There are two Khao Sans. Khao San Road, where you go if you want to know what several hundred backpackers getting drunk in third rate bars, endlessly retelling tales of daring-do on the backpacker trail before self consciously eating grasshoppers on a stick, looks like. The increasingly desperate story begins in Khao San Road, glamourising the unglamorous.
It refers to the beach of the title, but could equally refer to Khao San. Luckily there is more to this area…. The other Khao San exists in numerous side streets closer to the river. I rather liked this other Khao San, it felt a bit like Shoreditch in London, just a lot warmer and with fewer beards.
Where the Khao San Road does bargain basement, the surrounding area has evolved into a vibrant and alternative scene that attracts almost as many young Thais as foreigners. There are hip bars, pop-up restaurants and trendy hotels. Even the massage parlours look half decent. The whole area has a very different feel to it, familiar and alien at the same time, which is presumably why it attracts so many people.
There are still plenty of food stalls and a constant stream of people trying to sell you stuff. None more constant than the Akha women selling wooden frogs that make a croaking sound when rubbed with stick.
That sound will live with me for an eternity. They quickly become a familiar part of the background noise in Khao San…and by familiar, I mean you can easily be offered twenty or thirty frogs in an evening.
