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A city of contrasts, Bangkok blends serene shrines with soaring skyscrapers and bustling streets with quiet canals. Amidst this tantalising environment you'll find sizzling street food, colorful markets, and vibrant bars. Night or day, this capital is a treat for the senses. Your DK Eyewitness Top 10 travel guide ensures you'll find your way around Bangkok with absolute ease. Our newly updated Top 10 travel guide breaks down the best of Bangkok into helpful lists of ten - from our own selected highlights to the best Buddhist temples, places to eat, shops and festivals. You'll discover: - Seven easy-to-follow itineraries, perfect for a day-trip, a weekend, or a week - Detailed Top 10 lists of Bangkok's must-sees, including detailed descriptions of the Grand Palace, Wat Phra Kaeo, the National Museum, Wat Pho, Bangkok's Canals, Damnoen Saduak Floating Market, Chatuchak Weekend Market, Jim Thompson House, Wat Arun and Ayutthaya - Bangkok's most interesting areas, with the best places for shopping, dining and sightseeing - Inspiration for different things to enjoy during your trip - including children's attractions, things to do for free and hidden-gems off the beaten path - Streetsmart advice: get ready, get around, and stay safe DK Eyewitness Top 10s have been helping travelers to make the most of their vacations since 2002. Touring the country? Try our DK Eyewitness Thailand.

A PASSIONATE, AFFECTIONATE RECORD OF ADVENTURES AND MISADVENTURES IN THE WORLD'S HOTTEST METROPOLIS Tourists come to Bangkok for many reasons—a sex change operation, a night with two prostitutes dressed as nuns, a stay in a luxury hotel. Lawrence Osborne comes for the cheap dentistry. Broke (but no longer in pain), he finds that he can live in Bangkok on a few dollars a day. And so the restless exile stays. Osborne's is a visceral experience of Bangkok, whether he's wandering the canals that fill the old city; dining at the No Hands Restaurant, where his waitress feeds him like a baby; or launching his own notably unsuccessful career as a gigolo. A guide without inhibitions, Osborne takes us to a feverish place where a strange blend of ancient Buddhist practice and new sexual mores has created a version of modernity only superficially indebted to the West. Bangkok Days is a love letter to the city that revived Osborne's faith in adventure and the world.

A thriller with attitude to spare, Bangkok 8 is a sexy, razor-edged, often darkly hilarious novel set in one of the world’s most exotic cities. Witnessed by a throng of gaping spectators, a charismatic Marine sergeant is murdered under a Bangkok bridge inside a bolted-shut Mercedes Benz. Among the witnesses are the only two cops in the city not on the take, but within moments one is murdered and his partner, Sonchai Jitpleecheep—a devout Buddhist and the son of a Thai bar girl and a long-gone Vietnam War G.I.—is hell-bent on wreaking revenge. On a vigilante mission to capture his partner’s murderer, Sonchai is begrudgingly paired with a beautiful FBI agent named Jones and captures her heart in the process. In a city fueled by illicit drugs and infinite corruption, prostitution and priceless art, Sonchai’s quest for vengeance takes him into a world much more sinister than he could have ever imagined.

Bangkok Express is an often hilarious, always dangerous, fast moving tale of the tricks and turns in an exotic land where what meets the eye often fools, if not confuses, the observer. Joe leaves behind a life of commuter trains, a messy divorce, and an egotistical boss to undertake an assignment that changes his life forever. For Joe, Thailand is a private investigator’s hardest challenge. A land where women, drink and drugs come with no warning attached and nothing is what it seems. Can Joe untangle a web of corruption and lies and write the report that the ‘suits’ want to see? Or is there something else on offer, something that will bring more happiness than that of a ‘job well done’?Bangkok Express is a beautifully bizarre, exotic novel that will leave the reader feeling like they just stepped off a fast moving train in the world’s most exciting city.

Tuttle is proud to present the very first comprehensive photographic guide to the birds of mainland Southeast Asia, the Philippines and Borneo. Included are the birds of Peninsular Malaysia, Thailand and Indochina, as well as those found in South China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. This book covers 668 species and contains more than 700 colour photographs. There is a distribution map for each species. Many of the photographs in this magnificent volume appear for the first time and have been carefully selected to show the most important species. The concise text provides vital information that will ensure accurate identification of species in one of the world's most diverse avifauna regions. Indispensable reading for all bird lovers.

Bangkok like you have never seen it before. The author takes you on an architectural adventure through the bustling streets and busy canals of this regal city. The author's well-researched insights and his beautiful sketches will heighten your appreciation of Bangkok's palaces, temples, monuments, pavilions, markets, public buildings and many other quaint corners.

In the twilight years of Thailand's ailing King Bhumibol, battles between royalists and their red shirt opponents are increasing, and the tectonic shifts that lie beneath Thailand's decade-old political crisis have become increasingly apparent. Serhat Ünaldi's Working towards the Monarchy sheds new light on recent developments with its bold analysis of urban space in downtown Bangkok: buildings, the author finds, are abstractions of the complexities that shape Thailand's transformation. Most criticism of the political role of the Thai monarchy—its deep involvement in Thailand's uneven capitalist development, Bhumibol's endorsement of military coups and his silent acquiescence to political violence—has focused on the role of individuals: the king, the royal family, or privy councilors. Ünaldi departs from such limited intentionalist approaches to show instead just how deeply enmeshed the monarchy is in Thai society as a whole. He demonstrates how and why Thais from all walks of life drew on royal charisma to advance their individual aims, in effect "working towards the monarchy." Ünaldi's sociological analysis of urban space reveals how buildings and spaces have been constructed for political and economic ends, particularly to shore up the monarchy. For several decades the architecture in central Bangkok has helped protect the charisma of the monarchy, which dominates landholdings and investments in the area. Because the sacred aura of the royal family legitimized capitalist expansion and consumerism, it was defended and enhanced by those Bangkokians who profited from it. Yet politically and geographically marginalized Thais failed to benefit from this royalist-led capitalist development and eventually found a new leader, business tycoon-cum-politician Thaksin Shinawatra. When Thaksin's followers turned against royal charisma and attacked the architecture that represented and supported it, movement away from royal charismatic authority became a real possibility for the first time. By combining sociology, political science, architecture, and anthropology, Working towards the Monarchy offers a unique interdisciplinary approach. It will interest scholars and generalists alike, particularly those involved in the comparative study of monarchies.

A good Thai girl spills the inside story about dating Thai women. You can find love in Thailand with girls who are marriage material, look like billboard fashion models, work in office jobs, speak fluent English, and don't see you as just a meal ticket. But it's not easy or automatic. In Thailand, you can't just approach strangers in public, even at a club or bar. And many of the women who you might think are "good Thai girls" are actually prostitutes in disguise. This book is the complete Thai insider's guide to meet good Thai girls, online or offline, understand typical Thai girls and red flags to watch for, go on a first date, proceed to sex, and pursue a long-term relationship. Learn Thai cultural points, such as spotting ladyboys, negotiating a family's requests for a marriage dowry, and even dressing for a date in Bangkok. It's not hard. You don't have to speak Thai. Even if you've never been to Thailand before, you can manage it. Linda Chomatree was born in Bangkok, studied in the US and the UK, and now travels between the US and Bangkok, working in her family's real estate business. She's seen foreigners in Thailand fall flat on their faces dating prostitutes or embarrassing themselves trying to chat up random women on the street. This book is her project to try to help foreign men find love with Thai women who aren't prostitutes and who don't tarnish Thai women's image. Your good Thai girl is waiting for you. This book is for finding her.