Shopping in Bangkok

When people say that Bangkok is a shopping haven, they are not lying. You can almost find anything there, from the authentic designer goods to their replicas.

I take it as a good thing that my wife and I are not much of a shopping couple. We could have spent too much over there. We try to keep everything under budget and we were a little bit worried when my wife’s sister told us that she spent a lot in Bangkok.

Anyway, I didn’t really find what I wanted there or maybe I was just too lazy to find what I want. I was there for the sole purpose of taking street photography. (my wife thinks that this is a lame excuse)

Shopping Malls in Bangkok

There are a lot of shopping malls near the Siam BTS line. Some are like Paragon in Singapore while others look a little bit like Far East Shopping Centre but with a better interior. Most of the stores in one shopping mall called Siam Centre are mostly concept stores. Their prices are a bit on the higher end but I think it’s worth to buy because you can’t find it anywhere other than Bangkok.

This is Siam Paragon. From the interior, it really looks like those high-end shopping centres that you will find in Singapore. Well, it is.

This is the interior of Siam Centre.This is Central World. One of the biggest shopping malls I have ever seen in my life. I went in just for the aircon. I was more focused on finding the Platinum Mall because they sell things at warehouse prices.

I was disappointed when the stuff was something that I would not buy. Or maybe like I said earlier, I am not much of a shopping person. I usually already have what I have in mind and just go to the store and get it.

Street shopping in Bangkok

I think you would find the stuff along the streets better than inside the malls. Although during the day, you might find yourself scurrying around looking for an air conditioned place. It is super hot during the day.

These vendors are also smart. They know that tourists will come out later in the evening or later at night so they opened their stalls full swing during the night.

One of the street vendors along the streets of Siam BTS Line.

It gets extremely busy especially during the weekends. I think there are a lot of tourists that just go to Bangkok for the weekend for their booze and party.

When we went back to the same spot on Monday night, it was not as lively. Part of the reason could be the locals are back to work.

The thing about these local street vendors is I find it a little bit messy. There is no special area for food and other stuff like clothes or accessories. They might be selling grilled stuff and the next stalls to them are selling clothes. So it could be a little bit irritating. Haha. (just my opinion though)

But then, on a positive note, you will not go hungry or thirsty as you will definitely find something to quench your thirst.

————-

So from my experience, the best time to check out their night markets and street vendors is definitely during the weekend from 7 pm onwards. Not to worry about the timing of the BTS as their last train will depart at 12 midnight. And you can get a taxi or a tuk-tuk anywhere.

Chatuchak Market in Bangkok

It was a mixed feeling of nervousness and excitement plus reluctance to go to Bangkok, Thailand. One of the major reasons was I had some work that was not completed prior to my trip.

But, as it was my darling wife’s birthday, I had to follow her every wish.

Thinking positively, I get to do my street photography that I love so much. The anticipation of making my camera work for me at the end of the day soothes the reluctant feeling of not wanting to travel.

Just wished that I had a smaller camera with me instead of my Nikon D700. You all know how heavy that piece of art is. On a side note, I am still going to get that Fujifilm XT-10 or maybe the Fujifilm XT-1. I am interested in both. XT-1 is weather-proof though. Sigh. I shall leave that to another time to talk about it.

So we set our way to the airport at 5.30 am (yup, our flight was at 7 am) and waited patiently for our airplane to take off. Once we reached Bangkok Airport, we made our way to Hotel Parinda. Their train system is well connected so we had no trouble reaching our destination. We were not able to check in yet so we walked along the streets of Sukhumvit to just have a feel of what’s going to be there. It’s a surprise for me to see many Arabs and Indians around that area. It is almost the same as going to Bukit Bintang in Kuala Lumpur.

After our lunch, we made our way to check in and took a nap before going to Chatuchak Market.

Chatuchak Market, Bangkok

What can you expect from here?

Well, it’s as big as 6 football fields from some of the review sites that I googled. So it’s pretty massive. There are so many streets (sois as they called it) in the market itself. Just one big round of the main street already took us more than an hour to cover and we haven’t even gone into any of their smaller streets.

Food in Chatuchak Market

It’s not really difficult to find food here in the market. Even for Muslims like us. There are a few stalls that sell halal food but most of the food are kebabs. We were lucky enough to find a stall that sells chicken rice and so we had our dinner there.

I ordered the chicken soup and curry rice. I was so surprised by the spiciness of the chicken soup. It had that addictive taste even though it is so spicy. Could be the amount of MSG that they put in.

Other than a whole meal, we settled for bread and butter with sweetened milk.

We had double servings because it is just that good. Be sure to keep this stall on the lookout. It’s quite near the entrance. There are other shops like this inside, but the quality is not that good because the bread was left out for quite some time.

