Exploration Day - FOSSAsia 2026

I took the liberty of waking up a little later in the day on 11th March 2026 at 0730am Indochina Time. As there was not much on my schedule apart from some exploration of the Bangkok specials and some bonding with the community friends, there was no need to rush. After sharing a quick breakfast with Samyak Jain and Aaditya Singh at the Lumen Bangkok Udomsuk Station hotel, we were ready to leave for traditional sightseeing and friendly conversations. As much as I wanted the KDE e.V. community friends from FOSSAsia 2026 to join our little escapade on that day, it was ultimately down to the three of us in the collective. Being our bonafide dayplanner, Samyak looked into the itinerary for places like Grand Palace, Wat Pho, Wat Arun, Wat Phra Kaew, Erawan Shrine etc. for the morning and afternoon. For the evening, we were planning on scaling the highest observation deck in Thailand, King Power Mahanakhon Skyscraper, with Anuvrat Parashar and Shivani Bhardwaj, who planned on joining our group later. Since we barely had one day before our departure from the country, we wanted to make sure that we not only made the best use of our time but also took our time absorbing what these sights had to offer us.

While Samyak initially planned on squeezing in a cruise dinner as well, Aaditya and I were vehemently opposed to that inclusion, given just how tricky things could have probably ended up with the poor evening traffic conditions in Bangkok. To add to that, we would not have been able to completely absorb the city skyline and the beautiful sunset from the seventy-eighth floor in the evening, had we been in a frenzied rush to depart. Contrary to the other days here, I chose a vegetarian diet on that day with Samyak while we bade farewell to Soundarya Rangarajan, who was departing on that day. We were eventually able to get ourselves a Grab ride from our hotel to the Grand Palace after some impatient waiting. On the twenty-kilometer-long path, we also enjoyed some English and Hindi music, with the cab driver gracefully allowing us to connect to the radio. Once we finally reached the destination, we struggled hard to leave the cab at around 1030am Indochina Time, given just how hot the temperature had become by that time. The humidity was helping us keep our cool but even then, I decided to purchase (and, of course, haggle for) a couple of hats for both Aaditya and Samyak from the adjacent street vendor stores.

After Samyak purchased a pair of sunglasses for himself, we crossed the blocked path to enter the Grand Palace premises. I was also instructed by a friendly tour guide professional to carry my satchel in front of myself to avoid getting pickpocketed, an advice that I really appreciated. With us being sent away from the automatic ticket vending machine, for reasons we could not quite comprehend partly because of the linguistic barrier, we had to purchase them from the manual counters. Thankfully, the place was not really occupied due to it being an unfavourable season for tourism, so while we dripped litres of sweat, at least we were free to explore of our own volition. Passing through stupas and structures, we realized that the 500 Thai Baht costing ticket allowed us entry to various locations in the Grand Palace's vicinity, making it quite a great deal. After breezing through a quick security check, the three of us finally made it into the inner campus where we halted for a while to take some pictures. The first temple that we entered after leaving our footwear outside and removing our headwear had an emerald-laden Buddha statue on display, with an unmistakably peaceful environment that cooled us down from the scorch outside.

Samyak shared the historical lore behind the regulations and, after staying there for about fifteen minutes, we headed out of the temple at around 1200pm Indochina Time. We also made one Paryakrama while keeping the worship construct towards our right as we left the place. The other temples we found were majestically plated with gold and it was enticing to understand the historical origins of the compound. Reading the guide materials provided there, a bunch of which were thankfully in English, the three of us made our way deeper into the campus to finally witness the Grand Palace. While it shared the location with more conventional temples, the building looked distinctively different from them, as if we went through a time-space warp when crossing the campus gates. The Grand Palace building felt a lot more western in its architecture, while the temples established the elegant Buddhist brand in their structure. We, of course, were not allowed to step indoors into the Grand Palace, so we instead were guided by the helpful authorities towards the Textile Museum, present in the same campus. As thirsty as we were at the time, we resisted the temptation of getting the cold drinking water sold there as that would have made us fall sick.

With another set of checks for the tickets, we explored what the museum had to offer us before heading downstairs to make some purchases. I realized that a great deal of their traditional clothing felt similar to what we wore back at home in India. This made them amazing collectibles both for myself and my family, and since I was looking for souvenirs to share anyway, those ended up becoming quite a good loot for me to have. I, admittedly, found myself splurging there as Aaditya and Samyak paired up to hunt for the distinctive traditional design stamps in the museum. Funnily enough, the linguistic barrier made me initially decline a handmade basket there that was being offered by the store staff, just because I assumed that they were trying to sell it to me, first. After some Sawadikas to the helpful attendants and catching up with my personally curated stamp collection, we began looking for the exit gate at around 0200pm Indochina Time. Do not get me wrong though - the Grand Palace area had a lot more to offer but we also wanted to visit the other temples too and had little time on our hands. We also got to witness the Royal Guards marching through the inner campus on our way towards the exit gate of the Grand Palace area.

