Ivan, Jennifer and I got a late check-out on January 31, 2009.  Ivan went to buy things at Boots.  Jennifer walked to the post office to mail a package.  We packed our backpacks up.  Then, we checked out of the Admiral Premier.  A taxi was called for us.  We were going to the airport.  This afternoon, we’d be flying to Manila, Philippines.

We wanted to check our luggage in.  The clerk at the counter said we needed to provide paperwork for a return flight from the Philippines.  Ivan told him that it was an e-ticket.  He said he wouldn’t print the boarding passes until he saw the return ticket.  Ivan went on the internet to book a cheap flight.  Ivan and Jennifer have never run into this problem.

We found an internet cafe.  Ivan booked a cheap flight on Cebu Pacific.  He told the clerk that he booked it.  He wanted them to find it in the system.  It was taking too long to show up in the computer.  The guy said he’d print out the boarding passes.  He insisted that Immigrations would require proof of a return ticket. 

We got some sandwiches at a cafe.  We headed to the gate to wait for boarding.  Ivan and Jennifer’s names were called.  Jennifer got a printout of the return ticket. 

We boarded the plane and sat down.  The flight was going to be 3 hours and half.  Ivan took out his laptop.  We watched part of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.  It was a smooth flight.  Luckily, Jennifer’s stomach didn’t act up on the flight. 

We arrived at the Clark Airport.  We went through Immigration.  The Immigration man thought Jennifer was a returning resident and gave her a year to stay.  Ivan got three weeks.  This was good since we were planning to stay about six weeks in the Philippines.  We grabbed our luggage and went outside.  Jennifer set up a private car.  We were staying in Quezon City with her Auntie Babie.  The drive was an hour and half away.  We left around 9 pm. 

The driver didn’t know the area well.  He asked for directions.  He still kept getting lost.  We finally arrived at Auntie Babie’s house at 11:15 pm. 

Auntie Babie cooked up some chicken.  I had a few bananas.  We took our luggage upstairs.  She showed us to the room.  Ivan and Jennifer took the mattress on the floor.  I laid down on the bed.  We went to bed soon after.

Later, we got ready for a night out.  I had a banana sandwich for dinner.  We took a taxicab to Bed Supperclub.  It’s a restaurant where you dine on big cushions.  It’s nice to lounge since it feels like you’re laying in bed.

There was a set menu and Ivan and Jennifer decided to share.  The first item was a tomato soup with noodles.  It was a tasty soup.  The main course was kingfish with a spicy salad.  The salad was much better than the fish.  But, the fish was decent.  There was nice chill music playing.  Ivan and Jen were enjoying the delicious drinks.  I had a mocktail called Banana Bang.  It was yummy!  During dinner, there was a show with Tina Turner.  They waited awhile before having dessert.   The dessert came.  It was a rich chocolate fondant with ice cream.  It was pretty good.  Dinner turned out to be wonderful.   

We walked to the other area.  The music was house music.  The area had an upstairs area with a balcony.  There was a big screen playing the tv show Futurama.  Another show came on with a Michael Jackson impersonator.  We all danced for a few hours.  It was really fun.  Ivan and Jennifer liked the drinks.  We were happy to find a great place to dance in. 

We woke up late on January 5, 2009.  We had lunch at the Cinnamon restaurant in the hotel.  Jennifer had a tuna sandwich and Ivan had a noodle dish.  I had a good banana and cheese burrito.  We packed up our backpacks.  We checked out of the room.  We stored our luggage with the hotel.

We took the Sky Train to Siam Paragon.  Ivan went searching for a Tesco.  Jennifer and I went browsing around the mall.  Ivan went everywhere in the Siam Square, but couldn’t find a Tesco.  We walked up to the movie theatre.  We got tickets to see Madagascar 2: Escape to Africa.  The movie was really funny. 

We took the Sky Train back to the hotel.  We bought Subway sandwiches to eat on the train.  We got our bags from storage.  We took the underground train to the train station. 

We settled down on the train with our backpacks.  Ivan went searching for food in the station.  Ivan and Jennifer had two bottom beds.  Right now, they were seats.  We departed at 8 pm.  Later on, a train employee turned our seats into beds.  There was curtain that covered each bed for privacy.  Ivan worked on his blog.  Jennifer read Tintin comics.  I listened to music on Jennifer’s iPod.  The train was pretty jumpy.  Jennifer put in her earplugs to block out the train  noises.  We went to bed. 

