Back in Bangkok for just one full day, my mom had but one goal: to eat at Raan Jay Fai, perhaps the most famous restaurant in all of Southeast Asia.
Jay Fai opens her doors at 9am, but you have to be there early if you want a chance to eat. There are no reservations, but they do set a notebook out on a folding table in front of the restaurant at 8 where those who have been queued up since 7am can write down their name for a ticket number.
We got our queue ticket and sat down next door for some coffee while we waited.
You must be diligent if you want to eat here. The staff shout out each queue number two or three times, but if you miss it, or if you don't hear it, you're out of luck and you'll have to come back another day. A few of the people ahead of us in line weren't paying attention and missed their chance to eat at Jay Fai's restaurant.
From the outside, the open-air shophouse restaurant looks like any other in the Old Town. There isn't even a sign in English, but you can't miss the hordes of hungry travelers lined up for blocks in front of Jay Fai's
Since then, she's become world famous for her wok-cooked seafood dishes made with the highest quality ingredients and for her iconic cooking goggles.
Today, it's one of the coolest and most unique temples in Bangkok and has become an iconic symbol of the city.
My wife made a donation so that Mom could "make merit", or engage in a ritual for good karma and blessings, for her upcoming birthday. Mom wrote her name and birthdate on a golden leaf, which she hung from the hand of the deity guarding the chedi.
It was about 10am, but after having waited around in the already hot and muggy morning air for a few hours (and after having been very annoyed by the angry tourists who missed their queue number), we decided to have a breakfast beer. And after all, Thai street food pairs best with an ice-cold bottle of Singha!
Jay Fai is best known for one dish in particular, the one that earned her a Michelin star: her world-famous crab omelette.
With street food usually running in the $1-$3 range, it can be hard to justify spending 1000 baht (about $30 USD) on an omelette. Jay Fai's omelettes are special, though. She came to fame by seeking out only the freshest and best quality ingredients and serving massive portions to her hungry customers.
The crispy egg of Jay Fai's famous khai jiao bu is wrapped around the freshest, juiciest, sweetest crab meat that you've ever eaten. This isn't that imitation meat you find at the store, but the real stuff taken right out of the crab's claw. She's not conservative with the crab, either! There had to be several full crabs stuffed inside there.
I guess you could come to dine alone, but the experience at Jay Fai's is really meant to be shared. My mom, wife, and I ended up ordering three dishes so that we could sample as much of her menu as possible.
Our second course was kung tod-gra-tiam, grilled prawns stir-fried with garlic and pepper.
The prawns were genuinely the largest that I had ever seen - each one was about the size of a child's fist.
Our third and final course was bu pad yellow curry. At 1,500 baht (about $50 USD), this is the most expensive item on Jay Fai's menu, but in my opinion, it's worth the price for a special occasion. Every bite was absolutely incredible, and although we were getting full, you just can't bring yourself to leave anything uneaten on the plate!
We ate it all and loved every bite.
Even with the high cost and long wait, Raan Jay Fai is well-deserving of its reputation. Dining here is a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
We still had time in the day, and since we were in the neighborhood (Rattanakosin, to be exact), Pinky and I took Mom to one of her very favorite places in Bangkok: The Golden Mount.
Wat Saket is a royal-grade Buddhist temple dating back to the Ayutthaya Era (the 17th or 18th century). Sometime in the late 1700s or early 1800s, King Rama III ordered the construction of a huge stone chedi on Rattanakosin Island, which unfortunately ended up collapsing. Over time, the pile of rubble was overgrown with trees and plants and ended up becoming a sort of hill.
In the 1850s a new golden chedi was constructed on top of the hill to house a holy relic from the Buddha himself, and a concrete wall was added in the 1940s to protect the structure from ever collapsing again.
You have to walk up a winding staircase to reach the top of the Golden Mount. Prayer bells line the walk, which visitors ring as they make their way to the peak.
Rising high above the Old Town, the Golden Mount offers some of the best views across the sprawling city. It's also one of the only places in Bangkok where you can always feel a nice breeze.
We took turns ringing the gong at the top of the Golden Mount, then descended down yet another winding staircase, enjoying the views across Bangkok and searching for famous sites such as the Grand Palace or the Temple of the Dawn.
We still had a little time, so I took Mom and Pinky to the Bangkok National Museum, a place very near and dear to my heart! For the past few years, I've been working with the National Museum in training to become a volunteer guide. It's through this program that I joined the Neighborhood Walks program, and I really credit it with helping me to learn more about Thai art, culture, and history in a more academic way.
there wasn't time to visit every single exhibit, but I wanted to make sure that we saw the beautiful Buddhaisawan Chapel.
In the past, the area that is now the National Museum was known as the Front Palace. It was the residence of the Second King, or Viceroy of Siam. The Buddhaisawan Chapel was the private chapel of the Second King's household and is home to the second most holy Buddha image in Thailand after the Emerald Buddha at the Grand Palace.
The chapel is best known for its incredible murals which tell the story of the life of the Buddha.
We enjoyed a temporary display about Japanese and Siamese porcelain.
Then, we visited a garage where the royal carriages are kept.
These golden chariots are used only for extremely important royal functions such as funerals or coronations.
Finally, we visited the historic residence of the Second King, a fascinating blend of traditional Thai-Chinese and Western Victorian architecture. A Chinese family shrine stood in the center of the living room, and an oil portrait of George Washington hung on the wall near a marble bust of Emperor Napoleon III of France.
Even though we had just returned from Chiang Mai, we were going to be leaving again the very next day on our next big adventure. It was afternoon, and time to rest, do laundry, pack, and engage in all the other unglamorous tasks that pre-travel preparation entails.
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