Thai mosquitoes

Ok, so, we already know that mosquitoes don't care for me but think that Barry is the most delectable thing ever. What we didn't know is that Thai mosquitoes got that memo in spades.

We came back from the lake at Ayudiyah and B was covered with bites. He has, without exaggeration, about 400 bites -- mostly on his feet. It looks like he has leprosy. Me? Not even one.

Ayudiyah

We just returned from a weekend in Ayudiyah, which is the old capitol of Thailand. There is a beautiful lake there, and a gorgeous resort, and lots and lots of water-centric activities. We mostly sat in the shade and drank, and we had a marvelous time!

Barry wore his blue and gold tourist shirt -- it makes his eyes look like lapis lazuli.

We were drinking Scotch as we waited for the resort shuttle, and this being Thailand it was late -- you can imagine what happened! And that is the only explanation I have for this pink picture that must have been taken in the shuttle.

The resort had a beautiful pool surrounded by a virtual jungle of greenery.

Here is a great shot of the curtains in our room. The hows and whys of this particular view can also be attributed to the Scotch!

We went to a party on the lake that evening. This blurry picture of Barry pretty much sums up how I was feeling by the time I took it -- double vision-ed. I must have fiddled with the camera somehow to make the party look all pink, but again -- no idea, so giving credit to Scotch.

The party was for our friends Laura and Brock, who will be moving to Portland in September. Please watch for them!

While we were carousing at the lake a tremendous thunderstorm blew up -- apparently I tried to record it, because I found this movie the next day. It's not terribly exciting, but you can see the lightning. It rained so hard the lawn turned into a rice paddy and we nearly had to swim out of there. I was wearing silver shoes, so you can imagine I wasn't extra happy about the mud. Fortunately, a long shower later my shoes were returned to their original shiny glory so nobody had to cry. xo

Five Stars

This is the Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit Hotel, a five-star Starwood property on Sukhumvit Road. Barry and I had dinner here last night to belatedly celebrate the birthday I spent in flight over the Pacific last month.

This is the lobby -- the picture doesn't do it justice. The colors are warmer and richer in person, the air is ever so lightly perfumed by the giant flower arrangements, the lighting is perfection, and there is a jazz band in the corner to entertain you.

This is the dining room, and again the picture falls far short of the reality. You cannot believe how flattering the lighting is -- we both looked two inches taller, 10 pounds thinner, and five years younger. Wait staff hovers just beyond too close, waiting to do everything except chew for you. The food is divine, the band is sublime, and our window table gave us a view of Sukhamvit, which looked lovely and sparkly and urban in the dark.

The highlight of the evening was when Barry sent three tiny roasted onions flying out into the night when his knife slipped as he cut into a truly enormous steak (best guess: two pounds of meat). We tipped a little extra to make up for it!

Miscellany

Omg, where would I be without Facebook?? Since I've been in Thailand babies have been born, dogs have died, jobs have changed, houses have been bought and sold, kids have learned to walk, hair has been shorn, hearts have been broken, and new leaves have been turned. All on Facebook.

Barry started back to school today and I started looking for a job. Ok, I got a mani/pedi and some waxing -- but those are necessary for employment.

It's been raining. We've been woken up by thunder cracks and very bright lightning two nights in a row now, with rain coming down like buckets of water being thrown at the windows. It's quite exciting, and reminds me of that time Amy and I experienced the hurricane at the beach -- by largely sleeping through it. Admittedly there was some wine involved. And come on -- we DID get up and look out the window.

I've discovered that Lumpini Park offers not only Jazzercise but also House-ercise, Cool Hits of the 70s-ercise, and Avril Lavigne-ercise, as well as Tae Bo. I've also discovered that at dusk the bats come out and swoop around the park eating bugs. Crazy numbers of bats, and very close to one's freshly coiffed red head -- which can be a little alarming, but so far I've yet to see a bat carry anybody off by her hair.

You know how you never know what you're going to miss until you're gone? You know what I miss? Pancakes. How pedestrian of me. Nevertheless, that's what I long for, so yesterday I bought some mix and this morning I made pancakes. Now, I've never actually MADE pancakes before -- but I've seen it done. It took me a few cakes to get my technique down, but I managed, and we ate pancakes until we were good and happy about it. Can you imagine it? I cooked!

And then I left all the pans -- and I'm afraid it took me many -- in the sink, because tomorrow Som comes and cleans up after us!! She will take away the laundry and bring back little towers of ironed panties. She will change the sheets. She will sweep the balcony with her funny little twig broom and dust between our surfaces and the crap we have piled on them, and then she will go away and maybe leave us tiny bananas as a present. I heart Som.

