Hello!
Today was absolutely exhausting, but oh so amazing. We had breakfast at the hotel which was really good and then set off for the day about 8.30. You know those protesters many of you told me to avoid? Today they decided to start their marching directly out the front of our hotel. We could see them from our window! But we went out and they were actually quite peaceful, playing music, waving flags and blowing whistles. It was completely fine, we even took some photos of us with them in the background.
So off we went. The first thing we noticed is that being two Caucasian girls by ourselves makes us stick out like sore thumbs. Everyone wants to help us, whether it be driving us around, showing us where something is or selling us something. All for a price of course!!! Reminds me a lot of the Grand Bizaar Mum, but not quite as nuts. We have quickly become adept at smiling, nodding and walking off!
Our first stop for the day was Wat Traimit. What is a Wat you may ask? It's a temple, or a sacred place. So this temple had the famous golden Buddha, a 5.5 solid gold statue that holds the Guinness world record for being the most expensive and heaviest statue of its kind (worth £37 million!!!). It's located in the heart of Chinatown. So we also had a look at the museum about Chinatown, learning about the history of the area. We then also looked at the museum about the transportation of the Buddha and the discovery that it was gold (when it was found, it was covered in plaster but after being dropped this chipped and they discovered the good underneath!). But the main draw was the Buddha which is very impressive! I was very concerned about the workmen in the room though who were assembling some scaffolding and had no harnesses, helmets or anything. There are certainly no OH&S regulations in Thailand!!!
We then got a bit lost trying to find our way toward the biggest tourist attraction here - The Grand Palace. But after much map reading, wandering around and directions from three people (who - you guessed it - then tried to drive us or sell us something!) we found our way to the tourist ferry port and caught the blue ferry to stop 9 and went to the grand palace. Here we again ran into protesters but they were fine!!! We bought a delicious pomegranate juice and I bought a sarong (now I have two to wear over my shorts in temples). We spent a great few hours in the grand palace complex. This place is about 2.5 square kilometres - massive! The royal family of Thailand used to reside here but now it holds many museums and is open as a tourist attraction. We aren't sure where the current Rama (king) lives though, we didn't read that anywhere. We went to the weapons museum and went and saw the Emerald Buddha (ironically made of jade) in the Wat Phra Kaew. Finally we went to a textiles museum describing how the current Queen revolutionised the world's image of Thai fashion in the 1960s.
Next we walked to Wat Pho which is famous for the Reclining Buddha, a 46m long Buddha lying down. Here one of the guards queried the scarf I was wearing over my shorts. Not sure what his problem was though, it covers my legs!!! It was here I started to get really hot and exhausted. The sun was definitely at its strongest, but other than that the weather was just comfy most of the day. Hot but not unbearable (unlike Melbourne which I hear is awful at the moment!!). We each bought a piece of artwork and successfully haggled to about 20% of the originally quoted price.
From here we somehow found out which ferry to get to our next and final Wat. There is no signage and no direction here, it's all chaos. For such a huge tourist city the public transport is very confusing and quite limited in the tourist areas (no metro). But nevertheless we made our way to Wat Arun where we climbed very VERY steep steps to the top for a great view. We were so tired but we did it!! We also signed our names on the banner up the top. I wrote "Go pies" alongside mine of course ;) Whilst waiting for the ferry Laura made friends with some local kids who were dancing to some music. They loved her and laughed at her silly dancing!!
We headed back to the hotel and had a bit of a rest, then went and had street food out the front of our hotel where a lady was making what I can only describe as a mixture between a crepe and an omelette. It was made of dough and then egg added later, then we had banana, condensed milk and chocolate sauce on it. Laura went back for seconds!!
Now we are watching BBC world news (thought I'd put that bit in for you mum). It has now hit me even more that I'm on an overseas adventure because mum and I always watch it in Europe!!! We are thinking of all at home affected by the heat, there's been a huge segment about how hot it is and all the ramifications especially people fainting at the Aussie Open and fires.
We will definitely sleep well tonight! Tmro isn't going to be as crazy.
Love
Claire and Laura
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