Bangkok - day 82

We got up late, packed our bags, left the big backpacks at the hostel and took two little bags with us for our trip to the north. We took the skytrain to Siam and walked into a very nice shopping mall. The contrast between luxury and poverty in Bangkok is insane. All the nice shopping malls around this area have metal detectors at the entrance, as well as security guards. We went up to the 5th floor, where the cinema was supposed to be... and walked into what must be one of the biggest cinemas we've ever seen! We thought we would walk right into the ticketbooth, but no, we walked into a huge hall with a bowling alley and a Starbucks and an Imax and a bunch of escalators and lots of ticketbooths... We wanted to see the new James Bond movie; just to give you an idea of how many cinema rooms they have in this place, there was a 007 movie starting every 40 minutes! We thought it would probably be very expensive, but it only cost 2,50 euros per person! After going through three more metal detectors, we finally got to the right room. The screen was incredibly big and the sound was amazing, but best of all were the seats: reclining ones!! The movie plot was crap, but the special effects were great, so overall it was entertaining and definitely worth the price!! We spent the rest of the afternoon walking through that mall and the next and the one after that... One of the most surprising floors was the 2nd floor of the cinema mall cause it only had car dealers on it; they had everything from Ferrari to Lamborghini, to Maserati to Aston Martin, to BMW and Mini and even Spyker and Lotus. They each had a whole bunch of cars in their "shop windows" although we have absolutely no idea as to how they got them there! The last mall we went into was called MBK and is known for being where the local youth goes shopping. Apart from having normal shops, they have an impressive area dedicated to fake items. It looked a lot like the Silk Market in Beijing, except that the vendors don't talk to you unless you ask them something and when you ask for the price, they give you such a low price you don't even dare to negotiate it! Nothing like China!! A much more relaxed way of shopping for sure! From the mall we walked along Chinatown all the way to Hua Lamphong train station where we waited for our 19h35 night train to Chiang Mai. We had booked a 2nd class sleeper ticket and were disappointed to find that what we got were just two regular seats... until after departure... that's when they started pulling out tables and serving dinner (if you wanted any) and a bit later they came by and turned the seats into full sized beds! They even had sheets and pillows and privacy curtains and little reading lights... In the morning they came by to serve breakfast and clean up the beds again. Great service for only 15 euros per person for a train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai (750 kilometers)!

Weather: hot as usual