Our cabbie, “Joe,” was a talker, and he kept us entertained our entire ride into town. Told us about the best restaurants around, and asked tons of questions about the cruise ship – when it docked, etc. –so he could plan out his day tomorrow. Quite the entrepreneur – very smart!
We arrived at the Hotel Boss about 7:30am, and it was a hive of activity. Good Lord! The people! Ed specifically picked this hotel because it had early check in (we paid extra – but definitely worth every penny). We walked right up, checked in, and were in our room before 8:00am. Totally worth it!
The hotel is pretty new, and incredibly basic. Teeny, tiny room but on the 10th floor with a decent view of the city. It has over 1,000 rooms and 2 elevator banks on either side of the hotel. Crazy. But all we cared about was that we had a place to put the luggage as soon as we arrived, and then had a place to lay our sleepy heads when we were ready to nap/sleep the night. Worked perfectly.
After getting settled and changed, we wandered out into the surrounding area, checking out the Hawkers Market down the street for dinner possibilities and trying to find the wine store. Never found the wine, but found a 7-11 that had wine and beer, so we bought our supplies there, then headed to a cute little local coffee shop, Toledo’s Espresso Nook, and filled up on double shot cappuccino. Yum!
Back at the hotel, we dumped our purchases, reconnoitered our neighborhood maps, then headed out again snapping pictures of the two mosques in the neighborhood.
The little streets were crowded with small restaurants and silk shops – all getting ready for business. The whole area reminded us a lot of Warorat market in Chiang Mai - the stores, the portico over the sidewalks, the mix of people. Very familiar to us.
Meandering around, we found a side street with great murals behind the mosque…
...then continued our explorations, checking out lunch options. We settled on a little cafe on the corner of Arab Street, with”authentic Persian cuisine.” They had an “all day happy hour” and the owner was very sweet, so we grabbed a nice table under the fan and ordered our Persian meals. A Lamb “set plate” for Ed (typical Lamb Kabob with rice and salad for lunch), and a Lamb Doner Wrap for me. Both excellent, authentic, and filling.
Afterward, we strolled the streets again, looking at restaurants, then headed back to the hotel where we actually napped for a couple of hours, a rarity for us, but definitely a necessity after all those hours flying.
Later that evening, we decided just to go to the little Hawker’s place next door for dinner – it’s a little more pricey (everything being relative, like $1USD more), but it is close and we don’t feel like walking back to the Golden Mile stalls. Ed gets some sort of soup bowl, while I try to get chicken satay, but after waiting 5 minutes for the girl to come out of the kitchen, she tells me they are out. Ugh. So I go to the Japanese place for a bento box, I want the BBQ chicken with udon noodles. The girl says it is spicy, and I say a little? Yes. Ok, I can do a little. Turns out she gives me the Udon noodle soup – which is not what I wanted, and it was spicy! I ended up just eating the noodles and picking out the chicken But really, it filled me up, so it wasn’t a huge deal
Back in the room, we watch Raiders of the Lost Ark and start to watch something else, before we fall asleep in our teeny little room overlooking the city.
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