Thailand – Laos Travel: Day 3 – Part 4 – Muslim Food Stalls and Night Market in Prachuap Khiri Khan

For the Malay language, click here.

Continued from the entry Thailand – Laos: Day 3 – Part 3 – Wat Ao Noi in Prachuap Khiri Khan. For pre-travel, please refer here.

For friends who have followed my travelogue and writing on Facebook, you may already know that the story of Prachuap Khiri Khan (PKK) stopped here, namely the Muslim stalls and the Night Market. I can’t wait to continue the story about our family trip after this entry.

Why call it Motorcycle Tuktuk (MT)? I don’t know the term tuktuk used by this region. Yes, the call name for this type of transport is slightly different according to the district even though the function is the same. After the tuktuk rider sent us here, we quickly and vigorously went straight to the stall without overthinking or complicated because we were too hungry.

The location is next to a bank and is only open from 5.00 pm onwards. These are the only Muslim stall in Prachuap town. Indeed, we have checked other places and no Muslim stall, except at the Night Market. They sell chicken rice with a choice of regular rice or sticky rice. I suggest trying the sticky rice here (“pulut”), it’s very delicious!! The prices are pretty affordable and range from THB35 to THB50 per plate.

Some may ask why always highlight halal places? First, because it is my duty as a Muslim to preach to my fellow believers. Secondly, because I have a blog for travel information, especially Trivacker, the purpose of traveling is to share all kinds of information found along the way.

GPS location of Muslim stall: 11.803989, 99.797282

The waiters at the stall are very friendly and like to joke with our kids. Among all the persons working there, no one can speak the Malaysian language. While we were looking at the fried chicken that was being cooked, there was also a local man (refer to the first picture at the top standing in front of the stall) who had just stopped there and asked us, “where are you from?”. I replied, “Malaysia”… “Oh Kuala Lumpur?” … yes … answered us. But the look in his eyes is different like a person with a mental problem, but I treat him well because we’re all human beings, despite their other circumstances, are still servants of God. Then he left us there. Maybe he is excited to meet outsiders like us or has beautiful memories of a long time ago in Malaysia.

Here there are about 5 to 6 tables and not all tables are full because many customers are busy having their meals. Tatie and Aqif seem very happy. Everyone can’t wait for the food to be served, including me.

Best of all, the customers here are mixed, Muslim and non-Muslim.

I showed the “Like” sign until I forgot to take a picture of the chicken rice because it was too delicious. Thailand is famous for its particular types of rice, such as fragrant rice, sticky rice and others. All because of the food and manufacturing technology there. In 97/98, Thailand was no exception to the Southeast Asian currency crisis. But due to the technology of manufacturing, production and canning of food, they managed to survive.

Notice there’s a food stall behind me? It is common to do business side by side with non-Halal traders. Unlike in Malaysia, such a situation will look disgusting. Want to be an all-rounder traveler? Accept the fact that this situation is happening all over the world. If you can’t suit it yourself, don’t travel anywhere! Indeed, from the beginning, I have trained my family on how to deal with this problem.

Before going home to Maggie Guesthouse, we also ordered extra chicken rice for a takeaway, and we might feel hungry later in the middle of the night because there is nothing to eat. In front of Tatie is the 7-Eleven and on the right side of the picture, there is a row of shophouses which is the first place we stepped our foot when we got here for the first time.

Because our guest house is only 300 meters away, we just went back on foot without hiring any public transport. While walking, I like to look for abnormalities to differentiate it from the surrounding of my country. Then I saw a local clinic here. I want to capture the differences in construction and decoration, the way patients wait, the arrangement of furniture in it, the reception counter and more.

An example of a bank here is Siam Commercial Bank. See the shape of the building (which is a shophouse) where the ATM is at the bottom together with the parking lot and counters and the administration on the top floor. Interestingly in Thailand, it’s very rare to see vehicles parked overnight on the sidewalks of the main road. If there is, the locals stop by for a while in the parking lot to hang out for a dine-in or go to the grocery store. A high fine? Manners? Discipline? Or consciousness? The habit of double parking, similar to Malaysia, does not exist in Thailand.

Arriving at MG, Tatie reminded me of the Night Market that Nok had informed me about this afternoon. It is located by the beach and so we continued to walk there. But, oh forgot to tell you, before that, we stopped by Maggie Guesthouse (MG) to place the chicken rice that has been ordered earlier in our room and walk to the night market, hands-free.

The current atmosphere on the way there is the best. It feels like walking by the seawalls in Padang Kota, Penang.