And I heart you, too, and miss you. Call. Write. Come visit. Facebook me! xoxo

New hair

I got my first Thai haircut, and it turned out great! I was very worried, because my natural hair condition is what Stephen and Jeremy fondly refer to as "Jew-fro." My hair could could not be MORE different than Thai hair. Theirs is all straight, thick, and slippery; mine is curly, fine, and frizzy. It's a lot longer wet than dry and I was afraid that a Thai stylist might not know that, thus cutting my hair too short and sending me out into the humidity to quickly become Ronald McDonald.

The stylist spent about six minutes cutting and about 45 drying -- she COOKED the hell out of my hair. It was absolutely straight when I left the salon, and it's already curling up 30 minutes later. I had to show you how it looks straight, because it won't happen again -- I have neither the skills nor the patience to reproduce this.

Rain

Today I got caught in the rain, and it was fabulous! We were walking home and the rain started to fall very lightly and gently, which was fine except it sort of steams on the sidewalk and you feel like dirty air is swirling up onto you. If you don't think about what's in the rising vapor it's fine, but I have seen some things on those sidewalks -- ew.

So we're walking and we're laughing about how we're trying not to think about the dirty street breath getting on us, when the sky opened and the rain came DOWN! We were immediately wet to the skin. It's like stepping into a shower. We were half a block from home and there was no saving us -- we were soaked! We just laughed and held our hands up to the sky -- it's the most amazing feeling to have so much water pouring on you in the middle of the sidewalk in the middle of the day in the middle of what was actually a tiny little tropical rainstorm! We passed our friendly noodle guy, and he kindly offered us an umbrella -- but it was way too late. The girls in the massage salon on our street laughed and gave us thumbs up as we went by. Our doormen scrambled to get us brollies at first, but then realized we were way past their efforts.

It was wonderful!

Titanium

More cocktail party action -- last night we went to one at the Erowon Hotel -- some international networking function. Surprisingly fun! I wore that new black Calvin Klein dress and it was a big hit.

Afterward we went to a club called Titanium. It has an Ice Bar, and not just some cheesy slab of ice with a vodka luge in it. This is Bangkok and they are not playing. At Titanium you are greeted by bar girls in stylized chong sams of various colors and degrees of translucency. You are assigned a herd of them -- exactly how many depends upon how many men are in your party.

They escort you upstairs to a big heavy metal door. A tall and unsmiling man in long sleeves opens the door -- ka-CHUNK -- and cold mist comes wafting out. You can almost hear it sigh. They hustle you inside and close the door behind you. Now you and your party are in the care of the bartender. He feels free to smile and explain the flavors of vodka available -- besides the usual citron and pomegranate you can choose things like mint, chocolate, bubble gum, and tutti frutti.

The glasses are chilling on the Ice Bar -- which is a bar made entirely of ice. There are no seats -- it's too cold in there to stay long. We came in out of a 90 degree night and as soon as we got into the Ice Bar I started shivering -- it is SERIOUSLY COLD in that room. I had my shot of mint vodka and made for the door, feeling like I'd just swilled half a bottle of Scope jello.

The bar girls were waiting when we came out -- customers don't range freely in this joint -- not the men, anyway! They took us down to the main floor and gave us a big corner cocktail table with about a million pillows on the sofas. You had to sort of burrow into them to get a purchase on the seat. It felt pretty good at first, since I was half frozen from the Ice Bar experience.

We had come to see the house band -- famous because it is made up of six tiny Thai girls. Who RAWK, as they say. This being Bangkok, they are a cover band, but they are very good at what they do and it's entertaining to watch their tiny little arms and legs flailing away around instruments as big as they are.

It's also very entertaining to watch the men get hooked and reeled in and landed by the bar girls. First they talk politely, then she leans into him, then he puts his hand on her back, then they dance a little shoulder to shoulder. Then she starts humping his leg and soon they are making their arrangements for the evening, which usually entail Mr. Casanova paying some sort of fee so she can "leave work early." Interesting system.

From Titanium we took a stroll -- always exciting in 4" heels, absolutely thrilling on the treacherous sidewalks in this town. Fortunately, I'm not new here -- to tall shoe-ville, I mean -- so I didn't break a heel OR an ankle, and we made it to Mojo's without incident.

Mojo's is famous for their "coyote girls." Coyote girls, as far as I can tell, are teenagers in spangled underwear and white boots dancing on the bar. It is HILARIOUS. You haven't laughed until you've laughed at a Thai girl trying to be "sexy" in a soft porn kinda way. I'm afraid the coyote girls received extra helpings of gawky and not nearly enough sultry. It made me cringe, and you KNOW how I hate that.

The coyote girls dance to live music provided by the house band. Apparently Barry has been to Mojo's before, because when I came out of the loo I found that the band had invited him and Mike up to play -- and there they were, smacking the drunken hell out of "Hey, Joe" while coyote girls spastically and arrhythmically flung themselves about. This called for more alcohol, so I had some.

Aaaand SCENE!

The way we live now

Here are some pictures of our building -- out of order because I can't figure out how to use the damn program and I'm tired of messing with it! This first one is the view as you come up the stairs from the pool through the breezeway. The background of this temple art is Lapis Lazuli -- brilliant blue stone with tiny gold flecks.
More temple art masquerading as decor.