As there was a complimentary shared bus travel service made available for the ticketed tourists, we did not have to bother walking through the scorching sun to watch the Authentic Mask Dance Portrayal of Ramayana. While we waited for the journey's start, I haggled with yet another local street vendor for some Thailand fridge magnets, all the way from 300 Thai Baht (which was their asking price) to 150 Thai Baht (which I settled for when I began from 100 Thai Baht). I did not realize that this trip to Bangkok was helping me grow in more ways than one, as not only did I get to represent Fedora Project while making some community friends, but my bargaining skills also improved quite drastically. We were able to make it to the Roleplay Auditorium by around 0215pm Indochina Time and made it to our seats after yet another round of ticket checking. The experience of witnessing the Authentic Mask Dance Portrayal felt magical even when the three of us had known the Ramayana legend for a while now, from both Indian and Nepalese folklore. As much as I hated to admit, their rendition of Hanumana felt handcrafted and inspirational in various undiscovered ways, making me emotionally nostalgic and eternally grateful.

Returning to the lobby at around 0300pm Indochina Time, we spent some time looking for some more collectibles to purchase before finding ourselves a Grab ride for Wat Arun. This time I looked for keyrings that I could gift to my family members instead of fridge magnets, which I honestly already had too many of. As we did not have enough time to go to Wat Pho, we decided to make Wat Arun the final stop before going to the King Power Mahanakhon Skyscraper to watch the glorious sunset. Staying connected with Anuvrat and Shivani on the Grab ride, we were finally able to step into the Wat Arun campus. Unlike the Roleplay Auditorium where the entry was complimentary for ticketed tourists, we were taken aback when we had to pay another 200 Thai Baht to enter the premises. That did include a bottle of water though and since we were both hungry and parched, having skipped the lunch plans entirely, spending some more money had become the least of our worries. The campus premises had a myriad of Asian tourists donning the traditional clothing that Thailand was known for before entering the actual structure. Crossing a steep flight of temple stairs, we made it to the other side to witness the beautiful riverside.

It must have been the combo of us being adjacent to the river and the sun gradually starting to set that the temperature started gradually decreasing. That was a welcome relief for the three of us, as we had one more place to visit in the early evening before we could even have a chance at some slumber. As the Wat Arun premises were a whole lot smaller than those of the Grand Palace, we were able to explore a great deal of it in a relatively short period. We decided to spend some more time there taking some pictures, both for ourselves and while helping others out too. But as the sun had started going down into the horizon, we were on the clock here to make it to the observation deck as soon as possible. I was glad to note that the place was not really that far from us, but we still had the flagship Thailand evening traffic to worry about. Getting a can of Strawberry Fanta for myself and Aaditya and Coke Zero for Samyak to keep us from passing out of thirst, we rode one more Grab ride to the King Power Mahanakhon Skyscraper. We were finally able to make it to the bottom by around 0415pm Indochina Time, allowing us to catch up with Anuvrat and Shivani before, of course, taking a long elevator ride to witness the Bangkok skyline.

To our pleasant surprise, the security guard turned out to be a Thailand national who knew Hindi and was curious about where we came from. Some small talk later - we got ourselves a locker space to leave our belongings in and I could finally halt carrying my shopping loot from the afternoon. Before boarding the lift ride, we halted briefly for some group photographs at their courtesy, which felt useful in remembering this trip. We found our ears ringing as we experienced a rapid change in pressure while quickly ascending up to the seventy-fourth floor on the lift. While we would have loved the sights of the cityscape while going up, we had to make do with the digital displays on the walls and ceilings of the elevator. Through the glass walls, we got to experience being at the highest altitude in Thailand while still staying connected to the ground and it was a scenic vista like nothing else I had ever witnessed before. We could not click good photographs here due to the poor lighting, so we decided to head up to the ultimate floor to finally watch the amazing sunset in the Thailand skyline. This elevator operated relatively slowly but that allowed us to watch the gradually rising city view as we headed up by four more floors of the building.

