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Just another Jess in Japan

~ An ALT in Fujioka, Gunma-ken

Just another Jess in Japan

Category Archives: Thailand

Bangkok and Back

17 Thursday Jun 2010

Posted by Jess in Greater Tokyo Area, Gunma-ken, Thailand

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bangkok, food, shopping

Finally, the LAST post of the trip… a month late! Well, at least I finished, right?

Anyway, Bangkok I think was my favorite part of the trip, solidifying a fact that I already knew… I am a city girl at heart. Bangkok is a really fun and interesting city, and I hope I get the chance to go back and see more of it, as well as the rest of Thailand, one day!

Anyway, we flew in from Phnom Penh and grabbed a taxi for a pretty long ride to our hotel. We decided for the end of the trip to stay at what is actually managed apartments, and it was a really great place to stay. The first night we just walked around the area, and then grabbed dinner at a Japanese restaurant in Patpong. This area happens to also be the overpriced tourist area, which was really rather uncomfortable with all the propositions for “shows”. We probably should have brought a guidebook of the area, because then we would have known, but oh well!


Room and view


Streets and flowers


Patpong

Those flowers smelled divine; in the jasmine family I think they were!

The next day was a walking tour of chinatown. We tried to follow the tour laid out in the guidebook but gave up; the streets were confusing, we got lost, and it was hot. So we just saw a few things and then went back to cool off!


Solid gold Buddha at the first temple we went to


Around Chinatown


Pretty chinese style umbrella to keep the sun off. I bargained for it, but not hard enough lol


Narrow streets

After relaxing in the evening we took off to explore the area around the hotel. Kenji got a few shirts tailored for him, we grabbed ice cream and sandwiches, watched the sunset, then took off for another area we heard was good for shopping. Said shopping center just so happened to be… right in the area the protests were going on. Actually, we got a bit turned about getting out of the skytrain station and managed to walk right into the camp. We skirted around, asked a few people to point us toward the shopping area we wanted to get to, and eventually got there right before they closed. We still managed to get shopping done, and everything seemed to turn out just fine!

Actually, the shopping was pretty amazing! We both had a lot of fun and got a lot of things!


Mmmm, ice cream!


Temple shaped like a boat


Sunset


And shopping outside the complex!

Next day was our second walking tour, which also didn’t turn out as planned. The heat was just really oppressive, so we just skipped a few temples. We did see the palace though, which was pretty amazing if only for the sheer amount of bling on it!


Murals and guardians


Everything seemed covered in mirrors and jewels


Shiny!


Okay, I took a LOT of shiny pictures… just lemme get through them!


The first pic is a scale model of Angkor Wat for some odd reason…


One last set


The temple for the spirit of the city, right outside the palace


After walking around for a long time, we decided to head back, but I at least wanted a picture of Wat Arun across the water.

We rested, then decided to go back to the shopping area of the previous day. Some of Kenji’s shirts didn’t fit, so we were going to see if we could exchange sizes. On the way we stopped in at A&W (yay!)


Yay!


The red shirt’s camp near the shopping center


This place is awesome for shopping!


I got a watch, among other things!

Our plane was SUPER early the next morning, so we called it a night and got ready to go. The plane ride home was pretty uneventful, and we got to Japan just fine, found a bus, and headed back to Gunma. On the way we were pleased to see wisteria blooming, which means we hadn’t missed them in Fujioka!


Cool green with bits of purple

And that’s it! Now I can go back to posting the normal stuff, including soon pictures of the house I will be moving to by the end of the month!

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Thailand and Cambodia: The Beginning

26 Wednesday May 2010

Posted by Jess in Cambodia, Thailand

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Tags

angkor temples, bangkok, siem reap, traveling

I am finally getting into gear and posting these! Took me awhile, huh?

We left Japan on April 24th for Thailand pretty late in the day, taking the bus at around 1pm. Our flight left around six, and it was about a six hour flight to Bangkok. Since we were getting in very late at night, and would be leaving for Siem Reap, Cambodia the next day, we booked a hotel close to the airport for the night and didn’t bother with Bangkok at that time.


Our plane in the sunset


Kenji and the two sake bottles for the flight we bought before leaving


Our basic hotel room


Three types of money! We would have collected 4 different currencies by the end: yen, of course, dollars and riel for Cambodia, and baht for Thailand.


View in the morning


Statue in the airport in Thailand

We woke up and went for our free breakfast, checked out, and got back to the airport. The flight to Siem Reap is quick, but very expensive due to a monopoly by Bangkok Airways. But the money was worth not having to deal with 6 hours on a bus, and the numerous border scams that we would have run into.

We were picked up at the airport by a car and dropped off at our hotel called the Hanuman Alaya. I was really happy with this hotel, it was gorgeous, the pool was great, and the food as well. We checked in, grabbed some food from the restaurant and relaxed by the pool for a bit, then got ready to get our tickets for the temples.

There is a deal where if you buy your ticket for the next day, you can go ahead in to see the sunset. So we grabbed 3 day passes, and then our tuktuk driver drove us out to Phnom Bakheng, which is considered THE site for sunsets. I actually wasn’t really impressed, and there were a ton of people. We elected to call it a day and go back down the trail before it got dark enough to be dangerous, and went back to the hotel for dinner.


Siem Reap airport


Our hotel’s pool as seen from the restaurant/2nd story


Yum


Bedroom and inside the hotel’s lobby


Relaxing by the pool


Tuktuk driver and getting our ticket


Up the path and the very steep steps of Phnom Bakheng


Sunset, Angkor Wat can be seen from the middle picture


Kenji and monks


Elephants on the way down

So that was our first two days. The next few days were dedicated to the temples.

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