Bangkok: East Meets West, Part I - A Western City

Hello and welcome to Bangkok. After spending about 24 hours here, I have decided that my next two posts will be a miniseries, "Bangkok: East Meets West." I've ALREADY seen SO MUCH here, and have so much to talk about (watch, I plan a couple of long posts, and they'll be one paragraph...), that I'm splitting it up. Here in Part I - A Western City, I'll talk about my transit, arrival, and impressions of the Western-ness I've observed. Tomorrow (or so) I'll write Part II - An Eastern City (bet you didn't see that coming) and talk about the Eastern-ness I've experienced (royal palace, temples, architecture, etc). I already have a ton of pics and video to share, but of course I'm still having difficulty uploading, so they may, unfortunately, have to wait. So without further ado, I present:

Bangkok: East Meets West, Part I - A Western City

I arrived in Bangkok on Saturday 30 Aug around noon bangkok time, after getting in a taxi Friday, 29 Aug, at 1 pm paris time. Sure there was a 10 hour flight involved and a 5 hour time warp, but I think it was still a lot of traveling for whatever period of time I was actually in transit (still not sure how to calculate that :) ). Although protestors here have shut down 3 airports in Thailand, they left open the international one (sukhumvent or something) - I guess they still want the tourists to arrive (although we aren't numerous...damn weak US dollar.).

The flights! Were awesome (barring the 36 euro i paid for my luggage being 3 kilos overweight. ugh. and this was AFTER i moved stuff to my backpack, which then clocked in at a svelt 11.8 kilos - plenty of room to spare with the 12kg limit!). I slept on both - CDG (paris) to Amsterdam (just north of 1 hour) and Amsterdam to Bangkok (10 hours on the nose). Amsterdam airport was cool. It's like a big ol' shopping mall, complete with American food court! Burger King was packed, so I just had Sbarro's...served by Mario (of Super Mario Bros. fame) himself! (creepy resemblance now that I think about it) During my layover, I listened to some music and did a little shopping and reading (I bought a book on how to make small talk, cause I think I suck at it. the book seems to be helping! if you need advice on the matter, just contribute to the 15 euro i spent on it, and I'll be glad to share :) ). The Bangkok flight was great. Had a nice seat in the aisle that seemed to recline a degree or 2 more than usual - a welcome miscalibration. Also, the headrest had little flaps you could fold up, so you could roll your head and have some support. sweet. This was the first flight in recent memory I used the blanket and pillow provided (are these still around on US flights?). They showed Iron Man, but having just watched that, I opted for the nap session. I awoke to an interesting first meal (there were two): like three small cubes of beef, green beans, rice (all three hot), then a cold green bean salad (KLM, what's up with all the green beans, did you stockpile when spinach and tomatoes went bad 3 years ago?), a piece of bread, and some puddingy dessert. Pretty lame compared to British Airways.

After dinner, went back to sleep for a few more hours, watched a little bit of the new Indiana Jones (snooze fest), and went back to sleep again. This time I awoke to a rather delicious breakfast! I was a little timid to try the western omelette egg hash looking concoction, but looking to make good on my promise to myself to try everything presented to me, I dove in. It was great (relatively speaking - we're on an airplane here people, don't forget)! I also enjoyed three mini puffy pancakes over apple preserves, a roll, this fluffy yogurt / raspberry sauce dish, and one other cold thing I can't recall right now. I didn't speak to anybody around me on the flight.

We landed right on time (at least that's what they told us - I had no idea, so thrown off from time changes) at the international airport, which is a behemoth. It took me like forever to get to customs and the money change people (not a terrible rate... at least I don't think. def wasn't rip off fest '08 like in rome when $200 turned into 100 euro in March). Going through customs was a pleasure, primarily because I was ON MY GAME and was first on line when the new teller opened!!! Boy those poor saps waiting in front of me on the old line must have been sad. Prob saved myself 30-45 minutes, which was great, cause Jose (my boss) was waiting for me outside (I actually saw him through customs grab his bags from the baggage claim, but wasn't about to scream past the national security people. he took a direct flight from paris to bangkok, which he told me was almost diverted to land in India on account of a passenger seizing onboard. there were 2 doctors on the plane that came to his rescue). Jose and I shared a taxi to the hotel, as the guy with my name on a placard never showed up!! (there really was supposed to be one!)