Splitting from Samyak, Anuvrat and Shivani, Aaditya and I goofed around near a defunct archaic telephone booth for a while before experiencing the relieving water mist spray near the rooftop bar. It surely became a whole lot cooler as compared to the heat that we were experiencing earlier in the day due to the impending sunset, but the mist spray giving us gentle moisture was still welcome. Leaving our phones behind and covering our shoe soles, we finally made it to the world-famous skywalk experience with nothing but a thick reinforced glass floor between our bodies and the ground. The seventy-eighth floor was roughly over 1030 feet tall from the surface and it was a surreal experience to watch the vehicles and people beneath us going about their ways. With the staff's permission, I also took the skywalk experience to the next level with some obligatory pushups (because, seriously, why the heck not?). Our little collective helped each other with taking pictures as we listened to some tunes played by the rooftop bar's musical professional. The only things that felt like experience spoilers were the thick clouds that covered the sun, thus not allowing us to have a clear view of the radiant sunset that we were all there to witness.

After availing ourselves of the complimentary drinks, the five of us headed up to the gallery to paint the fleeting moments of the beautiful sunset into our memories at around 0530pm Indochina Time. While the served mango-flavoured and watermelon-flavoured mocktail drinks that Aaditya and I ordered could have been a lot better than glorified diabetes-causing syrups, we were just happy to be there at that time. The rooftop eventually started getting occupied as the sunset occurred and we decided to head down from the populated gallery. We did get to witness the golden lining from beyond the thick clouds as the sun dove into the horizon and the city lights started glowing up to take its place at around 0615pm Indochina Time. Taking the vistas in and projecting our minds out, we also got to witness some firework shows near the ICONSIAM mall, followed by drone shows a few moments later. Wanting to have some more of those beautiful vistas, we decided to leave for the mall in the next moments, but we had to bid farewell to Anuvrat and Shivani at around 0730pm Indochina Time. As they were leaving Thailand early the next morning, it just made a lot more sense for them to spend some moments resting up.

Once we made it downstairs from the seventy-eighth floor, Samyak got himself a printed copy of the photograph we took when we arrived there and we started hunting for another Grab ride for the ICONSIAM mall. We finally had to settle for a Bolt ride instead as the flagship Thailand evening traffic drifted from bad to worse as the night started falling. Our rush was unfortunately in vain, as while we were able to make it to the mall by 0830pm Indochina Time, Samyak had unfortunately been ill-informed by their outdated website about the shows happening once more at night on that day. Since we had made it there anyway, we decided to spend some time purchasing some goodies and getting some dinner to finally be able to recharge ourselves after an arduous day. At the food court on the bottom floor, Aaditya and I got to enjoy some roasted crocodile meat - a meal that the two of us were experiencing for the first time in our lives. Samyak and I also purchased some world-famous Thailand-branded Tiger Balm and the associated essential muscle oils. Letting our increasing bargaining proficiency take the stage, we managed to get ourselves some collagen creams as well for free by pooling our orders together into one big order.

Finding a dining spot was not a simple ordeal as not only did we have to get past our analysis paralysis of which cuisine we would like to have, but we also had to find an eatery place fast as the restaurants had started closing down. We finally settled for some Indian cuisine that one could honestly never go wrong with at a restaurant called Indian Art and amidst conversations about Nepalese famous Khana Sets and Indian famous Meal Thalis, we were able to enjoy some recharging time. Finishing up the food, we were able to find ourselves a Grab ride back to the hotel relatively quickly as we headed outside the mall at around 1030pm Indochina Time. We hung out at an adjacent HelloRide renting stop (thus, making this journey a full circle, if you know what I mean) and had a chat with Aaditya's family back home while we waited for our ride to arrive. The three of us were able to reach back to the Lumen Bangkok Udomsuk Station hotel by 1130pm Indochina Time and after bidding Samyak farewell, Aaditya and I hung out for a while in my hotel room discussing community mentorship, employment opportunities and many other things, since he was uncertain about his future direction, having recently graduated with his bachelor's degree.

Honestly, he reminded me of myself from about half a decade back when I knew about various things but was uncertain about my direction. I advised him to stop looking for general mentorship in open source software communities and instead look for various experts in distinct fields. After helping him out with some more questions, he left for the day as I started wrapping up my own packing since even I was departing on the next day. I took some time to visit an adjacent SevenEleven store at around 0100am Indochina Time to see if there were purchases that I wanted to make before I finished my luggage packing. As I wanted to take back the general regional livelihood experience for my family, I elected to purchase general commodities like dental toothpaste, hygiene products, soft drinks, preferred snacks and other things. I had to blame one of the soft drinks that had traces of caffeine which I ended up having then, because that pushed my sleep schedule a whole lot later into the next day. Finally, after a satisfactory round of luggage packing and some work catch-up, I was able to set an alarm for a relatively later time on the day of my departure and call it a day (or at least try to) at around 0230am Indochina Time.