Tuk Tuk Goose

On our first full day in Bangkok, we were introduced to many of the wonders of the city - pad thai, golden buddhas, and ancient buses that couldn't make it out of second gear. However, one particular component of the city filled our entire day. It was the mode of transportation known as tuk tuks. In the western world, this type of transportation is unheard of, but they are absolutely fantastic. Imagine a motorized tricycle with a back seat and a canopy cover. The backseat can comfortably fit about 2 adult men, but not letting American spatial standards get in our way, we managed to squeeze 4 of us into the seats multiple times throughout the day. Flying through the city and coming within inches of cars, people, and any other objects on the road, these open-air, budget taxis provided us with wonderful tours of the city, some quality bonding time with each other, and a few bumps and bruises (the ceilings were quite low), all for an average price of $5 (150 baht) total.

While the views and exhaust fumes were rather enjoyable, the most interesting part of the tuk tuk culture was the drivers and "travel guides," aiming to acquire our business. Literally at any point when we pulled out our maps, a man would appear from nowhere to provide directions for us. Except the directions we received ended up being inquiries into the sites we've seen and propositions for extremely cheap (10 baht/person ~ $0.33) tours to multiple sites around the city. At one point, we were a street away from our destination, the 50 m tall standing buddha, and a man attempted to convince us to enter his company's tuk tuks to see places halfway across the city, when all we wanted was some help in finding the nearby temple. Thanks to Aseem's conversation with one of these "guides," we learned that these cheap rides would not take us to our destination at first, but instead, would bring us to a tailor where the driver would obtain a gas voucher and where we would be expected to buy suits from the store. After this delay, we would be brought to our real destination. Thankfully, we were savvy enough to avoid any of theses scams and fought off many "guides," including one man who almost became belligerent when we told him that we would rather walk than take his tuk tuk.

Attempting to ignore all these people and navigate our way around a city on foot, we got turned around few times and ended up changing our plans to go to new sites that happened to be along the route that we were walking. This part adds the "goose" portion to my title since at points, it seemed like a wild goose chase trying to find the different temples and palaces on our list. However, we successfully made our way around the city and got a good sense of Bangkok through all our wandering and tuk tuk rides. (Add good closing line here.)