Thailand
Having visited Bangkok, Thailand many times, I try to make it a point to visit somewhere new every time I'm there.
Within Bangkok, there's Bangna, Wong Wian Yai, Pinklao, Srinagarindra Road, Pak Nam Market, Chaengwattana. These are places that most tourists won't go as they are outside the main tourist spots and are inconvenient and time consuming to travel to.
Mae Khlong Railway Market, Amphawa floating market, Ayutthaya, Kanchanaburi and Sukhothai can be reached or planned as a day trip or overnight trip.
When I plan for such trips, I will usually do some research on the place. What transports available, how to get there, where to alight, how much the fare, what to see there, anything to beware of (scams, etc), what are famous there and most importantly, how to get back.
I try to make sure that important information are covered. While I tend to overdo the research, I rarely have an itinerary and just explore the place when I get there. Most of the times, I don't even look at the maps or guide book.
During one of my trip, I decided to visit Klong Suan 100 Year Old Market.
I went to the Ekkamai Bus Terminal as advised and bought tickets. It turned out that the mode of transport is a minivan instead of bus as advised online. Perhaps there's not many people taking this route.
Klong Suan Market is along the way to Chacheongsao Province, which is located south-east of Bangkok.
As usual, I made sure we boarded the correct bus by checking with the driver on my destination.
Onboard the same van were two Japanese ladies who were visiting Chacheongsao.
We chatted a bit and I shared some information on interesting places within Bangkok they could visit.
Along the way, the van stopped at a few waiting area with benches to pick up passengers. A few passengers also got off at other parts by informing the driver where to stop.
As I was enjoying the scenery, the van stopped and the driver turned and spoke something in Thai.
Before I realized it, we've reached our destination.
He was telling us to alight.
We got off and saw a pillar with Thai words inscribed on it. We couldn't understand what was written except to confirm we've reached our destination when we saw what looked like the number 100.
We followed the path that led us to the market.
On approaching the market, there was a big parking area.
The entrance to the market is just an opening which could easily be missed if you do not look properly.
We had an enjoyable time exploring the place, buying some food and had our lunch before deciding to leave.
We walked out of the lane back to the main road where we got off earlier.
Then we realized we got a problem.
We didn't know how to get back to the bus terminal.
We asked the locals in the market and no one could understand us.
We said Bangkok and they shook their heads. Just then I remembered Bangkok is also known as Krungthep and I asked them again. Again, they had no idea. One of them ran to ask an elderly lady and all the information we got was to go back to where we alighted to wait for the minivan.
In most other places, there are designated places where we can wait for the minivan to bring us back from where we came from.
But here, there's no waiting area. The place is out of nowhere. There are only two lanes in the countryside road and everywhere you look, there's nothing except vegetation.
Trucks, motorbikes, cars and vans zoomed by in both directions and left a trail of dust flying in the air.
We were thinking if we wanted to continue our journey to Chacheongsao but decided to head back as we did not know which minivan was heading towards that direction. The vans have printed signs on the body indicating the destinations but all were in Thai.
So we crossed to the opposite side and stood there waiting.
Whenever a minivan appeared, we try to see if there's any English writing on the body indicating the destination. But alas, all of them were in Thai.
We managed to stop a few that passed by and again, none of them were heading to our destination.
There we were, me and my cousin looking like idiots, standing by the roadside in the wild looking at all the vehicles zooming by for as long as we could remember not knowing what to do and how long more we are going to wait. And when a truck drove by, we quickly moved backward and covered our mouth and nose from the fume and dust lingering in the air.
Now, I was about to apply what I learned from my army days - hitching a free ride to somewhere nearer to my destination. But there were more bikes than cars and those that passed by didn't have space for us.
The occasional taxi that passed by weren't empty as well.
People who came to the market saw us standing there. When they left, we were still standing there.
We saw the locals carrying Big C supermarket plastic bags on their bike coming from across the slope where there were rows of four-storey buildings we could see from afar. Should we walk there? Will it turned out to be farther than we perceived?
Finally, after almost two hours of waiting, we sensed a ray of hope.
A mother was walking out of the Klong Suan market with two of her teenage daughters. They had bags of food and a tray of eggs in their hands.
They walked to our side and stood there waiting.
Like a chicken and duck, we finally managed to find out that they are going to the same place as us.
So now we have five persons waiting for the minivan. But there is another problem.
If the minivan arrives and there are not enough seats for us, it's either them or us who will get to board the minivan. If there's three seats available, the driver is most likely to pick them as he can fills his seats.
Just then, an empty taxi came.
We made the decision there and then to take it.
Initially, the driver was hesitant as he was heading towards the airport to pick up passenger. However, he agreed to send us to the nearest BTS Skytrain station at Onnut if we were willing to compensate him extra 50 baht as surcharge which he would get if he had gone to the airport instead.
Of course, we agreed.
It turned out this driver could speak Cantonese as he had worked in Macau previously. He had came back to Thailand to take care of his sick mom.
We had an interesting chat and when we reached our destination, we gave him a tip on top of the fare and surcharge.
Looking at this incident, there's so much uncertainties, fears, worries.
How do we get back? Did the local understand us? Did they give us the correct information? Where are we going to wait? Are we waiting at the right place? Will the minivan comes? Will it ever comes? What if it didn't come? What if it comes but there's no seats for us? Should we go Chacheongsao and see if we could make our way back from there? Should we continue waiting? What else could we do besides waiting? How long more do we have to wait? Would it be safe to hitchhike? Do we want to walk toward those buildings we saw? Should we walk farther up or toward our return route? Will we end up spending the night at some unknown place?
This turned out to be one of my most memorable trip.
Not many tourists get the opportunity to stand at countryside road for two hours.