Ivan and Jennifer were eating their Subway sandwiches.  I had my banana and honey sandwich, which I had brought from Monkeyway.  We arrived to Bangkok a few hours later.  It took forever dropping off people at their hotels.  It seemed like they were scattered across town.  We were going to the Khao San Road.  Ivan decided to have the driver take us to Phranakorn Nornlen Hotel.  Ivan couldn’t find it though.  He got confused with the rivers, because they all look the same  – he asked me for help. but I didn’t have a clue, because I’m only a little monkey, and little monkeys are hopeless with directions, unless it involves finding out where the nearest banana shop is.

We went back to the Khao San Road instead.

Ivan was searching for a hotel.  Jennifer was tired of looking for a place.  She gets grumpy when she’s really hungry.  We checked in at the Khao San Palace.  This hotel was nothing special.  The walls were dirty.  The room’s decoration looked like an old 70′s hospital room.  But, it didn’t really matter since we were only staying for one night.

Ivan got a much needed haircut.  Jennifer got her nails painted.  Ivan and I went shopping.  Ivan used the internet cafe.  Jennifer was getting a nice oil massage.  We had some Thai food at a restaurant nearby. 

Jennifer decided to dye her hair.  She’s always  wanted red hair.  It would have be a two step process.  First, they would have to bleach her hair.  Then, the red color would be added.  So, Jennifer was blonde for a few minutes.

And here’s the final result:

It came out really red – but Jennifer likes it.  I wanted to get my fur dyed blue, but Jennifer said it wouldn’t be a good idea for a monkey to do that…..apparently Ivan and Jennifer get enough stares as it is, traveling around Asia with a pet Monkey, but if that monkey was BLUE then it would be even worse! I made a note in my diary to ask my dad Dave if he would ever dye all his fur blue.

We woke up and got breakfast at the Khao San Centre across the street on January 3, 2009.  We checked out of the Khao San Palace.  It turned out that Phranakorn Nornlen was sold out for the next few days.  We took a taxi to the Admiral Premier Hotel.  We checked in to the hotel.

So, we went to the Sky Train to the Chatuchak Weekend Market.  We had lunch at a small restaurant in the market.  Ivan said it was the largest outdoor market in the world.  Ivan and Jennifer shopped for a few hours. 

The market is filled with many things to buy like food, shoes, purses, jewelry and crafts.  There were many people shopping.   Our feet were getting tired from walking around so much.  We took a taxi back to the hotel.  We got room service for dinner.

We took two taxicabs to the Admiral Premier Hotel.  Everybody checked in.  The hotel offers great accommodation with a pool on the roof.  We brought all our luggage to the room.

Ivan, Jennifer, Neal, Rob and I headed up to the pool.  Nom was sleeping in the room.  There’s a great view of the city.  It was great place to relax.  We ordered room service.  I had a good banana soup and also fried banana.  We hung out at the pool for a few hours. 

We went back to the room to shower and get ready.  We walked to Soi Cowboy for dinner.  We sat down at Old Dutch.  Neal ate two bags of fried grasshoppers.  Everybody else (including me) didn’t like the idea of eating grasshoppers.  Ivan and Jennifer started off with spring rolls.  Ivan had a fish soup.  Jennifer ordered noodles with chicken.  I got bananas and chips.  The food tasted good here.  We ended up having drinks at a bar nearby.

We woke up and had the free breakfast on December 26, 2008.  We had another cool day at the pool.  Ivan, Jennifer and I had sandwiches by the pool.  We found out that Neal got sick – probably from the fried grasshoppers the previous night.  We chilled in the room afterwards.  We were planning to meet for dinner later on. 

We hopped into a cab to a pizza place.  We went inside Basilico.  Ivan and Jennifer started with a tuna salad.  Then, they shared an eggplant pizza.  I got the banana pizza.  It’s good but nothing is as good as my dad’s pizza!  Ivan and Jennifer really enjoyed their meal. If you’re in Bangkok and you’re craving a pizza – definitely check out Basilico.  Neal still wasn’t feeling good.  He walked back to the hotel.

The rest of the group headed to a bar.  The bar had a mechanical bull.  Ivan rode it a couple of times. 

I wanted to try it but I probably would have flown across the room.  Afterwards, we headed to another bar for more drinks.

We got into a taxi.  We were headed to the Siam Paragon to do some Christmas shopping.  The traffic was a bit heavy.  There’s lots of Christmas decorations around. 

There were environmental ones like a tree made out of CDs or one made out of Coca-Cola cans. 

