On my first visit to Bangkok, I was so overwhelmed. Everything was simultaneously so new and so different. It was the first stop in my journey and I just landed from an 11 hour flight. I remember, landed in the afternoon and it was very sunny, so I grabbed my camera to explore this strange new city – very quickly realising that my hotel was not in a very touristy area. In fact, I didn’t see any Farangs (Thai for ‘foreigner’) near my hotel at all.
I only had two days in Bangkok before I left for Koh Samui, so I tried making the most out of my short stay. I tend to dislike the usual tourist-appropriate activities; I like to walk around and discover a new place.
Having no real expectations about Bangkok, I found myself wandering around, searching for food, eating fruits from stalls at the street, hoping I won’t I get robbed in small soi’s, not understanding any signs, menus or people and sweating a lot because of the heat.
On the second day, after a good night’s sleep, I really started enjoying Bangkok. It felt like an adventure! It was and adventure: I was alone in a giant city, not knowing a single soul, and I did not speak the language.
Figuring out where one should go in such a huge city is not easy, so I stuck mostly to different stops on the BTS Sukhumvit line, one of the public transport systems. I got off the train, randomly, when I liked what I saw. No goal, just exploration.
So consider these pictures my first bumbling, naive glimpse of nomad life and Bangkok, too. I would return many times throughout in 2016, more wiser, less overwhelmed and without jet lag. But that’s another story.
