Bangkok Day 2 - Floating Market, Temples, Thai Boxing

Lung Kamol picked me up at about 8am for our day trip. After dropping me off the night before, he went and did some research at market and made suggestions for what I should do. We set off on our journey first to a floating market outside the city, about an hour and a half away. At first look when we got to the canal, it was no more than 6 ft wide, and the boats were about 4 ft wide, with a little 4 cylinder engine on the back of the boats. Rat would be my driver for the afternoon. While we were idling, I asked him about how long he had been doing this, and he said he had lived on the market his whole life, but started driving recently. We even stopped by his mom’s home/shop (well played, to my brother/sisters, this is where you get your first surprise from when I get back.) We then set off down the canal to the market. Vendors in these same boats, many without engines selling everything from food (pad thai, thai chicken, wontons, duck salad, etc but I went with fresh mangos with sticky sweet rice and fresh bananas and a couple beers) to pictures with Snakes, Lemurs, monkeys, and of course gift items. And that’s where I got pics with a Pygmy Slow Lorris. For those of you who will research it eventually, yes they are poisonous, but not too very harmful to humans. But these were really friendly. And I had faith in the handlers.

After the boat took me back, Kamol had bought me different foods to try and a fresh coconut as well. Reminded me of the Dominican coconuts though, they aren’t brown and furry, but green and look like cantaloupes almost. We then set off to a few temples on the way back, where Kamol had gotten in touch with a monk from a large Buddhist Monastery, who spoke very good English, and let me learn about Buddhism and the life of a monk. This was definitely a highlight. Then monk was very open to questions and even walked me through a temple and explained various statues, what they worship, and who Buddha was. Really fascinating stuff that I would be more than happy to share, but I don’t want to bore anyone to tears here. I will say that this gave me immense appreciation for how to act, what to look for, and what to do inside the temples as I visit them from here on out.

The last stop was at a resort, Kamol wanted to take me to a Thai culture show and a boxing match. Pretty neat to watch. Boxers are small and quick and aren’t limited to use of hands. Mix MMA with boxing gloves, but no pinning or fighting on the ground. First encounter with elephants here too, but didn’t spend too much time on that as I knew I’d get a full day later this week.