×
John was very knowledgeable and was excited to take questions and share information. He was upfront about what he had expertise in and responsive to the group
Jakkrit was not actually Jakkrit. He said he was the brother of Jakkrit and his name was John. He was late, he didn't flag himself when he arrived and his English was very poor. The tour unfortunately, was extremely awkward and uninformative. He told us that for one of the temples there is a 50 baht entrance free but we didn't have to pay if we didn't want to but then he went into the temple complex and finished his tour in the temple complex which forces you to pay. He also said if we left the tour early we had to tell him so we can pay the commission fee. He would also say the wrong information. We asked if the color red had significance in Buddhism and he said it was made from mercury which was not the question. He also complained about his wife during one of his talks. He had a microphone that didn't work properly but he kept trying to use it during the tour. At one point, he blocked an entire side walk to give another talk, disrupting the foot traffic. When a couple said they had to leave early for a cooking class he said the tour was almost done but spend another 20 minutes talking about nothing. I asked him about temple etiquette and he replied and said, "as I already told you, you cannot kill animals in the temple" Which I think is obvious but also we should not kill animals outside the temple too. There was a Spanish family of five that could not understand him and at one point they thought the tour was over because he didn't explicitly say it was over. He was a kind and good person but not a good tour guide. I find it to be disingenuous for Jakkrit to send his brother in his place. This is false advertising.
The best tour guide ever, the food we tasted and ate was delicious and cheap, thanks to the guide. After more than 3 hours wandering around we ended at the 24-hours market, which I didn't knew about. THANKS!
