Bangkok Day 1: Chatuchak and T&K Seafood

This is a super late post since my trip to Bangkok was in June this year ^.^ We'd managed to book return tickets in August last year for only RM130, not including baggage though. Luckily, we'd managed to get an early morning flight, arriving at 9.30 Bangkok time. Earlier arrival means more time to shop, hehe =p

We'd already made reservations for a hotel during the MATTA fair earlier this year, which was the P2 Boutique Hotel (http://www.p2hotel.com/). It only cost us approximately THB1400 per room per night for a room, which was on a twin-sharing basis. So the total only came up to about THB2100 per person for our three night stay, which was really quite cheap.

Anyway, the great thing was that there was an airport transfer included, so we didn't have any problems getting to the hotel. After checking in and leaving our luggage in the rooms, we headed on to our first destination =)

First stop, Chatuchak market!! This is a huge outdoor market which is only open on weekends. Too bad for us, we arrived there on a Sunday, so we only had half a day to spend here. For convenience, we chose to take a taxi directly there and the cost was really cheap too! It only cost us THB100 in total to get there, which we further divided between the four of us who shared the taxi.





Chatuchak



The crowds here were enormous and it was really stifling hot. We'd originally planned to get lunch here before starting our shopping but in the end, decided to split up and just snack on some of the food there. We got so excited shopping that we didn't end up eating much anyway.



There was one item which I didn't manage to get a photo of though, cause it was finished in a matter of seconds -.- It consisted of a piece of sausage wrapped by a piece of bacon, and then fried. This was covered in oil, but it was sooo good. Thinking of it is making me salivate again, hehe =p



1. Don't know what this is but looks cute ^.^   2. Roast pork  
3. Stall selling fried snacks   4. Coconut ice cream

Shopping at Chatuchak is really cheaper as compared to Platinum Mall. I managed to get dresses and skirts for THB150, as well as small bags from as low as THB100. After half a day, I don't think we had even seen a quarter of the whole area yet. Really wish we had more time to spend here. Obviously it would be more comfortable shopping at Platinum since there is air-conditioning, but I guess there are pros and cons to both? It all depends on individual preference I guess.

Anyway, we took a taxi to Chinatown for dinner at T&K Seafood at around 6 in the evening. This place was recommended a lot online so we decided to come and try for ourselves. Quite easy to recognise the place as all the waiters were dressed in green shirts. Apparently, there's another restaurant just opposite where all the waiters are dressed in red shirts.

We were lucky to have arrived slightly earlier and managed to find seats and make our orders before the dinner crowd got there. By the time we left, there were people waiting by the roadside for seats.

We ordered a variety of dishes to share, such as the tom yam, fried squid, or chien, glass noodles salad, stir fried vegetables and fried rice. My favourites for the day were definitely the fried squid as well as the glass noodles salad ^.^

Can't really remember the total cost of everything but on average each of us paid about THB200 for the meal, which was quite worth it considering the amount of food we ordered.



1. Roadside stall   2. Bird's nest   3. Shark's fin soup

Another recommended food item was this stall directly opposite T&K seafood which sells shark's fin soup and birds nest. Even though we were already stuffed from dinner, we couldn't resist going over to try this. It's quite cheap though, one bowl of birds nest above cost us about THB200, while the big claypot of the sharks fin soup cost us THB500.

Before heading back to our hotel, we went on to this store which sells a variety of pork related snacks, such as pork floss, fried pork skin, etc. The shop was full of tourists and it took us a while to choose everything we wanted to bring back as souvenirs. It's located along the same row of shops where the stall selling the sharks fin soup is so quite convenient to get some souvenirs there after dinner. Can't seem to remember the name of the shop though, but I think the logo has the symbol of a pig?

Anyway, that's all for the first day! Coming up next is Day 2 ^.^