Mo Chit Uncovered: A day at Bangkok's busiest bus station

[somtamslap]

The Northern Bus terminal, or Mo Chit, is Bangkok’s biggest and busiest station. Serving provinces predominantly in the north and northeast of the country, it’s an axis of excursions for all different walks of Thai life – with thousands of local and foreign travellers using the station daily.


Mo Chit smoulders.

It smoulders with the humidity of the city, and the exhaust fumes of idling buses, and the soupy steam of perspiration emitted from the nomadic masses.

Fortunately there is a veritable swath of eateries within the terminal building where one might purchase a snack and a drink, or even a full plate of food in order to obtain a modicum of comfort and satiate the appetite before the vehicle departs.

Let’s meet some of the characters passing through one of Bangkok’s most vibrant gateways…

Bum and Trevor

It’s outside a 7-Eleven that we meet our first pair of passengers: Bum, a 41-year-old Thai national who hails from the Thai/Laos border province of Mukdahan, and Trevor, a 67-year-old retired butcher from Stockport.

Apparently engaged in a deep and heated recourse, we let the couple conclude their tête-à-tête which ends with Trevor marching into the shop with a cocked and loaded wallet.

Meanwhile, Bum remains somewhat forlorn at the entrance:

“He will not stop drinking!” she tells me, while reaching into her handbag for a menthol nasal inhaler to clear her nose.

As if to add some authenticity to this statement, Trevor presently emerges to the dulcet ‘ding-dong’ of the 7-Eleven sliding doors with a carrier bag fit to burst with large bottles of beer Leo.

“Just a little aperitif,” he says, expertly cracking open one of the bottles with an upturned cigarette lighter and deftly putting paid to half of the contents.

It’s hard not to notice that Trevor and Bum have packed to excess today with no less than four large suitcases in tow.

“We’re moving to the sticks,” remarks Trevor, gesturing towards their laden trolley.

“Yep, it’s far too expensive for us in the big city, so we’re going to stay with Bum’s parents in Mukdahan for a few months while we sort out our own accommodation.”

Bum looks pensive. Trevor drinks.

And the unlikely couple go on their way…

Greta and Heidi

Gap year students Greta and Heidi from Holland stand out amid the sweat-sodden masses.

They are six feet tall, blonde, fresh-faced and beautiful.

Attached to backpacks which could quite happily accommodate an Isuzu D-Max, the ladies go on to inform me that they are heading into the wilds of Thailand’s Isaan region today, where they will embark on a two-day trek around Khao Yai national park.

Each sporting quirky apparels freshly plucked from the stalls of Khao San Road, they represent every European twentysomething on that much-hallowed voyage of self-discovery while subsisting on a budget of minus five Euro per day.

“Today we will travel on a second-class bus to Pak Chong”, they chime almost in unison.

“This way we make a saving of 40 baht”.

They, of course, had the option of using Nakhon Chai Tours or the First Class service, but their parsimonious approach to world travel has apparently moved them to employ the services of a bus company with a track record for mainly reckless driving with occasional disastrous results.

Still, Greta and Heidi weren’t to know this.

But they will.

Upon the cessation of the journey one can only surmise that they will be on the telephone to their parents regaling how their lives flashed before their eyes, and could you please send sufficient funds for me to get back to the Western hemisphere post haste.

Sniff, sniff, sob, sob.

May

Next we meet May, a glamorous, silky-haired 20-year-old with an hourglass figure, soft brown skin and a knowing grin which belies her tender years.

May comes from Surin, Thailand’s driest, and therefore poorest, province.

She has spent the last seven months seeking her fortune in the big city and is now heading back home to share the spoils with her family.

May has been a rather busy young lady, and during her stay in the Big Mango has accrued no less than six foreign boyfriends – from Singaporeans to Scandinavians – whose combined donations have made her a millionaire.

But things haven’t always been so easy. Just eight months ago, when she wasn’t up to her neck in buffalo shit, May would toil hard under a tropical sun, harvesting rice by hand and maintaining drainage ditches and canals.

“Now we can buy our own rice!” she tells me, a big beaming smile etched onto her face.

Indeed her trolley is laden with 10kg bags of Hom Mali (the Mercedes Benz of the sacred grain) as well as a selection of dried and cured foodstuffs. May has certainly proved that bending over in a bedroom is significantly more lucrative than doing so in a rice paddy, and more power to her.

Nonchalantly stepping on to the bus now, her iPhone 6 begins to buzz in her jean pocket. She answers.

“Hello darling, how are you….” And the conversation is lost amongst the melee.

And so the sun sets over Mo Chit Bus Station – but you can bet every grain of rice in Roi Et that its doors will open again tomorrow.

