I think I went a bit ballistic on the carbs this morning.
How it happened I don't really know, but life's like that sometimes, isn't it, and all we do is to roll along with whatever catches our fancy there and then.
I'm not someone who normally goes for stir-fried tang hoon vermicelli (because I'm the kuay teow type of girl) but for some reason this morning at the buffet counter it seemed tasty and so I took a tongful.
Was it good?
Yes.
It's not that I don't like tang hoon.
It's just that I prefer kuay teow more than any other noodle, and in any case, I love how pretty glass noodles look when you hold them up to the light.
They simply shine.
Along with the tang hoon I took a couple of siew mais (I think they were spinach, but don't ask me why they're green) and a single sausage, because, oy, even at breakfast one can do with a bit of meat.
For the other plate I helped myself to a muffin (the kind they had here weren't very sweet but tasted really buttery), a pastry that I think must have had jam inside, a bit of waffle, and a pancake.
Then because their cubed watermelons looked so red and juicy, I helped myself to some.
The rest of the morning was spent working in the room, then down it was to the McDonalds next door at lunch time.
I think they were having the seasonal summer time offers, so we decided to have much as we liked, ordering a truffle burger, two pieces of fried chicken, fries, and a matcha McFlurry ice cream that I wish I had a lovely picture of.
Funnily enough I don't have a picture of the ice cream.
Nor do I have one of the burger.
I only have a picture of the burger box.
After lunch we walked around the area.
I'd like to say that I knew just what roads it were we went to, but because we simply wandered where our feet took us, all I can see from Google Maps is that we very likely went on Soi Ratchadamri 2, and maybe Soi Phetchaburi 30.
I also know we crossed the bridge that spans the watergate of Wat Sri Bunruang, because somewhere along the bridge my attention got curious by the sight of apartments that overlooked the water there.
It might have looked like a little worse for wear, but if there's anything I've come to realize about infrastructures and apartments, it's that exteriors don't always match the interiors.
You might get a peeling paint kind of apartment building with dust and grit and faded colors on the outside, but the inside might be wallpapered, neat, aesthetically pleasant, well lived, and well looked after.
One never knows.
And so one must never judge.
It did feel a little like a walk back to the past though.
Some of the buildings made me wonder how this place might have looked back in the 80s and 90s when they were still new.
What was Phetchaburi Road like then?
What was Ratchadamri Road like then?
Were Palladium and Pratunam and MBK already there?
Perhaps, like everywhere else, locals saw their buildings got higher and higher, their exteriors and aesthetics get leaner and slimmer.
But Thailand has a knack of balancing the old and new, the traditional and modern, quite successfully, and it's there in fair bit of neighborhoods and distracts around town.
From this place we went back to the BTS and headed off to Ekkamai.
My friend had a prior appointment.
It wasn't my first time here, but the place still felt kind of new to me, so I decided to take a quick gander around.
It's a bit of a mix this place is.
I didn't have much time to look around, but on one side of the Ekkamai BTS there's Wat That Thong, with Sukumvit Hospital just behind it, then further down on Ekkamai Road there's Big C Supercenter and all the condos.
On the other side however, there's the Ekkamai Bus Terminal (Eastern) and the Science Center for Education, and a school named Patumkongka School.
It was going to rain, so no exploring for me this afternoon and back I went to Major Cineplex where I sat for an hour or two.
Right after this we Grabbed to Muang Thong Thani- about 22km out of main Bangkok in Nonthaburi Province- for the outlet stores that we'd heard offered brand products at great prices.
I don't know much about this district, but I'm told that it was first developed in 1978, then expanded in 1989 when condominium towers, mid-rise apartment blocks, flatted factories, and the like were rapidly built. The Muang Thong Thani Sports Complex, built for the Asian Games in 1998, has since become IMPACT Arena, and is one of the largest convention centers in SEA.
It is near the IMPACT Arena where the outlet stores are- literally opposite- and whilst we spent a bit of time wandering around the outdoor bazaar and weekend market, we spent more time in the sports stores, and came out bearing boxes of shoes from Adidas and Converse.
We didn't have much time to look at other brands, but at another time definitely I'm going to drop in to Nike, Timberland, GAP and some of the other more street-style brands that are there.
Armed with our new shoes, we headed to the food court at the mall (I think it's COSMO, but it might well have been another) for dinner.
It's a very huge food court, by the way, with lots and lots of stalls, but most of them seemed to cater to the locals (menus were all written in Thai) so we headed right to the back where there were a couple of cafes.
Here we ordered a plate of Pad Thai and a plate of ostrich steak (how often does one get to have try ostrich meat?) and for dessert we decided to have a cup of Thai-style chendol.
I liked my Pad Thai.
My friend found the ostrich meat more tender than anticipated.
And we both liked the chendol, which, compared to some other places, had a larger serving of brown palm sugar, an even larger serving of coconut milk, and lots of crushed ice.
There was an AEON MaxValu Supermarket in COSMO itself, right behind the food court, so after dinner and a quick call at Starbucks, we headed right there.
And because it's remarkably difficult for visitors aka farangs to get themselves back to the main parts of Bangkok's city center, we walked towards Novotel Hotel, and took the 22km journey back via Grab.
(Fortunately someone was coming here at this hour, and the driver was intending to go back)