A university day

When I leave my house to start my trip to the university I first off take a moto taxi. As Bangkok is always crowded with traffic the moto-taxis are the perfect way to squeeze in between a bus and truck, take the pedestrian walkway as a short cut and hopefully make it on time to the next appointment.

I jump on one of the orange jacketed men’s (only once a woman was driving me) bikes, usually a worn down Scooter, 125 or 250cc and we cruise 10-15minutes through heavy traffic. This is costing me around 40-60 Baht (1,00-1,50€), depending on the distance.

I get off at the rather dirty “Klong Tan” train station where I’ll get my ticket for the 30 minute train ride.

 Locals don’t have to pay for short distances (inner city) and I am charged a ridiculously low 4 Baht (equal to 10 cents); explaining the low maintenance and generally rather poor standard of the trains.

The tain is generally about 10 minutes late, but calculating this in, almost always on time. During peak hours the train can be quite packed, but me and my classmate Johanna generally find a spot to sit down when we head for our weekend classes.

In the train you can buy fruit, sausages and even a whole meal of rice and meat from passing vendors.

Each Wednesday we meet a fellow passenger who took it upon himself to become our personal Thai teacher during travelling time. He used to work for Thai airlines at the Suvarnabhumi airport, which explains his good English skills and his eagerness to be around foreigners.





 

     

After passing through rather shantytown areas, squatter settlements that arise around the rail tracks, we get to our destination “Phra Chom Klao”, right next to KMITL, Techno Ladkrabang.

The yoghurt strawberry fruit smoothie at our favourite wooden coffee shop is delicious. 

Thai university students like to play cards during their free time. They might seem like high school students, but at age 17 they start studying at Bachelor level and Thais generally have a younger appearance.

During Thai language class

The International College, where we take our courses, is a newly erected 8 floor building. In “our” room on the 8th floor, generally reserved for the 5 MBA IMRE students that we are, the chairs still carry the brand tags, as no official inauguration for thanking the donor has taken place yet. Our classes range from Waste Management, Biological Treatment Methods to Case Studies, where we have local experts visiting to give lectures on either their company going green or their field of expertise. The most interesting guest speaker so far was Gregor Wessels who talked about sustainable land use planning with the help of GIS and showed case studies of Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City and Jakarta. Further on he gave insight knowledge of the construction plans of the new MRT line (please read a later entry for more regarding those plans). In between weekend classes we head for a lunch on campus. In front of one of the cafeterias a huge lizard is living and walking around freely. He is fed by the cafeteria staff and apparently not dangerous although sized and looking similar to a crocodile. Each of the cafeterias consists of many little food stalls thus offering a broad selection of foods. My favourite eatery is the Isaan stall that prepares “khao soy”, a northern style spicy curry soup, which is served with chicken and crispy egg noodles (picture follows later). I have not seen it anywhere else in the city yet but am on the hunt. Only fellow classmate Joseph from Ghana chose to live on campus and uses some of the sports facilities and the library in his free time. The rest of us generally head home after class. On the way back I again take the train, pass the Klong (dirty city canal) by walking and change into the red bus on Thong Lo. During the day this street is too crowded to calculate travelling times with public transport but on my way home I love to use the tiny quirky old steel model of a bus. Depending upon date and time I go out for dinner, drinks or any other activity.

Nights out in Bangkok

I tend to forget my Camera when heading out but here are a few shots...

Khaosan Road whith Eva and Maria (friends from back in the day travel to Australia)

Mr Thailand in love with Jessie

Maria goes street hawker

Altitude Rooftop party with Rike and Franzi (friends from school times)

pictures by Altitude

  

New Years eve with my study buddies Vimukhi and Johanna

Night out at RCA´s LED club

random people posing

"I don´t know if I want to remember this night..."