Once at the hotel, we split up to our rooms. I unpacked (finally not living out of a suitcase - never unpacked in Paris, didn't feel like home. plus i'll be in thailand longer - incredibly hard to believe right now) and then went to the 'gym.' I hope they don't advertise it as such on the website, cause it isn't. There is a treadmill, a bike, a stairmaster, and a rowing machine. I tried all 4 for a nice cardio warm up, and NOT ONE was functional. Since it was hot, I was already sweating at this point, and felt 'warm' enough - so I just hit the weights. I did bi's and tri's and then some abs (the equipment for all of these is lacking). It felt great to work out for the first time since the MCAT (may 10)! I'm still feeling high today from it. The hotel describes its fitness center as,

Taking regular exercise is good for your health, so we provide you with choices of quality exercise equipment and sauna in our superb fitness centre. Or you can experience a soothing feeling while enjoying the limpid water in our large outdoor swimming pool. Stay fit and healthy whether you are on a business trip or vacation.

I think 'quality' is perhaps the adjective farthest from accurate in describing the facilities, and 'superb fitness centre' is the funniest thing i've read in asia yet!

After my workout, I went back and showered, and then waited for Jose in the lobby. He came down around 6, having overslept (I was down at about 4:30 cause I wasn't sure what time we agreed upon. I just read and watched people come in and out of the hotel... and I actually fell asleep too). Jose took me on the metro here a few stops down (skipping the 'Eastern' stuff - that's for next post), to what must be the shopping capital of all of eurasia. We went to one tremendous freakin' mall. We must have rode the escalator about 7 flights up and down - past a bowling alley (think lucky strike), several car dealerships (bmw, maserati, porsche, ferari, I kid you not - IN the mall!), fitness center (now HERE was quality), and movie theater (think muvico, jon) with IMAX. My jaw hung low the entire trip. I was NOT expecting to see this here. Next, we walked along the sky route outside (its above the street) and passed THREE MORE equally ginormous malls. We took a taxi back to the hotel, and picked up Manju (really nice girl in her 30s, she works at the India office), another Union employee, and went to dinner.

Along the whole western city theme, we had dinner at a place Jose read about in the Times. Apparently so too did everyone else there, cause they were all clearly expats (don't worry, the staff were all Thai). The place was great. I tried a Lychee drink (anyone know what that is? i had no idea before i tried it...) cause Jose and Manju ordered it as well. For appy I had these seafood skewers with spicy sauce. Pretty good! Came with shrimp, eel maybe, and salmon. For dinner I got massamum lamb. This is the same dish (though I usually get with beef or chicken) that I've had twice at this Thai place in hicksville matt likes. Having had the authentic Thai version now (or what I imagine is authentic...I still haven't hit the street vendors), I can say hicksville does a pretty good job (i think its #49 on their menu... maybe 59, or 52?).

After dinner, we went to one of the night markets which I'll save for 'Eastern City,' and then Manju and I went out to a bar (Jose went to sleep) in patpong. This too was pretty interesting, as one of the waitors there tried to sell me cocaine (I think - it was a little folded up piece of paper with something in it... and he was shady about it...). Once he got the message I didn't want (he tried 3 or 4 times?), he offered to get me another heini. I happiliy accepted :p This bar was also funny because they had a live band covering American rap songs! I took a video of "In the End" (Linkin Park), and will post when I have better bandwidth.

Manju and I finally convinced a cab to take us home on the meter (most try to rip you off), and I went upstairs, got my wifi on, and posted to you all. I went to bed at 4am. Manju called at 8 to wake me. I got up and slowly made my way downstairs to the free breakfast included with my room. I paroozed (can't figure out how to spell that one properly...) the buffet to make sure I made a wise decision before taking food. There was some (what i imagine to be) traditional thai breakfast stuff (noodles, chicken dish, veggies - looked like takeout from yim's wok), and some american stuff (lots of rolls, bfast meats, an egg station). I started with a roll cause lots of the stations were running low (I showed up about a half hour before close), but then I noticed a magical thing, a new plate of pancakes!! I jumped up, got me two pancakes, when just then, the egg guy put out an egg! I took that too. I topped my fresh egg with a slice of cheese which melted, took the fresh pancakes, two pieces of old oily bacon, some 'artificial maple flavor syrup,' (thanks for the warning, Royal Benja!), and made myself an egg mcmuffin. delish!

At 1030 I headed out for my private tour of the royal palace and temple with Manju, but that's all Eastern baby.

On account of being 5 hours behind and on 4 hours of sleep, I am going to nap.

A bientot,