A Very Short Guide to Bangkok

Bangkok is enormous.

Humid, overfed, and seemingly powered by sugary iced drinks and shopping malls.

Humid, overfed, and seemingly powered by sugary iced drinks and shopping malls.

There’s food everywhere, cold coffee everywhere, and somehow far less honking, shouting and general chaos than I had prepared myself for. I’m sure Bangkok can get properly crazy, but I purposefully never made it to the *Hangover* part of town. I don’t need that energy in my 40s.

I stayed at a great hotel, ate at one genuinely excellent restaurant, drifted through more malls than I can count, and found a cool photography shop that still develops film.

I also spent some time around Song Wat Road, which felt like one of the few genuinely walkable neighborhoods I came across in Bangkok. Old shopfronts, cafés, little design stores, good food, and a decent chance of buying a cool hat. Have an iced coffee. Then have another one.

This is not a comprehensive Bangkok travel guide. It’s just a very short list of places I actually went, actually liked, and would recommend to a friend.

If you need one good Bangkok hotel, one great restaurant, and a couple of worthwhile places to wander around, this should do the trick.