The wind here feels a little different. Moderately strong, but the wind was a bit smooth, calm and cool as well. The gusts of wind feel like in a movie where a book writer is relaxing in a bungalow house on the shores of Scotland waiting for inspiration to emerge. Very engaging and able to make people pensive instantly.

Aqif stared at the beach while puzzled “where is this place, huh?”

From a distance, you can see the Night Market. But we relaxed first on the edge of the beach wall. Of course, there’s nothing we can see straight at sea, but I realized that we were already close to Bangkok and within the coverage of the Gulf of Thailand, which, if by road, would circle thousands of kilometers until we reached Cambodia.

Behind me is a very long jetty built by the local government for tourism purposes. From Google Maps, I think it’s about 380 meters long! We did not set foot on the jetty because we were a little bit exhausted. However, it’s enough to look from a distance. Moreover, when you reach the middle of the jetty, you don’t see anything other than the night atmosphere. Fortunately, my camera with a large sensor can ‘swallow’ the lighting around this jetty successfully.

The Gulf of Thailand extends as far as Cambodia. The green line is the point of view of our eyes if we continue to look ahead (Cambodia). Notice on the left side of the map. Our distance to Myanmar (Burma) border is very close. Prachuap is the nearest location if you want to step on Myanmar soil.

Why didn’t we cross Myanmar for a while? We’re not interested in short trips. If you intend to enter Myanmar, satisfy yourself by exploring all the places as much as possible. Maybe next time…

Tatie stood behind the building and the hallway leading to MG. The distance of 300 meters from here to the end was our first location when we arrived at dawn earlier today. Such was the darkness of the night we had to endure.

The first pinpoint of our location when entering the Night Market for the first time. Maybe it can be used as a reference for you. GPS location: 11.805204, 99.799126

After spending 15 minutes on the beach wall, we set foot at the night market. It is huge and divided into two parts. The first part is before reaching the jetty earlier (pictured above) and the second part is after the jetty. For those who want to hunt for halal food stalls, we suggest walking up to the 2nd part and past Saranrom Park, which has dragon statues surrounding it. There are 3 halal stalls that sell chicken rice, omelets with snails (I can’t remember the type of snail name), and others.

While writing this blog entry, I just remembered taking a few pictures of Muslim sellers here.

There are a variety of food dishes but it’s non-halal and we can only stare at it. Except we can eat only fruits.

We also came across a stall selling children’s clothing and bought a shirt for Aqif there.

As soon as we got close to the jetty, I noticed a few soldiers and police were escorting a VIP or maybe a minister. They are surveying the area. Maybe for a site visit or came to shop at the night market. I asked a policeman behind them who the VIP was, but he shook his head and walked away. I felt that maybe he did not understand English and they had to move quickly to follow those VIP groups.

The gate leads to the jetty. With a width of almost 10 meters and a length of 380 meters, I think this is the longest jetty I have ever seen in my life. Unfortunately, the signboard is in Thai writing.

After taking pictures at the jetty, we set foot on the 2nd part of the night market. The breakdown of these two parts is self-categorized by me. So, how do you know where the Night Market segment begins and ends? It’s easy. The jetty and Saranrom Park (dragon statue in the picture above) are the central dividers.

We did not go straight into the 2nd part but surveying Saranrom Park first. Don’t be confused because there is also a place with the same name in Bangkok, Saranrom Royal Garden. Unfortunately, because I can obtain no information from Google, I can’t tell the origin of the Saranrom name.

I know of the only purpose, which is as a place of worship according to their religion. Maybe it can give them good luck or security in their lives.

Saranrom Park location from Google Maps.

One thing I like about these Thais, despite entertaining here and there, eating delicious food, shopping at the night market and others, but still do not forget their God/Goddess, as well as diligently in praying. Everywhere they pray. What about us with practices that are believed to be right?

This woman was surprised because I took a picture of this place and at the same time, she got up from the place of prayer and faced me. May your requests and prayers be granted. We might not know. Maybe they have problems in life, chronic diseases, financial problems, marriage problems, business problems, etc. I consider it a servant’s affair with their respective creators.

Buddha statues, which is the main attraction of Saranrom Park.

As usual, water dragons act as “guardians of the area”.

Couples who are praying and worshiping. As if there is a similarity, the visitors’ clothes here are all black.

Among the water dragon figurines in small size. A beautiful small house placed the candle, glowing like a higher self placed in the body as a house and waiting to be recognized by the lower self.

I entered the park alone while Tatie and Aqif were looking out from below.

