A few years ago I was in Thailand, on a one week long trip. It was my "impromptu" stage of traveling, when I was going along with the flow, having almost nothing planned, apart from the hotel and plane tickets.
I think it was already my second or third day in the big city. I knew my way around the BTS skytrain stations and I even cruised once on Chao Phraya, the big river that crosses Bangkok. That day I had in plan a visit to the Wat Pho temple, the one in which they say thai massage was born (the real thai massage, not the happy ending one). It was a 20 minutes boat trip from one of the train stations. The picture above is form that temple, by the way.
I bought my ticket and embarked on a long, touristic boat, along with other 20-30 travelers. The guide must have been speaking 5-6 languages, he was constantly joking in English, French, German and Russian. His speech was obviously learned and rehearsed, but it was still funny.
Once we got to the pier, I stepped out from the boat and I was just about to head towards the temple, when I heard a voice: "Look, look, a little clocodile!". It was a local guy, in hist fifties (but hard to tell exactly, they hide their age very well). Dressed well, a nice smile, grey hair. "Where?", I asked, approaching the handrail of the pier.
"Ovel thel, ovel thel", continues the guy pointing somewhere in the water. For a brief second I get to see a half a meter crocodile surfacing the water, then nothing.
"So, whele ale you flom?" starts the guy, and it's only now that I see its badge. In Thailand, every person approaching you has some kind of badge, which usually means they want to sell you something. So, that was his game, I say to myself. That's how he attracts potential clients. Well, at least he's funny and I saw a crocodile.
"I'm from Romania. Europe, I add, seeing his confusion."
"Oh, Eulop. Vely cold. Vely cold." By that time I already knew that everybody in Thailand considers Europe to be a very cold place. Which, for them, is true, given the fact they have only 3 seasons: hot, hotter and hottest. "And what al you lookin' fol?" continues the guy, obviously looking to learn what to sell to me.
"Well, I'm looking for the floating market, I say, thinking at a poster I saw back at the hotel. (The poster said something about a place where all the logistics were handled by sailing ships, in a channel structure of a few square kilometers. Seemed interesting.) Do you know where I can find it?"
"Of cols, come back aftel the temple" smiles the guy.
To make a long story short, after a few hours I meet the guy at the same place. He calls in a tuk-tuk, I pay upfront (1500 baht, if I remember well) I get in, and the tuk-tuk starts to roll.
At that moment I realized I'm in the middle of an unknown city, not speaking the language, driven away by a guy I never met, at the indications of a guy I just met. Kinda crazy. So I took a photo, just in case.
After a few minutes, the tuk-tuk drops me at a deserted pier. The driver looks at me, smiles and then just leaves.
I'm alone. On the mighty Chao Phraya I see longboats, low touristic boats and all kind of other ships. On the pier, just me and a few logs. So, what am I supposed to do here?
At that exact moment one of the logs starts to move and I realized it's a human being. Not sure if it was a man or a woman, with all those clothes resembling the color of a log, just like his or her skin. I see a smile though, and then he or she is waving. I get a little bit closer.
From the middle of the river, a longboat is heading towards us. The guy from the boat and the logman are talking briefly and then the logman is inviting me to step in. Oh well, let's step in, see that floating market and get back.
For the next 10 or 15 minutes we cruised on the main Chao Phraya channel. I was the only one on the boat. The guy in the back was smiling at me every 10 seconds.
Then, we make a left and enter one of the most surprising ares of my trip. Instead of huge hotels and shopping malls, hundreds of small houses. The channels were narrower and narrower.
At some point, we see a very small boat, with a lady wearing a national outfit. The boat stops near buy and the lady starts paddling towards us. I look in the back and the guy smiles at me for the one hundredth time and says: "Floating market". At that point, I knew I was screwed.
Well, not totally screwed, but you know, taken advantage of. But I didn't feel bad at all. I bought an elephant from that lady and we got back to the pier without any incident.
Back at the hotel, I looked once again at that poster and saw the wording too: "The floating market of Damnon Saeduk". Which was a city 100 km away from Bangkok.
Well, next day I bought an organized tour from the hotel and got to see that market too. Which was also impressive, as you can see from the photos below.
But, to be honest, I enjoyed more the thrills of my "little clocodile" adventure.
All photos from my own collection.
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
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