandy compass (which my brother-in-law Bryan kindly lent to me as a sort of amulet) combined with the map, we finally figure out our location and made our way to the train station to purchase tickets to Chiang Mai. We had heard the the train to Chiang Mai sells out quick so we wanted to make sure we got that done. The tickets were expensive (relatively), about 800 baht per person ($25 USD). We leave on Tuesday to head north towards Chiang Mai.
I fell asleep around 9:00 pm with a feeling of excitement for all the things I saw and experienced, and a feeling of hope that the days to follow would be life-changing.
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