Phi Phi Island Glimpse

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(view from our hotel room)

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Leaving Thailand in just a few minutes.

Gonna miss it here.

Bangkok: Megalopolis or Game Show?

Let's be honest. If you're going to do Bangkok, it might as well be in a single day. And if you're going to do Bangkok in a single day -- reality tv style -- it might as well be on that venerated of holidays, the eve and morn of His Majesty the King's birthday.

It's, like, the backpacker-tourist holy grail. Getting past the scammers to find out if things (the Grand Palace?) are open; finding the whereabouts to mix the nightlife with the daylife; and generally surviving the throngs, the heat, the stickiness, and the weirdness and grime long enough to make it back to your room and take yet another shower. Just on our block on the infamous Khao San Road, there are without a doubt over a thousand vendors. I didn't even take a lot of pictures (O rarity!) for fear of losing my camera, and anyway who needs snapshots of Chang Beer tank tops and another chicken-on-a-stick cart?

Meanwhile, we managed to get a blissfully vegetarian meal in at a spot Brita and Lonely Planet recommended (thanks B-Munny!) -- as good as the food is in Thailand, it might be served devoid of any vegetables, and often entire menu sections start with "deep fried" -- and a delicious, legit, roast duck place (seconds on the duck, please!) frequented by locals and recommended by our guide, Suwit, who travels to Bangkok often.

I have to jump around. Like I said earlier: love the blog, but don't have ten hours to catch you up on everything! Saw the reclining Buddha. Tres sweet! Impressive indeed. We loved the details, mother of pearl, outlining the stories of the 108 Buddha postures, on the soles of his feet.


Wat Arun was a favorite for both of us. The ferry ride over is exciting; the detail is incredible; the temple's steep ladders no joke; and the proximity to the water and the Grand Palace impressive. Wat Arun at sunset, meanwhile, is downright romantic.

After dark, and another gauntlet walk through Khao San -- which by now, on the eve of HM the K's birthday, was basically unapproachable by car -- we got taken by a broad-grinning tuk-tuk driver with the fume-belching, backfiring three-wheeler from hell (300 THB -- about $9 -- for a trip that cost us THB 59 returning in a wonderfully air-conditioned taxi.) But we did, eventually, get taken to our destination: the swank Sirocco bar, high atop the city -- the kind of place, in short, we could never get into in the States (if it exists at all.) We bought Ash a pair of $5 close-toed rubber shoes, a size too small, from a street vendor so she'd be allowed up.



Even in Baht, the place was mighty pricy -- but the voyage well worth it.

By this point, we felt totally toast. But we weren't too surprised when a polite game of Thai'nglish charades with the cabbie revealed that we'd be getting dropped off somewhere short of the hotel -- the King's birthday would allow nothing closer. No matter that tens of thousands of people clogged the street, and we weren't sure of our location, much less the route back. But the Thais do make for a safe, orderly mob -- snapping pictures, staying sober, leaving quietly at the end -- so we didn't mind sticking around for a rather amazing sensory display I can't really discribe, with human dragons, fireworks, music, high-wire gymnastics, colored fountains, loudspeakers echoing out propaganda, and the like.



We've met several people from the region whose only pilgrimage to the States was to Disney Land or World, if you get what I'm saying. We'd heard Ratchdamnoen Klang -- Ratchdamnoen (or, Rajdamnern) also being the name of our street in Chiang Mai -- was decorated for the King's bday, but we had no way to know it would be like this. Also, word had been that everyone wears yellow for the King on his birthday. That's not quite right -- when he's ill, as now, everyone understands to switch to pink ("happy color!")

The Grand Palace -- open, free, to the teeming pink hoards; ornate, resplendant, and reverant, and angular -- was supposed to be (a) not open yet; (b) closed entirely; or (c) um, well, discussion, closed, emphatically closed, according to, on our walk, (a) a cab driver; (b) a tuk-tuk driver; and (c) a group of policemen and women.

