Chris Visits Khao San Road

Saturday evening saw Nuch and I meet up with an old workmate from Reckitt Benckiser in Hull. Chris Cordall was in Bangkok as a prologue to his tour of Laos and Cambodia. He was staying at the Prince Palace Hotel in the old quarter of the city. We decided to visit a restaurant down one of the biggest tourist traps in Bangkok, “Khao San Road”. This is a part of town that is inhabited by the backpacker fraternity, not a part of town I usually frequent.
The Backpackers, despite their attempts to fit in with the local community and being cool are only just tolerated by the locals. The main reason is they don’t spend enough money in the economy, they want £5 a night rooms, they want 15p meals they want £1 T-shirts, all this they get but they also get all the crap. Shitholes to live in, crap to eat and cheap rags to wear. The locals would rather be making more money on quality gear with tourists who aren’t afraid to spend.
Khao San Road is about 400M long and up and down it is packed with shops and stalls selling everything from silver through to fake degrees from Warwick University, it is packed with young kids on their year out doing the Asia thing. It’s a traffic free zone at night, and in all fairness it’s worth a look, but you’ll soon be anchoring after your four star in the better part of town. There are a few things to look out for, if you want drugs in Bangkok, this is the place to get them! All the stories you hear about people being caught with drugs in Thailand are true, avoid them like the clap. Even if you’re in a room with someone smoking, leave the room and leave the building. The Thai Police take a dim view of westerners doing drugs. Pick pockets are rife, so always take the usual precautions and lastly don’t buy anything; the crap that is sold on Khao San Road is available in most other parts of Bangkok at cheaper prices.
Some of the Restaurants are very nice, and one called “Tom Yam Kung” the three of us visited, it was very busy, but we managed to get a table. We started with Tom Yam Kung, which is a very spicy soup with whole prawns, mushrooms and vegetables, very nice, we also had Green Beef Curry a bowl of something with eggs and crab in it, again very nice. Wash this down with three or more San Miguel’s and you have a good night.
After a couple of hours and a few tales from Reckitts we put Chris into a taxi bound for his Hotel. It was good to see him and I hope he as a great tour of Indo China.