Day 2 in Thailand was a
tourist’s dream. Our first day there we saw a girl in our hostel wearing these
awesome flowy Thailand-y pants, and we had to get some. The markets in Thailand
were better than any markets I’ve seen in Hong Kong so far, and we bought
multiple pair, among other things. All of us girls wore our pants on our tour
the next day and looked absolutely ridiculous with our pants, tennis shoes,
cameras, and “I Heart Bangkok” tank tops. It was a great day.
Our tour guide picked us
up from the hostel and our friend Matt was going to sit passenger. He walked
over to the driver’s side (regularly the passenger’s side in America) and sat
down. It took him a second to realize he was in the wrong seat, and our tour
guide almost died of laughter.
The driving here in Thailand is much
more civilized than in China. Pedestrians actually have the right of way, people
actually use blinkers, drivers are much nicer, and I hardly heard anyone
honking. It was a nice change. Lots of people drive little mopeds and the
ladies ride sidesaddle. It’s quite impressive!
Our tour consisted of
floating markets, a magic show, elephant show, crocodile show, and ended with
elephant riding! The floating markets were awesome! All 8 of us got a covered,
wooden, canoe-like boat with a driver and he drove us around the river past floating markets and trinkets galore. The vendors have these hooks on sticks
and the aggressive ones just pull you in, whether you wanted to look there or
not. It was such a cool experience.
The magic show was
really weird and not really even worth writing about. There was the magician
and his assistant, who never cracked a smile and walked very slowly and
dramatically. It was more of a comedy show, really.
The elephant show was
awesome! The people who work at the park reenacted a lot of history that Asian
and African elephants actually went through. Then the elephants danced and
played soccer. We couldn’t stop laughing.
Next we saw the
crocodile show, where these two guys stuck their hands, and HEADS, in
crocodiles’ mouths. It was insane! They almost like hypnotized the crocodiles
with pressure points and their mouths would stay open. Still, I would never….
And then for the grand finale, and obviously our favorite
part, the elephant riding. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed as hard as I did on
the back of that elephant with Melanie. Our “driver” of the elephant turned
around to make sure we were ok because we could hardly breathe. He didn’t
understand English very well and probably thought we were extremely weird. He
was laughing a lot too, though; I think we’ll be his most memorable ride ;) He
was really funny and we enjoyed him, until he got super sketchy at the end of
the ride. He kept saying “tip-tip” and it took us forever to realize he wanted
us to tip him “and the elephant.” He stopped the elephant while we were still
hidden in all the plants and trees until we paid him, so I’m pretty sure they’re
not supposed to ask for money. It was so awkward, but we just paid him off anyway.
Just that whole experience… I’ll never forget it!
That night we went out to Royal City Avenue and spent the
whole night just at this one club, Route 66. It was huge! And it was like a
light show in itself. The Thai people loved us, and there were a ton of foreigners.
We met a couple people from England and danced the night away. I’m gonna go
ahead and add Thailand to my list of favorite countries. It was such an
incredible weekend, there are no words….
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