Words + Pictures

Walking Bangkok

Despite several false starts and a couple of detours caused by over-friendly natives, I reached escape velocity on Monday afternoon, able to get through the wall of tuk tuks, taxi drivers, and tour operators who marked the perimeter of our hotel. My goal was to see some of Bangkok in the best way I know how, which is to walk its streets.

This is a selection from my travel by foot over the course of the few days that I was not traveling by bus or boat. It is an odd collection of conflicting evidence which points in the direction of our own 21st century experience with urban life, but with differences that are much easier to see than to articulate with words. Bulging with growth, walking allows you to see the part that is often still from another age—not necessarily the reason for coming to Thailand, but aside from the tourist destinations, what you find when you get there.