Ivan and Jennifer went to a sushi buffet for lunch.  It’s shabu shabu style.  There’s conveyor belts that brings the meats, fish and sushi around to the customers. 

You can put the items into your soup and cook it.  They ate a lot of food.  I had a banana and chicken sandwich at a restaurant in the mall.

Ivan went his own way.  Jennifer and I went shopping for Ivan.  I did get a chance to shop on my own for a short time.  The mall is really big.  There’s also another mall right next door.  We shopped for two hours.  We all met up afterwards.  We went to the Siam Discovery.  Ivan bought a few items. 

We were all tired from walking so much.  We walked around the area to find a massage place.  We all got a thai massage.  The place had Ivan and Jennifer wear this yellow shirt and pant set.  The thai massage is good.  It can be a bit painful at times though. 

We took it easy for a few hours.  Ivan and Jennifer had a tuna sandwich at the hotel.  It was good.  I had a banana pancake with extra bananas. 

That night, Ivan and Jennifer went to Joe’s bar and had a few drinks. Jennifer sure giggles a lot when she’s had a few drinks. 

We went downstairs on December 24, 2008 to get breakfast.  The menu consisted of rice salad, cornfield, guava sauce and apple juice. The food was good again.  We chilled for awhile. 

We took a taxi to the Khao San Road.  We walked around browsing the souvenirs.

We walked to May Kaidee’s Vegetarian Restaurant.  Here we had some good vegetarian food.  Of course, I had to add banana to my rice dish to make it satisfactory for me. 

Later on, we went back to the hotel.  Neal, Ivan’s brother was arriving soon.  His girlfriend Nom lives in Bangkok.  We saw them at the hotel since they were checking into their room.  It was nice for us to see a familiar face.  Neal came with two of his work friends Aaron and Rob.  We planned to meet shortly to go out. 

We relaxed in the room.

We took two taxicabs to the Khao San Road.  We went to the Khao Sarn Center for dinner.  Ivan got the green curry this time while Jennifer got the red curry.  I had the banana noodle dish.  There was lots of beer drinking by mostly everybody.  I wish I could have joined in.  Our next stop was another bar.  We stopped by Gazebo and smoked some hookah.  There was a band there that sounded okay.  We went to the nightclub Bossy.  The music there was pop, dance and r&b.  Ivan and Jennifer enjoyed dancing around.  The nightclub was filling up with people.  I danced on the table so I wouldn’t get stepped on.  The club had a big raisedwalkway with stripper poles.  Lots of people danced on the walkway.  We had a fun night! 

We had some noodles at a small restaurant.  We hopped onto a minibus towards Bangkok.  We were lucky again since it was another ride that was shorter than usual. 

We took a taxi to the Khao San Road.  This is backpacker central in Bangkok.  It’s a street filled with hotels, restaurants and souvenir stands.  Jennifer couldn’t believe how many backpackers that we saw walking around.  We checked in at the D&D Inn right on the Khao San Road. 

We only had to walk down the road for dinner.  We went to the Khao Sarn Center.  Ivan ordered a red curry with chicken.  Jennifer got the green curry with chicken.  The Khao San Road has great food stalls.  My favorite is the one selling banana pancakes for 20 Baht.  I brought my dinner to the restaurant which was three banana pancakes.  Ivan and Jennifer really enjoyed their tasty food. 

We walked further to find a place for drinks.  There are several places serving cheap drinks right on the sidewalk.  Ivan and Jennifer enjoyed a drink and talked for awhile. 

We then headed back to the hotel and went to bed.

We checked out of the D&D Inn on December 22, 2008.  We took a taxi to Phranakorn Nornlen Hotel.  It’s a little hard to find.  Ivan found this hotel on  Tripadvisor.  It’s a highly ranked hotel on their website. The place is charming and cozy.  We arrived there and a staff member brought us some sweet ice tea.  The rooms are great.  There’s hand painted art on the walls.  It’s like being in a country home.  There’s a cd player on the wall.  They provide music for daytime and nighttime.  They make their own soap that has no chemicals.  An organic breakfast is included with the room.  There is no tv in the room.  I guess that’s the only drawback to the hotel. 
The staff is very friendly.  We settled into our room.

We headed downstairs for lunch.  I got a banana and honey sandwich.  Both Ivan and Jennifer got the chicken pad thai.  It came with tempura vegetables.  The food was really delicious. 

We went into the city.  We had dinner at Tip Toe.  The food was alright there.  Ivan and Jennifer chilled at a bar and had some drinks.