And another band of colourful and complicated characters will spill through en route to wherever their lives are destined to go…

http://whatsonsukhumvit.com/mo-chit-...t-bus-station/

[Dillinger]

I see you've omitted Slap the self fornicator in trap 3

[kingwilly]

How about a few of the thai guys hanging around?

Bus drivers, nose pickers and general ne'er do wells ?

[somtamslap]

I see you've omitted Slap the self fornicator in trap 3

Oh yes. The infamous wanking episode. I forgot. How could I forget.

That's the next feature sorted then. Best public place to toss oneself off in the big mango.

Bus drivers, nose pickers and general ne'er do wells ?

It would help if one of that little lot was a psychotic Yabba dealer with an itchy crotch. Just for the purposes of a peppy story and what have you.

[barrylad66]

may has just given me a little 'twinge'

[somtamslap]

Indeed young May has quite the knack for making a cock a move. The filthy minx.

[withnallstoke]

Indeed young May has quite the knack for making a cock a move.

Young May.

[chassamui]

All day? In a Bus station? Really?

I did once spend the large part of a day waiting for a train. Sat on my suitcase, which did not fit in Withnail's Honda basket on the outward journey, because it was full of Chang. I sat outside the station 7/11, in the shade, drinking snag som and coke from a used 14bt plastic coffee cup.
Standards.

[Dillinger]

I did once spend the large part of a day waiting for a train. Sat on my suitcase

Yep he has a big cock does Withnall, hope you're all healed up now Chas

[Neo]

No pictures required..! Excellent

[Chittychangchang]

robbing that picture from the site, tell's a few stories.

[somtamslap]

Reminder to self: Withnall's posts are not safe for work.

A huge oversight on my part that. Half the office copped a load of Amy's testicles.

[withnallstoke]

Reminder to self: Withnall's posts are not safe for work.

They are if you are sat on the crapper with your laptop.

Half the office copped a load of Amy's testicles.

Bollocks.
You could only see a smidgeon of ballsack squeezed out either side of those o so tight panties.

[somtamslap]

They are if you are sat on the crapper with your laptop

In situ right now.

[beerlaodrinker]

Indeed young May has quite the knack for making a cock a move. The filthy minx.

Young may was an expert issan chicken farmer, She has raised a lot of cocks

[DJ Pat]

I once took the bus from there to Pattaya, purchasing two seats as I had two kittens I was going to let loose at a friends place. They were quiet and well behaved until the bus started moving, when they would continuously poke their heads through the airhole I'd made with the zip.

It was cute, and nobody complained. When the constant mewing started it did get rather tiresome.

But we made it. My friend met me on his Triumph bike and we sped along Sukhumvit with me wrestling the bag to keep the buggers from trying climb out

Two years later and those two females have produced litters that have then produced more and more

Just before I got rid of them, two photo scans I crudely spliced together...

[grasshopper]

Their descendents are multiplying adjacent to soi 10 and beach road intersection as I write. Curse you DJPat!

[CaptainNemo]

Construction for BTS Green Line to start

Can't wait to make egg tarts in Rangsit with those uniformed hussies.

[DJ Pat]

^^Also a bit of info about future extensions on this page, as well as links to extensions to the MRT system

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BTS_Skytrain

[OhOh]

It's always Mukdahan!!!!

The city is the Thai Riviera, Venice on the Mekong. Ample restaurants with a view of the Mekong. Visit in the rainy season unless you enjoy looking at sand banks.

Felangs arm in arm with a local lady. Even an opportunity to grab an Espresso. A good supply of ATMs, gold and foreign exchange shops. Heaven on earth to may hiso Thai ladies.

Try some different province or are they all exceptional and banned you from entering them?

Miffed, mounting an expedition to Mukdahan, Monday week, in search of my kitten bound, gold embossed first edition.

[DJ Pat]

^^Not full of backpackers sat in Starbucks updating their blogs?

Sounds like a nice place

A good supply of ATMs

Are they walking around wearing wifebeaters?

[OhOh]

^After a few months of Issan village life Mukdahan is the holy grail. A visit can include filling half the village in the pick-up so they can go to the big city and see the lights.

[DJ Pat]

^^Half the village? In one pick up?

That's seriously against common sense safety rules. What if they crash?

[OhOh]

It was a very small village and the passengers were only women, of little economic value.

I always wore a safety belt. I believed they were connected to a piece of the body! My assumption was obviously taken from past experience, in a civilised country.

[somtamslap]

After a few months of Issan village life Mukdahan is the holy grail

Fishing on the Mekhong? Or getting twatted at the local boozer?

Or perhaps even a grease-down by wisened wench, maw dripping with betel nut juice?