What Do You Have To Do To Get The RIght Steak?!

Monday 9 October

This traveling business is hard work – getting up before 06.00, breakfasting and ready to leave by 07.30 – we had forgotten what a tour schedule was like. But we were ready in plenty of time to meet the minibuses that were to transport us today from Bangkok to Kanchanaburi and the Bridge over the River Kwai. Kanchanaburi is the third largest city in Thailand after the capital and Chang Mai, but I had never heard of it until I read the itinerary for this tour.

We traveled for about an hour, westwards from Bangkok, when we came to an area of flooded fields on both sides of the road. Was it fish? – no, the water wasn’t deep enough. Was it rice? – no, wrong season for rice paddies (the rains are just arriving). It turned out to be iodine salt fields (apparently iodine salt is the best salt in the world, better even than rock salt) – the iodine coming naturally from the seawater used to flood the fields before evaporation. There were very primitive windmills which helped draw in the seawater for the 3 kms from the Gulf of Thailand, and it usually takes about two weeks for the fields to drain and dry before the salt crystals can be collected – using a garden rake type tool. The salt is then bagged and sold on – either at the roadside, or the majority through traders in Bangkok, where it is four times the price of buying it at the fields. We tasted some of the small crystals, and it was extremely salty, even for me!

Our next stop was the coconut sugar farm, where liquid from the flowers of the palms is drained into wooden tubes, with small chips of tree bark added to make the liquid stay fresher for longer (I had never really noticed the beautiful floral stems on a coconut palm before, a bit like a plumes of feathers with small orchid size flowers, all a luscious creamy colour, mingling amongst the palm fronds – they tend to be overlooked as you stare at the large green balls of coconut fruits). This liquid is boiled in jam-making cauldrons over a fierce heat. When it has boiled for a while, it can be cooled and bottled as a very sweet drink. Or it can continue boiling until all the liquid has evaporated and coconut sugar is left as a residue – not so sweet as the sugar we are used to, more like soft coconut ice. We bought some fresh coconut fruit to munch, as I haven’t had that in years. Yummy.

Back in the minibuses (we were using two buses, six ‘trekkers’ in each), we traveled another hour or so to the woodcarvers factory – really a tourist shopping outlet – where local people were demonstrating their skills with various sized chisels to make elaborate carvings, mostly of jungle scenes with elephants and monkeys and coconut palms. They were almost 4D, as layer upon layer wood of was cut away so that you could see trees behind animals and jungle flora behind trees, etc. The wood has to be imported from Cambodia as the Thailand Government have banned any more trees being cut down for this purpose. Wood pictures are not my cup of tea, but the workmanship was dedicated and the labour intensive and beautifully done. I wonder what they feel like when they complete a piece that measures over 6 feet square and has taken months to complete – thankful that the chisel didn’t slip I suppose.

Onwards again for over an hour, to a pier, where long boats (much narrower than that we fished from on Koh Samui, but just a long), were waiting to take us up the canals to the floating markets. The water was again extremely high, and as they sped at full speed we received more than one drenching as we sat on small cushions almost on the floor of the boat – we thought of Jean and Juz – they wouldn’t have enjoyed this experience at all, as the boats rocked precariously in the wash, after passing other river traffic. But we all arrived safely at the market surrounding a junction of two narrow canals (this area is known locally as ‘the Venice of Thailand’. There were “shops” on both sides of the canals, and if you wanted to make a purchase from one stall on the other side, and you had already alighted from your boat, you could send your order and money over in a wicker shopping basket via rope pulley systems. It was a typical market selling everything from clothing, to furniture, fruit and veg to toys, hats and fans, etc. We wandered along one side on foot, and I was fascinated to watch the Thai women, with small braziers in their boats, cooking meals of dim sum, spicy chicken and noodles, or huge vats of rice, while other women washed their cooking pots in the canal water, beside these moored boats. The smells were delicious. We also tried a variety of new fruits – we had started yesterday with mangostein (?), a small, round, purple skinned, segmented fruit with a slimy white lychee type pulp in the centre, and also jack fruit – a bit like mango, but drier, sweeter and slightly chewy. Today we tried sweet tamarind – like dry dates; pomello (which had in fact been amongst the fruits at Smile for breakfast – like large segments of grapefruit, but sweeter and less juicy than we are used to; and very small bananas, about the size of your middle finger, only a bit fatter. They were richer and sweeter than their big cousins.

On leaving the market, we were told it would be at least another hour until lunch at Kanchanaburi, so it would be a good time for a snooze, so we cat-napped for the rest of the journey. The restaurant was by the river and we all chose the set menu – sweet and sour pork, hot plate fried chicken with egg, pork with mushrooms in oyster sauce, mixed vegetables, and of course steamed rice – all for 120 bahts per person – about 1.75 GBP. And you could always ask for more. We were all stuffed and sleepy after the meal – from Singhas or food I am not sure, but we only had a very short ride to the outskirts of the town until we reached our next destination, the region of the Bridge over the River Kwai.

