SE Asia Chronicles – Bangkok, Thailand
Day 2: Eating strange things…and seeing even stranger things

The morning was productive and touristy. Our friends Kaitlin and Nate met up with us and we all went to a travel agency to book our trains/boats/buses for the next part of our trip. Then we decided to take a little tour of the grand palace. Or so we thought. We thought wrong.

At the palace, we again saw hundreds of Asians dressed in black again (luckily we were in darker colors this time) waiting to get into the palace. They were going in to pay respects to the royal family. It ended up being too much of a hassle for us to find the entrance for foreigners, so we decided to walk down to another temple, Wat Pho, instead. We asked a police officer for directions, and suddenly we were surrounded by half a dozen officers, discussing the map and taking photos of us (mainly of Kaitlin’s red hair.) Two of the officers said they would walk us to the Wat Pho. What for? (See what I did there? Yay puns) We already figured out where it was on the map, but they insisted on walking with us.

Half way through the walk, they stopped to take a picture with us. Typically it’s drunk tourists that insist on getting their photo taken with police officers, but this time was reversed. It was the officers who wanted the photo….on their phones. Again, I’m not sure if it was to make fun of us later, or to admire us.

One of the officers even asked to add me on Facebook. I am so confused at what is happening…

We made it to the Wat Pho temple, toured around, snapped some pics, and headed back to Khaosan Road to shop and eat. Eat what, you might ask? Pad Thai, yes. But also scorpions, frogs and crickets, oh my! Let me rate them on a scale of 1-10 because I know you’re curious:

Cricket comes in last with a 4. Too small, too weird.
 Frog comes in second with a solid 6.5. It was actually kinda good.
 Scorpion takes the cake with a 7. Yeah, it got a C. I'd eat one again.

After eating strange things, we went to the hostel to nap. So anti-climatic, I know. But the night gets better, I swear.

Seeing even stranger things: The ping pong show

We started the night with a much needed trip to the bar. Obviously. We got buckets of alcohol and played Jenga. Eventually, about 15 people from the other hostel joined our group for the night of shenanigans.

Yay friends!

We decided since YOTO (you only Thailand once) we were due to see a ping pong show. Sounds innocent enough, right? …..

We all crammed into tuk tuks and sped off to the red light district to see the show. The tuk tuk race was one of the highlights of my trip thus far. Yes, I know I’m only on day 2. Once we got to the district, we mobbed into the first ping pong show we encountered: Super Pussy. Such a classy name for such a classy establishment. We agreed to pay 200baht each (approx $6) for entrance and a beer. The ladies tried to badger us into paying more once we were inside (we were prepared for this) but luckily Emma stood her ground and spoke for the group and the lady eventually left us alone. However, they periodically came by to ask for “tips.” Normally, I would tip for a service. But I was not impressed with what I saw.

Ping Pong show revealed
SENSOR: This part contains graphic information.

If you aren’t sure what a ping pong show is, let me give you a run down: A group of less-than-ideal-looking women shoot things out of their lady parts. Sounds lovely, I know. During our show, we saw an old Asian woman pull about 20 ft of green tape out of her parts, a younger woman shoot out darts to pop balloons, a woman smoke a cigarette out of her downstairs, and a woman using a marker in her vajay to write “Welcome to Bangkok.” All the while, mediocre-looking women swayed slightly next to poles in the background.

This is not what I signed up for.

I guess I thought it would be more impressive, but I was just grossed out the while time. It was like a car accident…horrific, but you can’t look away. You live and you learn, I guess. After the show, we tuk tuked back to Khaosan Road and continued to drink and hangout with our new friends. We didn’t go to sleep this night.

PS. This has nothing to do with this part of the story, but Lady Boys are everywhere in Bangkok. You will read about them in future posts.