A Peek into the Chinatown Bangkok

In all my visits to Bangkok (four and hoping for more) I never really tried street food, which was a pity. Bangkok and Thailand have such a varied street food culture and I was staying away from it! But I visited the Chinatown Bangkok which is on the Yaowarat Street and the record was set right! The plan was to roam around and eventually have dinner there.

Our first stop was the Kuan Yin Shrine which is a Chinese Temple. As you can see red was the dominant color around. I picked a particularly quiet moment to click the picture, there were quite a few people around, offering their prayers.

The idea was to explore Bangkok by night and see what it offered. So we explored Yaowarat Street area which is the Chinatown and Pak Klong Talat which is the largest 24 hour flower market in Bangkok. Both are colorful places.

So how did I fare as a vegetarian? I actually did fine. One of the first things that I could try were vegetable spring rolls. And they were good.

I tried the famous Durian for the first time on this walk. I read so much about it, I saw notices in front of hotels saying ‘no Durian allowed’ but I thought the fruit was alright. Maybe the famed smell which bars its presence from many hotels kicks in after a few days? I could eat the fruit without holding my nose.

But I could venture only to take a picture of fried grasshoppers (extreme right) and other insects which are sold as food!

The food market is a night market. You can see some vendors put the chairs right by the road. It was a lot of fun walking around and eating things! I was told that there are days when Chinese eat only vegetarian food due to religious reasons and the street market sell a lot more variety.

But the most fun was watching food being cooked while we waited for it to arrive to our table. And nothing was on fire, this is how they cook food on the Yaowarat Street! The flames would go really high when they put vegetables on the frying pan. I was constantly told to take care and not become too engrossed in taking pictures, or my hair might catch fire!

After food it was time to head to Bangkok’s biggest flower market Pak Khlong Talat but then I have already written about it, you just need to click the link to see it. It was a beautiful night out for me in Bangkok and it was my first proper introduction to street food and Durian!

I was invited by TAT New Delhi to visit Thailand and I had an amazing time.