Anyway, some of the locals told us that the best time to be here would be early morning or late afternoon when it is not that hot and humid. Most of the shops will close around 7 pm but smaller shops start to open their business on the streets itself.

————-

I will continue blogging about the rest of my trip in my next post as this is getting to be a very long post. I do not want to bore you so much on just one blog post.

Taking it to the streets in Changi Airport

Changi Airport is known to be one of the best airports in the world.

I think it is ranked 1st in the list. Makes me a proud Singaporean. But what I like most about airports or this airport, in particular, is the amount of activities that are happening at any time of the day.

I can be at the airport in the wee hours and am still able to capture a few shots street style. :)

Some of the photos have been uploaded here before as a black and white piece. I’m not so happy about the outcome, so I’ve decided to use some of my new Lightroom presets on the images.

I have no idea who left the trolley there, but I’m glad that they did. (although we are usually told not to leave our trolleys behind.) It’s not even those bag trolleys for your big luggage. This trolley is meant for transporting goods. It’s just an out-of-place kind of trolley.

Now, you must be thinking that I’ve moved the trolley. No. I’m too lazy to do that. More trolleys appear and this seems to be waiting for its turn to be checked in. Haha. The only problem is there’s nobody to check it in. Sad life for this trolley.

One of our favourite pastimes at the airport is to wait. Unless you like to shop, yeah it’s a haven for you. But for frequent travellers, it’s not just their thing. They would rather people watch and just wait for their turn to be checked in.

Last but not least, the people who took their time off to send their loved ones to the airport. They are the real heroes.

They keep sending their loved ones to the airport to travel away from Singapore and then they go back home. At least, they experienced the thrill of going to the airport.

Street Photography 101

What defines Street Photography?

In my previous post, I talked about how the photo evokes your emotions. There must be a reason as to why you took that particular photo at that particular time. While some people agree, others beg to differ. Street photography should be candid and fast.

I’m here to tell you that both are not wrong. Ultimately, it is what you want to showcase to your audience.

But as a guideline, this is what I can offer.

Be confident

The best is actually if you go out and shoot alone. But if you are just starting out and feel uncomfortable as a single person shooting around aimlessly, bring a friend.

Blend in with the crowd

Unless you have a phobia of people, then I guess there is nothing wrong to start with a huge crowd. For example, a busy walkway in your city. You can seamlessly blend in with the crowd. In fact, you will feel that you are an invincible figure. What to do next? Snap away.

Do I need permission?

Technically, public areas are definitely alright for you to shoot. Even the MRT train stations. I try as much as possible to try not to shoot in buildings or shopping centres even though you can find lots of opportunities to take photos there.

If you are taking that photo of a person for some stock photography (even though it is a public place) then yes you need the permission or model release form SIGNED.

Eventually, it depends on the country laws that you are visiting. But try as much as possible to get out of sticky situations by knowing what you can take and what you can’t.

Be respectful

I can’t stress this enough. Imagine this. You are in a public place and it is your right to shoot what you want (after going through point number 3), the person that is in your frame says you need to delete that picture. You just have got to do it. I think we do not need to argue over this as the person has every right to not want his face in the picture.

Just make it a point to think what will you do if you are in the same situation.

Editing old photographs

The reason I am writing this article is partly because I am going to have a shortage of new photographs to upload to my Instagram account (@m.k.d.c.w.z).

Don’t get me wrong. It’s not the same photos with different edits.

It is the photos that I thought will not go into the “published” folder in my dropbox. So I have been scurrying around looking for my old hard disks and diving into my collections from 2010.

It is amazing that I was able to find some gems. I think most of us when starting out will not think about certain photos that might be good enough. After years of taking photographs and many more hours of editing, you will definitely improve. And you might find that some of the preset edits that you have created in your Adobe Lightroom right now can be used on the old photographs. So never, ever give up on that old photographs of yours. Better yet, don’t delete it even when you are not going to use it. It might just be your next trending Instagram post. :)

This is one of the photos that I was talking about. I thought this was nothing much in 2013. I recently uploaded this to Instagram and has been receiving likes and comments for this image. It’s not that I am a “likes-and-comments” junkie but it’s good to receive feedback for your photos. It’s the way how I improve over time.

And it’s also interesting to see a lot of creatives in Singapore are loving this.

Of course, the credit for this image goes to Singapore Art Museum for having this exhibition. All I did was to take an image of this. If I’m not mistaken, this was taken during Singapore Biennale Festival. This is a yearly thing but I’m not really sure about 2016 for now. I do hope that they continue this and I am pretty sure more creatives will open up and showcase their talents.

Yes! Singapore needs to showcase more of our creatives’ works.