In the middle of
September my mother received an email from my father asking us to come to
Thailand for an urgent matter. The next day we quickly went to a ticketing
office and booked the ticket. I had to be absent from my school and other extra
classes. I couldn’t even sleep before our trip. The day dawned; I wore a nice dress and went
to theairport with my mother. Our flight was at 9.00 am, so we went to the
airport about 7.00am. We declared our luggage’s and went to our gate. Our
flight was AIR ASIA. About 8.45a.m, we boarded the aircraft. However, at 9.00 a.m.,
we departed Bandaranayke International airport. While we were flying we saw the
Puttlam and Trincomalee bays. Our flight took three and a half hours to reach
our destination, Bangkok. At 10.00 am (local time) we arrived at Bangkok
Swarnaboomi International airport.
A view of Colombo air port in the morning
We collected our baggage from the baggage claims
and went into the airport. Our father stayed in the south of Thailand. That
area is known as ‘Hatyai’. So we waited at the Bangkok airport for about 2.00
hours. We ate from the airport and declared our baggage. Then we went to our departure
gate. It was a domestic flight operated by AIR ASIA. We boarded the aircraft
and sat in our seats. About 5.00p.m (from Bangkok time) we departed Swarnabhumi
international airport.
Bangkok International Airport
About 7.00 pm we arrived at Hatyai International
airport. We cleared our baggage and went outside the airport. Then we met my
father and with him went to his apartment. The next day we went to a department
store in Hatyai. It’s called “Tesco Lotus” with only the ground floor. In that
department store, there are many kinds of consumer items. As you enter it, you can see a food corner.
Next to it is the play port where children can play many kinds of games such as
car, bike and war games etc. I mostly played car games.
I love playing car games
As you go inside the
shop you can see that there are many kinds of consumer goods such as electronic
items, furniture, phones, fruits vegetables, clothes etc. we bought many things
from it including a flying helicopter. After shopping, we went to the food
corner and had some meals and went home. I had a lovely time in Tesco lotus.
The next day we went to another department store named “Big C Extra”. It was
also like Tesco Lotus but it has three stories and bigger than Tesco. We did
shopping there too. Similarly, we went to several department stores. This time
my father suggested that we could go to Bangkok. So on Saturday we went to the train station
and booked first class. Our train was on Sunday. So the next day, we went to
the station. We had a lot of bags and a TV so we went to the station with my
father’s friend in a van. After we had arrived at the station, we unloaded our
bags from the van and went to our platform. The train arrived at 6.15 pm. We
got into the train. As we booked the first class there were rooms. So we went
to our room.
The room in the train we travelled from Hatyai to Bangkok
It is an air conditioned room with a big seat, a sink and a large
window. We had our meal in the train. Around 7.00 p.m. the attendant of our
compartment came and unfolded the beds for us to sleep. About 9.00p.m., we slept.
About 6.15 a.m., I woke up and looked out. It was the beautiful sight with
scenery. About 7.00 a.m., the waiter brought our breakfast. It was a delicious
soup. We had our breakfast. At first, I
loved the ride on the train but when we reached Bangkok I felt sorry because we
were nearing to Bangkok the train was very slow. At about 12.00 p.m. we reached
Bangkok. We had already booked a hotel from Hatyai so we went to that hotel
directly. It was a big hotel with many rooms. Our
room was no. 404. We kept our bags in our room and went sightseeing. First, we went by a sky train. To travel in
it, we got tickets. We had to insert the card in a card reader to go to the platform
where the train stops. By that train, we went to a destination called
“NakomPathom”. After we had got down from the train, we saw a large department
store with 7 stories. We went in and bought some stuff. Then we came to the ground
floor of the department store and found the food corner. We bought our food
from one of the food stalls. The food was very delicious. I ate every morsel of
the food. Then we came out of the
department store. Then my father asked me if I wanted to go by the sky train or
the underground train. Since I had never gone by an underground train, I said that
underground train was my choice. So we went to the underground train station. I
felt that it was a bit hot there. For underground trains, they issue computerized
tokens not cards. We paid money for the station we wanted to travel and got our
tokens. Once the token strikes the detector, it opens the gates and lets the
passengers go to the other side where you will find the platforms. After about
2mts our train came and we got into the train and sat comfortably. The train
was quite fast and it took to Hualampong Station in about 15 minutes. When you
leave the station, you should insert the token at the gate. By this time we
felt hungry so we went to the food corner of the station. We had our dinner
there and went to our hotel. We had a wash and went to sleep.
Next day early in
the morning about 3.00 p.m., we woke up and got ready to go to the airport. The
hotel we stayed provided us with a taxi to Swarnaboomi International Airport.
It was the first time that I travelled to the Bangkok Airport by road. Throughout the journey, I looked around while
moving towards the airport. Whether it
is night or dawn, there is a stream of traffic so we took the highway leading
to the airport. We arrived at the airport about 4.00a.m. We put our 4 bags in a trolley. We went to
the check-in counter and dropped our bags. Then we went to the departure gate
where our flight was scheduled to leave for Colombo. We traveled by Air Asia
flight FD3100. We boarded the plane.
This time we had our father with us. So I was very happy. About 8.30a.m.the
plane left Swarnaboomi Airport. During the flight, I talked about various
things with my father. After a while we had our meal on the flight. Then, about
10.00 a.m. local time we arrived at Bandaranayke International Airport. Then we
got down from the plane and went to the baggage claim. There we took our
baggage and put them into a trolley and went to the exit gate and called a taxi
to get to our home. As I was going home, I was still thinking about the good
time I had spent in Thailand.
Gavindu Samaranayake
