A Bangkok Trifecta: Dragons, Flowers, and Mall—Feb. .7–12, 2024

While I was in Bangkok. I enjoyed seeing three major places and activities:  Chinatown lunar New Year’s, celebration, the flower market, and the Icon Siam mall.

The highlight of my time in Bangkok was participating in the Chinese New Year’s celebration of the year of the Dragon in 2024 on January 10 and 11th.

On the 10th I went to Chinatown area of Bangkok and saw lots of people, many dressed in red, all along the major road in Chinatown It had lots of tempting foods for sale. I went with a couple watermelon smoothies as I wandered through the crowd.

On the 10th, Princess Sirindhorn was honoring the Chinatown celebration with speeches and gifts. 

The princess was entertained by a variety of performers, and the last was the golden dragon that ended up, heading down into the crowds in Chinatown.

The following day was more exciting because they had the two person dragon performance on elevated poles that was very exciting. It looked like there were about six dragons. They were competing with each other, jumping from pole to pole and stretching out to the crowd.  

Dragon pole dance performers are eating Thai Bahts as they move along the admiring crowd.

I visited the nearby Wat Traimat Temple while I was in the area.

I visited the nearby flower market on my way to Chinatown.and it was filled with acres of cut flowers— most predominantly orchids, chrysanthemums and roses. The smells of roses and jasmine permeated the air within the market.

In Bangkok, there are many high-rise malls, mostly focused along the skytrain route, but I had never been to the Icon Siam Mall that was along the Chao Phraya River. I took the skytrain to the river and then caught the 8 Baht shuttle to the Icon Siam mall. This mall was one of the largest and newest malls in Bangkok where you could spend all day shopping and eating your way around.

There seem to be a lot of Japanese restaurants here and many many high-end apparel stores, and even floors containing luxury automobiles for sale.  Since it was Chinese New Year’s, there were several dragons parading around and stopping at the stores to give and receive blessings for a prosperous new year.

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