Getting to Bangkok from the airport
Most people’s first experience of Thailand is getting ripped off by the limo touts. The touts lie in wait for all unsuspecting tourists and charge up to 2000 baht for the 250 baht taxi ride. Here are some helpful tips when dealing with touts, and this applies to any tourist location in Bangkok, not just the airport.
a) When emerging from customs, DO NOT stop and look around, with a “where the hell to I go now” type of expression on your face. This will inevitably lead to an attractive Thai lady with a clipboard coming up to you and asking “where you go?”
b) Don’t answer the above question by ferreting around in your fanny bag for a printed copy of the directions to the hotel you carefully prepared the day before to avoid just this type of issue. This action will be correctly interpreted by the Thai lady as “I am a stupid foreigner with no idea where I am, how much the ride will cost, or where the public taxis are, please take me for as much as you can, I can afford it.”
c) The correct answer to the above question is “bugger off, I don’t want a limo.”
d) The next challenge is to find the public taxi rank. Since opening the new airport, AOT have been experimenting with mobile taxi ranks. In some clever plan to enhance the travelers’ experience, the public taxis were at first forbidden from entering the airport at all and could only be reached by bus. The benefit of this, apart from the obvious increase in revenues for the Limo touts, is unclear. But our new 21st century airport has many new and advanced features that we mere mortals can’t possibly understand. So I didn’t question it either when the taxi rank moved to the ground floor (hard to tell which floor is ground in this uber-modern building). I’m sure it is perfectly reasonable to expect 5 million travelers a year to all spot the one small A4 paper sign that says “down to taxi” next to the escalator which is also conveniently located behind you once you exit the arrivals terminal heading straight for the door trying to ignore all the “where you go” invitations.
e) So now, at last, the taxi rank has moved again, this time it is rather strangely located outside the exit door, on the same floor you arrive on, almost unmissable to all but the most ignorant of travelers. The current location for the taxi rank, outside arrivals, was clearly rather unplanned, as instead of the nice little booths for the “helpers” who write down your destination for the taxi drivers. The poor “helpers” have to sit a little classroom desks by the road. So it looks like this current location is only on trial. We wait with bated breath for the next move. Possibly the departure area is worth a try, ideally suited for meeting arriving passengers.
f) One last word of warning: remember to keep the little piece of paper the “helpers” give you, and to note down the taxi number. As well as informing you of the 50 baht hidden airport charge (for what?) it can also be used as a complaints sheet. There have been a worrying number of reports of people being transferred against their will into alternative (clearly non-airport friendly) taxis on the expressway hard shoulder. Accompanied by the usual ‘broken Meterrrrr’ story. This behaviour is at best illegal but also downright scary for unaware visitors and not the type of image Thailand is looking to promote. I suggest you inform the tourist police if this happens to you.
Finding somewhere to live
a) After successfully finding your way to your hotel and a few nights 5 star stay at the Sokhoconrad Tree, it time to think about finding an apartment. Not yet aware that foreigners can live in houses too, and teak ones to boot, most new arrivals confine themselves, with or without orientation assistance, to the Expat town, aka Sukhumvit/Silom Roads. Unless you are American, in which case you can live out your tour of duty here in the all American, untouched by Thailand, Uncle Sam’s very own Nichada military compound.
b) Here area a few things to note about Sukhumvit/Silom so you can better decide on you perfect home location:
i. Condo’s here typically cost 2-3 times more than that of similar ones in neighbouring streets.
ii. Restaurants here typically costs 3-5 times that of similar ones in neighbouring street
iii. It’s where all the prostitutes work
iv. It’s where all the beggars sit
v. If you look up and don’t see the sky train, you are lost.
vi. Everybody speaks English
So once you have selected your overpriced, but oh so exclusive, Sukhumvit/Silom condo you can now move on to staff.
to be continued next month...
