Alas, they do not have good ol' IKEA here in Bangkok (although I've read snippets that the Swedish DIY-furnitures are coming to town!). The nearest they have is HomePro Plus which has just about everything you need for your house. The one I normally go to is in a 5-storey building connected to the Ploenchit BTS station. Although the prices are not as cheap and attractive as in IKEA, it does have a good variety of home improvement items and you are certainly spoilt for choice with what they have. What I miss, though, is the IKEA cafeteria with their fried chicken wings and free-flow of good coffee!
Caught in a heavy downpour after class one day, I decided to hop into a mall, grab a latte and wait for the rain to stop. I decided to eat at a store called "Sang kaya" or something like that, selling toasted bread with various spreads such as peanut butter, chocolate, sang kaya and butter - the usual. Sang kaya is a Thai custard dessert not unlike our Kaya on toast spread which we normally have for tea/breakfast. It tastes the same, just a little more egg-yolky and sweet. You can see how generous they were with the serving too! The buns were literally swimming in the custard! Because it was sweet, it went well with my latte (less sweet) and I ended up just slurping the custard and ditching the bread. You can find this in the food court in Emporium Mall (Phrom Phong BTS station).
Every weekend, Samuel and I will ask each other the same question: What to eat today? We've been to several places now because of that - and last weekend found us in Siam Paragon. How surprised we were to find that Toast Box is in Bangkok! Okay, although they were not really serving Malaysian food (Toast Box is under the BreadTalk group in Singapore & listed on SGX), they were serving nasi lemak! The dish is not the best (one of my favourite is the nasi lemak in Village Park, Damansara Uptown) but the rice is acceptable - I always judge them by its rice and sambal. You can find them in Siam Paragon's Food Hall and have a nice view of the workers baking for BreadTalk.
Getting dizzy? This is the normal crowd you will expect on weekends in the malls. Just like back home, the malls are always crowded with people young or old. In Bangkok, you add in the number of tourists here, yet one cannot imagine that an estimated 200,000 people visit Chatuchak Market each day!
I mentioned in an earlier post of the rainy season we are currently experiencing here. This picture was taken in our balcony during a heavy downpour which lasted for just half an hour. This has been happening quite frequently now, 20 mins of rain and suddenly the sun comes out again before the final curtain.
This was taken just after a downpour and when the sun came out again. I always liked the outdoors after a heavy rain, it's almost as if all the filth and "old-ness" have been washed away along with the rain. And the best thing about it is sometimes, the rain leaves behind some treasures...
A rainbow after every storm, that's what I want.
Getting dizzy? This is the normal crowd you will expect on weekends in the malls. Just like back home, the malls are always crowded with people young or old. In Bangkok, you add in the number of tourists here, yet one cannot imagine that an estimated 200,000 people visit Chatuchak Market each day!
I mentioned in an earlier post of the rainy season we are currently experiencing here. This picture was taken in our balcony during a heavy downpour which lasted for just half an hour. This has been happening quite frequently now, 20 mins of rain and suddenly the sun comes out again before the final curtain.
This was taken just after a downpour and when the sun came out again. I always liked the outdoors after a heavy rain, it's almost as if all the filth and "old-ness" have been washed away along with the rain. And the best thing about it is sometimes, the rain leaves behind some treasures...
A rainbow after every storm, that's what I want.
love the pics and narrative, Charis!
ReplyDeleteam staying here with a Bangkok girl, we talk about food back home all the time - other friends start to roll their eyes whenever we do that :D