The atmosphere at the Night Market. Seems a lot of visitors here.

The atmosphere is on the left. So that’s where we’ll go shortly.

One last photo shot at Saranrom Park. The water dragon has very bright lighting.

At the edge of Saranrom Park, there is an arrangement of beer bottles. I don’t know what the purpose and symbolism are.

Looks like chicken rice with salted fish eggs. But it is not halal.

One of the Muslim traders in the 2nd part of the night market. Pity her, many times I asked, “Muslim? Halal?” And many times she answered back but I can’t hear well probably because of the noisy surrounding. I asked many times because I thought maybe the face mask was not a Muslim hijab/veil but a face mask. After all, she wanted to cover it from the cooking smoke.

Finally, she answered by shouting…

ASSALAMUALAIKUM!!!!!

Me: Waalaikumsalam. Ok, I want to order one … lol.

In Thailand, eggs fried with snails are delicious! While writing this blog, I still remember its deliciousness.

There are also stalls selling unique foods such as quail eggs cooked on pans with many holes. Looks small and cute. I think this method or technique does not exist in my own country. Although sold by non-Muslim traders, I think it is still edible. Just because Malay throat like me who have long been indoctrinated that some types of food from sellers of non-Muslims are legit to eat even look disgusting to eat, so I didn’t buy it. Hopefully, I’m able to scrape the old doctrines that have been planted in my head since childhood.

Next to the quail egg stall earlier, there is a Muslim stall that sells chicken rice. It looks like the one we ate in the middle of Prachuap town earlier.

Your sister looks cute, isn’t she? Hehe. There is all kind of sellers here.

Want to buy local fruit? Sometimes it’s hard to ask, “how much per kilo?” The sellers here may not understand. The solution is to give her THB20 or THB50 and lets her weigh the fruit so that it is equal to the total amount of money you gave.

Belangkas. The last time I ate was when I was a child in my grandma’s village in Penang, Malaysia. Although living in two worlds, but the fatwa allows for eaten by Muslims.

The chicken is being fried. Non-halal. He uses up to three large pans.

Some even sell catfish in jars. I forgot the price, but it’s cheap.

Skewered ice cream. I want to eat it but am worried because, in non-Muslim countries, there is also a lot of ice cream, sweets and so on mixed with a small amount of alcohol.

View of the jetty from the direction of the 2nd part of the night market. Below the jetty, we can also walk or relaxing in that receding area.

To head back towards the guest house, I suggested to Tatie that we follow the path near the edges of the sea walls as the middle section was too crowded with buying and selling activities.

We pictured for the last time behind the Night Market.

There are many buying and selling activities in the night market facing the sea for unique, rare and strange items. We also came across beer-soaked with scorpions, snakes and so on as found in Cambodia. According to locals, it is used as strong medicine for men. Do you understand what I’m trying to say? Hehe.

It is located next to the jetty gate. Not sure what was written. But the “Checked-in” symbol that looks like Foursquare, Facebook check-in and Google Maps are the marks that make us interested. Before we took pictures, some Thais were not from the town of Prachuap and took pictures there. I asked them what the writing meant. The answers given are worse than the language of chickens and ducks. They do not understand English at all. I’m not sure if they understand my question or don’t know how to spell the writing, or maybe they’re not Thai and a tourist like us.

Saranrom Park with a background of Night Market traders.

Small type buddha statues are sold here. But, to me, this scene is very rare. Well, it’s not available at any night market in my country.

There are rows of chairs for massage in the 1st part of the night market area and overlooking the beach.

Cheap because for 30 minutes of massage duration, the price is THB100. Because we came with a small kid, so we didn’t take the massage services here. It will take one hour for both adults like us. We couldn’t wait to get back because we were sleepy and too tired.

That night we went back to the guest house in a rather tired state. The mixed tiredness of the previous days is compounded by not enough rest and sleep. Due to greed to buy halal food, it seems like tomorrow there will be a lockdown due to an emergency or the 3rd world war or zombie apocalypse, so there is a lot of surplus food in our room. We only finished it half not because of too full, but because of feeling too sleepy.

“Tomorrow we need to get up early,” I told Tatie. Tomorrow is the last day in Prachuap town and needs to check out at precisely 12.00 pm, as Nok told us. We appreciated her request as she allowed us to check in earlier at 9.00 am when we first arrived here.

Continuing on the 4th day, Thailand – Laos Journey: Day 4 – Part 1 – City Pillar Shrine at Prachuap Khiri Khan.