We asked (c) because we didn't feel we could trust (a) or (b), who had agendas and wanted to take us elsewhere. The police, however, were equally wrong; you have to be very careful how you ask certain things of Thai people, because they won't answer you in any way that might displease you. So, "I don't know" was not an option, even for the cops. (See previous post for the Maehongson stories; we learned to ask Suwit not when we would get somewhere, only how many more kilometers it was.)

Anyway, we got our "Bangkok scammers" stories. And while I realize I'm not doing justice to any of these places, and have almost completely dropped the Grand Palace, I'm actually too tired to go on, which is totally emblematic of how Bangkok makes you feel anyway.

We made it back to the airport, exactly 24 hours after we'd left it. We went a little early, just to be sure. After all, we needed a calm meal, a little space, and some air-con.

NEXT UP:

The downshift. Ko Samui -- which is raining cats and dogs at the moment, some time after midnight -- is about as far, holistically, from Bangkok as you can get...

Wrap: Chiang Mai, Maehongson, 3,000+ Curves

...................................AH!

To wake the day and find you are standing atop an elephant, in the Pai River, in Northern Thailand. Really adds pep to that morning commute.

It's funny, I can't wait to blog, and then sit here (after much faux techie dallying, always -- suffice to say, I cannot post video; and don't kick the chair or the computer crashes) and wonder how I can possibly 'splain the tip of the iceberg.

To mix metaphors.

Let's take a new tack today: What have we learned?

* That elephants may henceforth be referred to as "banana-eating machines." And enjoy dunking you every bit as much as, say, Toby.

* That the Thai are infintely friendly and polite; to a fault, even. So much so that our guide waited three days to tell us that shortly after we left, his daughter called to say his wife had been hospitalized... and he interrupted the conversation to humor a local woman who was explaining that, because their coffee maker was out, they'd like to offer us a glass of juice on the house; and by the way there's a guest house for rent on the top of the hill, next time we're in the area; you see she used to be a teacher, but retired, and...

[-Ok, well, back in the car. -But, um, about your wife?]

Note to Dad & Vic, who turned us on to Suwit, who's been wonderful: it sounds like she'll be pretty ok, at least considering after an earlier stroke (this one was apparently prevented with quick action and blood-thinners) she was semi-wheelchair bound.


It's also true they will not give you bad news: such as, This road I've selected is superduper(!) curvy (the Maehongson chamber of commerce opens early to provide visitors with a certificate notarizing the 1,864 curves you've endured on the road from Chiang Mai, though you must remove your shoes to enter); there's no food from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.; everyone here drives crazy; and we'll never (and didn't) make it before dark.



* A lot of places in Northern Thailand, it's awfully hard to take a bad picture. (Others, if you take more than, oh, say, 1,000, your girlfriend gets a little sick of it.) This photo shows that, although it's a shortcut to burn your rice field for fertilizer, the result not only smells pretty cool, it makes for some awesome valley settings.



Conversely, it's hard to take a good one in a cave; even a really great cave. But we already know this. It's just that sometimes you need something to do, in a cave.



* Rich likes food pictures.



(Why yes, that is my awesome girlfriend, about to devour one delicious! red herring that arrived head, tail, and skin.)

* Um. At a certain roadside stand in the mountains yesterday... I might have eaten a cat.

Might.

Have eaten.

A cat.

(That's what I get for passing up the bag of grasshoppers in Chiang Mai.)

* Ashley is very, very patient. Sensitive soul, yes, but she travels well and can put up with a lot! Plus, very practical. She tells me this is from the seven years in New Yawk: "We get things done." And of course, still lovely. (And a big fan of elephants -- even more than tigers!)

* There's a great place for grilled duck in Bangkok. (Thanks to Suwit for that tip.) Ah, but the king -- longest-running king anywhere in the world, over 60 years -- is not healthy enough to deliver his birthday speech... again... this year.

Also learned: the Thais love the king literally as a God here on Earth. The crown prince, though: kind of a shmuck.

* Thailand may seem like a smallish country, but it's got a ton to offer. We've canvassed just a tiny corner (Google maps the Chiang Mai and Maehongson provinces) and I've told you just a small fraction, but imagine the change when we hit Bangkok, for instance, or the ocean abutted by limestone cliffs.

* For once, I'm finally about out of words.