Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Bangkok, Day 2 - Siam Paragon Mall and Suan-Lum Night Bazaar

Hubby's off to work again. I am left to my own devices for the day.

After eating breakfast at the hotel, I make my way again to the BTS Skytrain and get off at Siam Station to see the Siam Center Mall and Siam Paragon Mall.

If you're in Bangkok and you plan to commute via Sky Train, I suggest you buy the BTS Sky Train pass for BHT160. BHT100 is for the actual pre-paid load on your card, BHT30 is for the deposit and the other BHT 30, which is non refundable is for the cost of the card. Pre-paid loads are sold in increments of BHT100.

Honestly, the malls in Manila are much better and more entertaining. I got bored looking arount the Siam Center Mall and proceeded immediately to Siam Paragon Mall and browsed around its department store, (since I cannot afford to shop at the Valentino and Cartier Stores there, he he he). I had a fabulous time at the Gourmet Market located at the Basement 1, there I found a cornucopia of fruits, vegetables, salads and other Thai gourmet items that I wanted to take home with me. I purchased some pasalubong for the office and some for my mom and my in-laws.



The selection of food and sweets at the Food hall located at the basement are endless. You're sure to find something that will satisfy your cravings.







These colorful mini fruits were made from jelly beans!



I had lunch by my lonesome at Cafe de Tu. My lunch consisted of Avocado Salad with Shrimp Roe and Paad Thai. A noodle dish that's mildly spicy with some prawns and bean sprouts. Yummy. I love the Paad Thai specially.





For dinner, hubby and I decided to go to the Suan-Lum Night Market located at the Lumphini station. It was such a hot night and we ate at the first air-conditioned restaurant that we saw. I forgot the name but it's Italian and the food was expensive and lousy. Forgettable name for an equally forgettable food, oh well.

The Suan-Lum Night Market is a huge covered night bazaar with a lot of trinkets, thai silk and fabrics, knock-off bags, shoes and watches. The place is certainly big but it was extremely hot inside. We personally didn't like this place since most of what you can buy here is available at MBK (where it's air conditioned). We were very disappointed and only walked away with just one small purchase. Typical temperature at midnight is 30 degrees centigrade, six degrees hotter in Manila! Yikes.



On the other side of the market, there's a huge beer garden where all kinds of street food were sold. When we arrived, there was a mini concert going on and there were a lot of people there. Too bad we already had dinner, I'm sure the food at the beer garden is much more interesting than the Italian place that we had dined in.

2 comments:

ericbau said...

All I'll say is this: I will never set foot in that night bazaar again. Very bad experience.

ericbau said...

The Siam Paragon mall is definitely an interesting place. On the one hand: high-end shops with items so expensive their prices are stratospheric. On the other hand: a food court area crammed with reasonably-priced delicious dishes that is always crowded by lots of customers. Too bad we were not able to watch an IMAX 3D movie.