I am at the close of my time here in Bangkok. Tomorrow morning,
very early, we depart for Laos. We are on a 8:30a direct flight, which
we have been advised is often cancelled, so we're holding a second
booking to fly to Ubon as well. We are dearly hoping the Pakse flight
goes, as otherwise we fly to northern Thailand, rent a cab to the
border, manually walk all of our stuff across the border bridge, and
meet a Lao driver on the other side...keep your fingers crossed!
Saturday Kecia and I headed to Jatujak market. It is like a rabbit
warren - rows and rows of stalls burrow along internal passageways,
with the occasional peep of light filtering through the tin roof into
the darkness below, and then you burst into blinding sunlight of the
main arteries and there are flutists playing for donations, steaming
street grills, giant furry peanuts...or rather, some really unlucky guy
who got to dress up as a giant furry peanut cartoon on 100-degree
day...we wandered and haggled, then rested with a glass of lime soda and
some mango slices...and then got back on our feet and trekked around
some more, looking for cool stuff and good bargains. I am happy to say I
have resolved some of my gift issues! But Vietnam will provide me other
opportunities, I think...
After we had exhausted Jatujak, or...rather, Jatujak exhausted us,
we got back on the skytrain (wish LA had something that modern &
efficient!) and took it to the Siam station, where we got off and got in
a tuktuk to go to Wat Po. I had wanted to see Wat Po last time I was
in Bangkok, but didn't have the chance, and Kecia had never been,
despite this being her 10th visit to BKK! Our tuktuk took the most
roundabout random route - we had negotiated the price in advance, so it
wasn't to cheat us, but rather to avoid the nasty BKK congestion (which
actually is worse than LA, if that's imaginable!). We teetered
precariously around corners in Chinatown, looped around traffic circles
with monuments in the middle, and turned so many times I lost all sense
of what direction we were going...and then screeched to a stop outside
Wat Po.
We went to go see the massive
reclining buddha. After taking our fill of the slumbering giant, we
decided we should support the temple, and so we paid $6 to have a
45-minute foot reflexology massive. It was lovely - we sat outside and
drank lychee juice in the courtyard of the wat having our sore,
Jatujak-trekking feet rubbed. It was so relaxing. When we were
finished, it was close to 6p, when the wat closes to farang (not to
Thais, though), and the courtyard was empty, and the scene breathtaking:
the grapefruit-colored sky and the thin arching spires of Wat Po, and
the Chao Phraya passing by slowly a block away. Beautiful.
We then met up with Sophie, a Vietnamese/French conservator, who
told us about this "jardin tropical et si beau" so we decided to go
check it out for dinner. We went down to the water ferry dock to begin
figuring out how to get there. We were waiting for the north-bound
water ferry, when the south-bound ferry arrived. The boat doesn't
really stop, but more slows down, the ferry boy tosses a rope onto the
dock to anchor the boat there, and then you have to haul it very
adroitly to make the boat. This is not a transportation method for
sissies. The boat started to pull away, and a woman standing in the
entry area on the rear of the boat started calling and motioning to a
guy on the dock, maybe her husband? Anyhow, he made towards the boat.
Instead of jumping immediately, to slide onto the open rear deck of the
boat, he hesitated, and with his giant camera bag and
socks-under-sandals, he jumped about 5 seconds too late. He leaped out
over the growing 2-ft gap between the dock and the boat, and managed to
grab the pole at the back of the boat - but couldn't hold it and tumbled
down into the river. Everyone on the deck gasped - we had seen it
coming but were all rooting for him. He didn't fall very far down,
maybe 5 feet, but into the murky brown of the dirty, lotus-filled Chao
Phraya...and completely soaked himself and unfortunately his camera. It
was such a surreal experience. I couldn't believe we actually saw it!
Therefore when our boat pulled up, Sophie Kecia & I made
quickly to board, and held on to the handrails, grasping tightly for
fear of repeating our German friend's mistake. We took the water ferry
nearly 45 minutes up the river - far outside of the BKK city limits, to
the end of the line at Nonthaburi. Then we grabbed a cab, and after
another 45 minutes, this time negotiating and calling the restaurant and
trying to figure out where exactly we were, we eventually arrived at
the Suan Thip restaurant. It was a beautiful garden, with small
pavilions/pagodas with tables interspersed with the lakes, fountains,
and jungle-like greenery. We selected a small pagoda in the center, not
far from the river, and settled in our cushions to (finally!) eat
dinner. It was delicious, but unfortunately so was I - having no idea
we were dining al fresco, I hadn't worn bug spray, and my right leg is
now covered in mosquito bites. Welts, really.
Yesterday our coworkers arrived, and we had a dinner meeting at Cabbages & Condoms. It was begun by a man named Mechai to
promote his family planning foundation - all the profits from the
restaurant go to family planning and safe sex education for Thais. The
clientele was mainly farang. It was a great restaurant, outdoors with
lush foliage and a live musician, with sparkly lights and yummy food,
but the decor was all...made of their primary materials. So, the lamps
were made of condoms. There were mannequins by the entrances dressed in
clothes made of condoms and birth control pills - it was very odd to be there with coworkers...
Today Jeff, Kecia and I worked on putting things together for the
workshop. We depart in the morning from the Massage Parlor King hotel,
near the neon sign of a giant lobster that reads "If it swims, we have
it" - behind Tops supermarket and the Starbucks...this is all soon
behind us for the wilds of southern Laos!
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