Hey Look, It's The King!

We forgot to take a picture of our Octopus cards; instead here's a picture of some colour-coded signs.

Hong Kong is a very well thought out city for a visitor. The transit system, which includes MTR (subway), buses, and ferries can all be accessed using an Octopus Card which is a credit card like pass that you can easily charge up at a machine in the subway or at 7-Eleven. You can also use your Octopus Card to purchase items in certain shops, pay for taxis, and ride the peak tram. If it has a means of taking you somewhere you can likely use your Octopus Card to pay for it. Navigating around is easy; signs are colour coded and multilingual. There are pedestrian controlled crosswalks and generally the traffic seems to follow a semblance of order.

Bangkok on the other hand... one could only describe the traffic in Bangkok as perfectly organised chaos. Before I left home, a Thai friend warned, "when you're crossing the street, whatever you do, don't stop." This makes complete sense to me now. If you stop out of fear or indecision the approaching vehicle, car, scooter, tuktuk has no idea what your intention is and therefore cannot plan their next move. Best to walk out with confidence meeting your destination head on all the while believing that no one would intentionally want to harm you. The smaller vehicles, motorbikes, scooters, bicycles will use any space that is available including the sidewalk so one must be vigilant in their constant seeking of space. Despite the vehicles vying for even the most minuscule bit of roadway we did not once witness an accident or even a close call. Drivers are very aware of the space around them and the space they take up. Horn use is a way of life and the sheer volume of the traffic is near deafening. We rarely carried on a conversation while we were walking on the streets as there was little point.

Not the King

"Hey look, a picture of the king."

"You want to buy a ring?!"

"A picture of the king!"

"A place to sing?!"

Gesturing madly towards the picture of the king that is displayed on the pedestrian overpass "The king!!"

"Hey look it's the king."

"Never mind!"

One day I wore earplugs for most of the day. Don't judge me until you've been here!

Took a tuktuk

 

My first tuktuk ride was wonderful in more ways than I expected. Before we got in, the driver waved down a local who happened to speak english and be walking by, she helped us agree on a price and told the driver where we wanted to go. In order to get the most out of our fare and more likely to avoid Bangkok's constant road congestion he forced his way down alleys and back roads at top speed. I held on with delight as he whizzed through narrow passageways with a confidence and joie de vive the likes of which could only be compared to a ballet dancer in hiking boots.

My very small opinion about Bangkok... immeasurable beauty mingles with the disturbing. Centuries old wats (temples) and generous smiling people, fetid canals with mountains of garbage, Asia's take on North American style shopping malls, and a not so underground red light district (that we managed to avoid altogether) makes up this dynamic, awe-inspiring and startling city.

Wat Arun (Temple of Dawn)

Wat Arun up close

The Reclining Buddha (Wat Pho)

Wat Pho