Souvenirs from Thailand

One thing that a balikbayan worries about before going back to the Philippines is the buying of pasalubong. I have the same worry in the last month of my stay in Thailand. I know that many people expect tokens from me when I return to my normal mode of life in the Philippines.

I made a list of people who will receive pasalubong from me. I included in the list my bosses, close office mates, close friends, some relatives, my brothers and sisters, my parents and my future in-laws, my future wedding godparents, my godchildren, and my Beloved. I also made sure that I will have my own souvenirs from the beautiful country of Thailand.

Key chains are the usual tokens that I buy whenever I travel around the Philippines. In fact, I collect keychains to mark the places that I already visited. The keychains shown in the above photo were given to some of my supervisors and other bosses in the office. For my other office mates, I gave these keychains:

Key chain of masks

I can't recall the exact price of these key chains. I think a pack of of those key chains costs around 100 Baht. I bought these key chains in Chatuchak Weekend Market.

Key chain looks cool but what's more cooler are refrigerator magnets. I now prefer to buy ref magnets during my travels than key chains. I aim to cover the door of our refrigerator with all the ref magnets that I have.

These are the magnets that I gave to my friends. They're pretty to look at and the good thing is that it costs 10 Baht per piece. This is much better and cheaper than the ref magnets (below photo) that costs 100 Baht per 3 pieces.

Expensive ref magnets

I bought the 10-Baht-per-piece from the Sinthai – Jatujak store in Chatuchak Weekend Market. The store is located in stall 121-125 Section 8 Soi 14/3 of the weekend market. I highly suggest this shop because their ref magnets are cheap. You may contact the shop owner at his mobile number 089-991-2828.

Aside from these, I have other ref magnets that I bought from other places in Thailand.

(Clockwise from upper left) key chain from Sukothai, and ref magnets from Doitung Flower Garden,
Ayutthaya, Mae Sai and Chiang Rai.

Now you have a hint of the places that will I post in the future.

Big bosses should have a special kind of gift, which means that it must not be a key chain. What I bought for them is a bell that doubles as bottle opener.

Bell + bottle opener

I also bought shot glasses for another Big Boss.

What I like with these items is that they are placed in decent boxes. I just handed them to the big bosses without the hassle of looking for boxes.

One challenge is in searching for souvenir gifts for my parents and future in-laws. My search is easier for my father and future father-in-law because I decided to give them baseball caps.

My only mistake in buying these caps is that I bought it at a market near the Grand Palace. One cap costs 400 Baht in that market! My blood pressure went up when I discovered that the same caps cost 250 Baht each in MBK. I was tricked! Grrrr...

Lesson learned. I must avoid shops located near popular tourist spots.

I had a hard time searching for gifts for my mother and future mother-in-law until I reached Mae Sai, which is the northernmost town of Thailand. I found these beautiful jewel boxes in the market of that town.

Each box costs at a reasonable price of 250 baht. Too bad that I didn't have the money to buy gold and jewels that I will place in these boxes.

I bought another gift for my mother when I was in Ayutthaya, which is this bag:

The bag costs 150 Baht.

The elephant is the symbol of Thailand. So, I searched for elephant stuffed toys. What I found are the following:

I gave the small elephants to my godchildren. I gave the big one to my Beloved.

There are other items that I bought from Chatuchak Weekend Market, MBK and other stores around Thailand. Of the many souvenirs that I bought, the ones that I value the most is this copy of the Holy Bible from a church in Rangsit town in Pathumthani Province...

The Holy Bible in Thai language.

...and the image of Our Lady of Thailand that I bought from the store of Bangkok Cathedral.

I value that copy of the Bible because it represents the parish church that served as my refuge during my 6-month stay in Thailand. It also reminded me of my Thai Catholic friends I met in that church. The image of Our Lady is highly valued because it is a very unique souvenir. Very few tourists buy this image as their souvenir of their visit to Thailand.

These are the few items that I bought as souvenirs from Thailand. I have other items that I didn't include here like the shirt I bought for my niece. I know that that my blog post will be very long if I include them all here.

How about you? What are the things that you buy to serve as souvenirs for the places that you visited. Please tell us by leaving a comment.