Endless shopping at Chatuckak

One of my favourite weekend activities in Bangkok is a trip to the Chatuchak weekend market. The largest market in Thailand consists of more than 8,000 stalls and loads of flying vendors in between. On first sight it seems as there is no order and you feel lost between the vast offer but once you settle you take note of the varying sections. On Saturdays and Sundays there are estimated to be about 200,000 visitors shopping around, mainly Thais but also lots of tourists. You can get everything that your heart pleases from clothing, Thai handicrafts, furniture to living snakes. It is a lot of fun to squeeze in the mass of people and look for the best bargain, buying random little things along the way just because in that moment you feel like you can´t live without it.
The one section I try to get around is the one with live animals. There is said to be some trafficking of endangered species. Moreover I find it disturbing to see hundreds of cute puppies and other young´ns sold to the crowd. They are barely alive and already sweating away in the heat between the thousands of hands that touch them. During one of my first visits I also came past a cockfight. To bet on the birds who often fight to the death, sometimes with razors fixed to the wings, is a bloody tradition in Thailand. If the losing fighting cock didn’t die he´ll end up in the cooking pot, as the meat is high in protein and thought to be stimulating. Usually more popular in rural Thailand I was surprised to see it openly practiced on the market, as there have been many campaigns to clean up the sport.
Anyways, in general its fantastic to fight your way through the crowd, hang out at the refreshingly laid-back artist section, get something to eat at the cramped food court, buy the perfect shirt in the vast vintage area with loads of local designers or just get some coffee in the little stands along the way. At the end of a long shopping day there is also a nice spot to hang out where changing DJ´s put up some good house and electro tunes, just before one heads home with filled bags, hurting feet and a satisfied smile.

walking dresses

 

this should´t become in-style

still continuing his revolution?

Liv´in

By now I have been living in Bangkok for 3 month and finally I am getting this Blog started. I wrote some texts a while ago but never managed to get them up on the net. During the next few weeks I hope to put up the pictures of the trips from November to January and also show you a bit more of my current living environment.
I feel like I am part of this city by now, surrounded by local customs, savouring all food delicacy of the street around the corner and in the many diverse eateries. I am enjoying the days and nights as they pass. Bangkok is a hectic sprawling noisy mega city where the developing world and global modernity clash. Every day surprises me with some random sight and I hope I can share some of my impressions with you.

sunset over Wat Arun

 amazing Koh Chang

Bangkok by night (picture from Altitude)

perfect beaches in Souther Thailand

Workout at Sathorn Unique - Abandoned Tower

Although I should have been studying on the 31st of January after I already had the weekend off, I joined a group of fellow Bangkogians and Couchsurfers for a journey to an abandoned tower. The “Sathorn Unique” was being built in the mid nineties, when the Thai economy was booming, destined to become one of the city’s fanciest residential skyscrapers (49 planned storeys with 659 residential units). When the Asian Financial Crisis hit the country in 1997 the developers had to leave the project, which was close to completion. The building was already up to the top, with installed wooden floors, two escalators and bathtubs. It is located right near the Chao Praya river and would have been luxury living due to the views and proximity to the city centre. But as of now it remains one of the “haunted ghost towers” in Bangkok (all old buildings are feared by the Thais as apparently ghosts occupy them). To get in we had to bribe a local smelling of whisky who then opened a few door inside the building for us. Nowadays almost all the valuables have been taken as especially the copper paid off on the market, but apparently a group is still protecting the building to claim the material. During our hike up we could see nature gaining back ground as trees began to grow at the lighter parts of the monolith. The 49th level wasn’t completed yet and we had to climb on steel to get to the more concrete area. Looking over Bangkok paid off for the sweaty climb up but then I finally grasped the danger of the site. On the way up I kind of ignored the darkness, unsealed shafts, and unstable parts but the height made me realise that there would be no chance of survival. This is not the only building which was left unfinished due to debt problems in this city but today the Thai economy has recovered and one can marvel at the many new polished skyscrapers around town. More about high rise Bangkok another time. Here go the pictures (most of them from Aaron Neilson-Belman):

(supposedly me)