We first stopped outside a monastery, with a very large float, decorated in polystyrene dragons and mythical creatures, all painted in vivid colours, with alms pots on the sides. Apparently, for three months a year, during the rainy season, the monks cannot leave the monastery to collect food, as they do every other morning of the year. So just before the rains arrive, the local people take floats, such as this one, around the community to collect the food for the monks. Also in the grounds, we could see the late abbot’s crematory (a huge white horse attached to a tall, open sided, Thai style structure) where they burned his body. Crematories are usually destroyed after the burning, but this abbot had been so popular, the local people asked that the structure remained.

We walked from the monastery to a museum called JEATH – Japan, England, America/Australia, Thailand and Holland – all the countries that had been involved in the South East Asian war in this region in World War II. We wandered through the exhibition of photographs and newspaper articles, and even some letters from prisoners of war who survived the building of the railway and had revisited the site many years later. This museum had been established in 1977 by the abbot of the aforementioned monastery as a memorial to those who died – 30,000 British soldiers, several thousand other soldiers and 100,000 local people! – and is now it is actually run by the monastery. The exhibition is housed in a bamboo hut, a replica of the living quarters of the prisoners of war. We then drove to one of the three cemeteries, where thousands of soldiers who perished in this area are commemorated, each with a plaque with a name, age and military unit inscribed in gold, as well as a few words of remembrance. This was very moving, especially as we saw that the majority of the British soldiers were in their twenties.

It was then time to go to the famous bridge itself. It is a large black metal structure (there were two bridges built at the time, one wood and one steel, but the wooden one was destroyed by fire during the bombing). The remaining metal bridge looks reminded me of the “Spender” bridge at Newcastle. Both bridges were completed in 7 months, a phenomenal feat, and possible only because of the inhumane treatment of the prisoners of war and local people, by the Japanese army. We walked across the bridge, high above the river (Colin was a bit wobbly when he reached the other side, but had managed not to look down to the fast-flowing river below). The immediate area along the riverbank is now peaceful and grassy, as the jungle has been cleared to make way for tourism, but it can still be seen as the mountains rise close by. It is hard to comprehend what it must have been like to have been here in the 1940s.

Across the river, amongst the usual souvenir stalls, an elephant was waiting for us to feed her – she was 45 years old, and although looking in reasonable condition, I am sure she would have rather been doing what she was raised for - hauling lumber through the jungle. We then walked to our hotel up a grassy track beside some fields with a few stringy cows – to the Felix River Kwai Resort, an oasis of calm, with pools, palms and fountains, after the grim reminders of the day.

On reaching our bedroom, on the third floor and no lifts, we found two king size mattresses on the floor, with blanket and duvet. It tried each one – one was very hard and you could feel the metal springs, the other was softer, more like a European bed. The bedside tables were behind the mattresses, under the headboard. We found the standard lamp did not work, and the air conditioning was very sluggish, even when set on 5 degrees. The porter who brought our case (remember we only have one case now) looked amazed at our room and asked if we were happy. I asked him if the set up was normal and he just laughed and went on his way. Five minutes later, a troupe of four ladies arrived and put the two halves of the bed together, and completely remade it with clean sheets. We told them about the light, and they called for the handyman, who arrived not long after and fixed the light and fiddled with the air conditioning so it worked more efficiently.

We decided that a swim would be the best cure for our exhausted bodies, so we found the large double-teardrop-shaped pool. The water was warm and birds (swifts or martens, not sure which) were skimming overhead, as we relaxed before dinner.

We all met up in the bar and after a couple of cocktails, adjourned to the dining room. Colin and I both chose tenderloin steak with green peppercorn sauce, jacket potato and vegetables – the Thai menu sounded great, but we would be eating Thai for the next week or so, and took the opportunity to munch an alternative. My dinner arrived – I had ordered my steak blue even though I remembered how delicious Dave’s “shoe leather” had been. When the plate arrived the potato and veggies were cold, but the steak was warm and the middle, pink – not bloody. So as not to let the meat go cold too, I started my meal, along with others at the table as their meals arrived, dish by dish. The Thai people do not have a sense of occasion for eating – they do not think that you all may want to eat together – and serve the food as it is ready in the kitchen. At this hotel the food is brought out and put on a central serving area, and eventually a specific waiter will deliver it to the table. Some time later this waiter brought Colin a Mexican steak, with peppers and a spicy sauce and rosti style potato cakes. He explained that this was not the dish he had ordered and they took the plate away, only to return it a few minutes later. He again explained this was not the right dish and the poor waiter was very confused – he checked his paperwork as we explained that obviously a mistake had been made when ordering. The Manager of the restaurant then became involved, and a short time later arrived with a different steak, but still not the dish that Colin wanted. By this time it was after 21.00 and Colin was beginning to lose the will to eat. He had shared a small amount of my steak, when I realized there was going to be a problem with his dinner and he ended up by ordering a plate of French fries! Our Tour Leader, Pok, was very upset about the service generally at the table, several other people had not got the right food at first, and others were served the meat part of their main course, which was devoured before the rice and other dishes came along. Another large table nearby, was also having many problems. When we came to pay the bill, the missing steak and the French fries were not shown, but the 10% service charge was!

It is proving quite difficult to get back in the swing of touring again – blogging at night, living out of our suitcase, getting up early, but the visit to the Kwai area today, was worth all the effort. Everyone has seen the great epic film about this horrific time, but being here and seeing it puts life into perspective. Tomorrow is the bike riding outing, so another challenging day in store.