Bangkok, Thailand (2)
- Julie-Anne Justus
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
Updated: 7 hours ago
One member of our travelling party (not me) is a keen market-goer so today it's train market and floating market day! Okay, I have to admit, they're fun destinations.
We start at Ban Laem Railway Station, about 80 km south of Bangkok, in a little village where even the dogs take it easy.
We travel about an hour by train to the Mae Klong Railway Market. The market stalls are laid out next to the rail lines. When a train enters the market, stall-holders have to pack up their goods to make space ... and then, after the train leaves, they set out their goods again. We saw this spectacle from both inside and outside the train. (It reminded us of Train Street, Hanoi, but the Mae Klong interaction with moving rolling stock is much more intense.)
First, the view from inside the train as we pulled into Mae Klong station. I had to elbow a selfie-taker (my travel nemesis) from the window to get these.
Once we were out of the train, and the stallholders had unpacked their wares again, we wandered through the market. It's all very close to the rails! While there were hundreds of foreign tourists, like us, and stalls selling tourist stuff, the market is also a genuine local market where locals buy their daily produce.
Ken took refuge in an air-conditioned cafe.
Of course, what comes in has to go out. After about 20 minutes, the whistle blows and the stallholders pack up everything again. Nok, our tour guide for the day, instructs us to move behind the red line (completely obscured in places) and stand still. Now it's our turn to watch the train go out of the station.
It's a strange experience. I felt claustrophobic when the train was in front of me, but knew I had to stand still and not panic and scream and run away. Not that I could have, anyway. Two trains come in to the station during the market day, at 11 am and 2.30 pm. So the stallholders are packing and unpacking six times a day.
A drive to the pier, where Nok* referred to the four of us respectfully as 'the elderlies' (I love it) so we have adopted this as our team travel name.
It's a long-tail boat trip from the pier through the water villages ...
... to Damneon Saduak Floating Market, where vendors are either on the side of the canal or in boats. Early in the morning and on weekends, vendors bring fresh produce in boats, but during the week — when we were here — it's mainly arts and crafts for tourists.
We tried some coconut pancakes, a specialty of the region. I asked the pancake lady to look at me for the photo, but her mask obliterated her face.
Ken and I were keen to revisit Jim Thompson's house. The house is still beautifully preserved, but in the 30 years since we last saw it, an art gallery, a textile museum and a restaurant have been added to the precinct. I highly recommend this when you're next in Bangkok.
Jim Thompson was an American who came to Thailand during WW2 as a member of the OSS, where he fell in love with the country. In the late 1940s, no longer in the military, he established a silk company and collected Southeast Asian art. His house was constructed from six traditional Thai-style houses, made of wood, and various old Thai structures that were collected from all parts of Thailand in the 1950s and 1960s. The house is now a museum of historical Buddhist statues, traditional Thai paintings and art from Burma, Cambodia and Laos.
Jim Thompson went on holiday in Malaysia in 1967, wandered off into the jungle, and mysteriously disappeared. His body has never been discovered. (Theories include dirty OSS secrets coming home to roost, but no one knows for sure. He probably just fell down a ravine in the jungle.)
The spirit house is in the garden. Every (or almost every) Thai house has a spirit house, which is built to honour the spirits of the previous residents of that land. Offerings are made daily to keep the spirits happy — unhappy spirits make bad housemates. Then there's the mouse house. This was a child's toy, like a doll house, designed to entertain children as they watched pet mice running around the passages. Like an early TV, the guide suggested.
Thompson's Thai silk business flourished internationally in the 1960s, and Thai silk fabrics were used in (big Hollywood movies) The King and I and Ben Hur, which created even more interest. The textile museum has a wonderful display of Thai silk fabrics if you're interested.
Some cold drinks in the the courtyard with dogs and children.
A couple of drinks at one of Bangkok's famous sky bars, the Red Sky Bar (this one on the 56th floor), to round off The Elderlies' adventure.
Next: Ayutthaya
*I realised I didn't have a photo of the lovely Nok so I asked her to send me one.
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