Because I was so determined to prove to my friends that I can reclaim the former glory of being a true, unattached single adventurer, I decided to go on a spur-of-the-moment trip to visit two places which I have been eyeing to discover for some time now.
So one, boring Saturday night (after I ran out of things to do in my apartment), I put on my fave travel clothes (specifically, a hooded t-shirt and a pair of shorts), slipped into my havies, packed Iko, some much needed toiletries plus snacks, and stashed my passport in my back pocket. After making a quick call to a friend, I was off to Pattaya City on my own.
My first dilemma was getting to Victory Monument. Although I have passed through this route countless times, I was still unsure. I checked google maps so to know which bus to take and since this supposedly fail-free site failed me several times in the past, I decided to call a friend as well to inquire about the bus number. After 20 minutes on Bus 39, I finally arrived in Victory Monument.
The second dilemma was finding the cheapest transportation service in the area. The last time I went to Pattaya City, we rode on a van and paid 130 baht but when we went back to Bangkok from there, we only paid 90 baht. We discovered too late that there were several transportation services strategically stationed around Victory Monument. When I got there, I couldn't find the van with the 90 baht fare but I was able to get on a van which asked for 100 baht. Once I was comfortably seated on the second row, I logged into facebook (my account then was still not deactivated) and anxiously waited for three hours to get there.
Travel time from Bangkok to Pattaya City is approximately 2-3 hours and it will help if you have a book or an ipod to keep you preoccupied. If you think that technology is too much of a nuisance, then you can enjoy the astonishing change from Bangkok's sky scrapers to the countryside's crop paddies. The safest stop in Pattaya City is Walking Street. Safe in a sense that you are right in the center of everything --- you have easy access to hotels, restaurants, bars, travel agencies, and the beach.
When the driver dropped me off in Walking Street, I went to the nearest travel agency to inquire about Mini Siam's location. Thailand's addresses are a bit tricky. The spelling you will see online may not be the same spelling you will see in the actual place, and the language barrier will only make matters worst. You can try as hard as you could to speak pasa-Thai but in the end, you'll only get a "mai kao jai." Being just a few months old here, I am still groping with getting the right accent. People here always say that I speak funny.
The manager of the travel agency told me to get on a song teaw (a converted pick-up truck used for public transportation which can accommodate about sixteen people in the back and two in front) and get off in Sukhumvit Road then get on another song teaw going to Mini Siam. Song teaw fares are usually 10 baht per person. The driver (after seeing my camera and map) tried to scam me by offering to take me to Mini Siam if I paid 170 baht. I opted not to take the offer and waited for other passengers which I am thankful for because Sukhumvit Road from Walking Street was just a 15-minute ride.
I met a motorcycle driver while I was searching for my first stop - Mini Siam. After asking seven other motorcycle drivers, we finally bumped into someone who knew where Mini Siam was. People here are more accustomed to the Thai names so it will be best if you knew both Thai and English names of the places that you plan to visit. This same driver (oooppppsss, too lazy to continue this now...)
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