Ironically, Backpacker's District on Khao San Road has become one of the top attractions for tourists in Bangkok. For one, many visitors are likely to stay there. Khao San has, by my estimate, about 100 hostels. But these hostels come with the added price premium of being located in the Backpacker's District. Frugal travelers, travelers "in the know," and worn travelers who scorn touristy areas shun Khao San and stay elsewhere. Yet nearly all, I am told, venture there at least once during their trip, if only to gape at the bleary-eyed Westerners.
For me, Khao San was an attractive introductory course in Bangkok. Here, and nowhere else, street foods are occasionally labeled in English, which allowed me to get a sense of what I was ordering -- a sense largely missing from looking at the item's color and shape. Vendors catering to all Western tastes cram into the short street, and spill over into neighboring streets. So a short walk introduced me to all kinds of massages, stores, vendors, and, through the travel agencies, events and sights that I later bargained for away from Khao San.
Brits, people speaking German and Americans are the predominant species in Khao San's ecosystem. Brits are mostly rising college juniors on summer vacation after a nearly ubiquitous junior-year internship. The German-speakers I saw have always been in families or large groups. The Americans seem scarce, or at least don't announce themselves the way Americans traveling through Europe do
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