A detail of the picture above -- stone Pekingese.
And yet more temple art -- this is the landing down from our floor. Antiquities everywhere in the building -- it's crazy.

Seats by the pool. Those are banana trees to the left. They bear tiny sweet bananas the size of my fingers. Our maid, Som, occasionally brings us bunches of them.
The deep end of the pool, The tree on the left bears beautiful white lily-like flowers, and there's a pink one right next to it out of the frame. The blossoms drop into the pool so you find yourself swimming through flowers -- it's gorgeous.
The silver orb in this picture is the filtration system for the pool. It looks like it fell off of Sputnick, so that's what we call it.
A view of the pool with the building behind it.
This is the view as you come around the corner of the breezeway and approach the pool -- so inviting on a hot day!
This is a doorway decoration from an ancient temple. It hangs on the second-floor landing in our building.
This is our lobby trash can -- it's brass and copper and they polish it every day.
This is our mailbox -- the very back of each box is mirrored, as well as the trim around the edges. You can see me in my white dress reflected in the glass.
The mailboxes - I think they're teak.
The front steps of our building.
Entrance to the lobby. Note the temple arch above the doorway.
Lobby chandelier.
This is an example of the flora in our courtyard. There's a lot of it.
These are some of the doormen -- note their snappy uniforms. They are always running to get us taxis, carry our packages, and just generally ease our passage through this world in any way they can.
This is the gate into our courtyard. It has to be operated manually, as is being done here.
We live in Ambassador's Court, which is actually on maps of Bangkok because real Ambassador's used to frequent the joint.

Green Papaya Salad

It's my favorite thing, next to you, and now I've learned to make it so I can have it any time I want and B won't have to beg me to go someplace other than a Thai restaurant for food.

You have to shred or finely chop the green papaya, and I cut myself only once in the process. Then you add this ridiculously hot chili sauce, fish sauce (better than it sounds -- kind of sweet), lime juice, salt, garlic, and, if you're me, more chilis. If my eyes aren't tearing it needs more chili!

I had it for dinner last night and breakfast today, and I may have it for lunch as well. It's that good.

A day and night

Yesterday we went to Chinatown, and promptly got lost. We had the best time wandering around the city! We found a street where people sit on the sidewalk next to bags of spice -- literally BAGS of cinnamon sticks, chili, cumin -- giant bags, too, half the size of a sleeping bag. Bags that make you think "cargo."

Eventually we got into a taxi with a crazy old coot (technical term) who laughed and laughed, took us over a bridge, then tapped his watch and shook his head to indicate that no, after all, he COULD NOT take us to our destination at that time of day. We just laughed, too, because it was so ludicrous! He took us OVER A RIVER out of our way and then deposited us on the side of what amounts to a freeway in the middle of back-alley Bangkok! We walked around for a while and finally found a pedestrian bridge back over the river to the side we started on.

From the bridge we could see some of the grand old houses along the river -- some are actually villa-like and palatial, and put me in mind of Venice. The river is about as dirty as the Venetian canals, too -- ew. My guess is pestilential.

While trying to figure out where we were we stumbled upon the flower market -- omg, it was gorgeous and smelled like heaven. They use tuberose to make necklaces and chains to place on altars here, and the smell is divine. Lots of roses and chrysanthemums and marigold, too, adding up to the sweetest, spiciest, freshest perfume -- and you don't often hear about streets that smell good here!

From the flower market we found our way to Kao San Road, which is a street market--heavy part of town rife with student backpackers and low-budget tourists. It's like a long shakedown street -- all kinds of crap available for inflated prices. It's the kind of place you have to see once, so we toured it. Found a bar with a big patio and had some beers while the light faded.

Flush with hops and barley we decided to stop by Saxophone, this famous Bangkokian blues club, before our appointment with friends at another nightclub called Bangkok Rocks. Saxophone was fun -- a blues band playing nothing but covers of the classics -- Crossroads, Sweet Home Alabama, One Way Out, Little Sister, Johnnie B. Good -- all the usual. The musicians are very accomplished, but one set of that is plenty, so we pushed on.

Before we left, though, I hit the loo and had my first squat toilet experience. Good thing I do yoga. Also, good thing I always travel with tissue in my pockets like an old nun -- it wasn't provided there. Instead, they have what they call "the bidet" -- don't be fooled, it's a hose. It's a vegetable sprayer, really, just like the one attached to the kitchen sink. And there are no paper towels for drying, either. I shudder to think.

Next stop was Bangkok Rocks, which is the jewel in the tinfoil crown of the beleaguered and never-really-off-the-ground Bangkok Indie Rock Scene. Thai people are not indie. They don't want to be different. They don't want to innovate and they don't want to stick out. They like to dress alike. They like to blend. They like cover bands. In fact, they LOVE cover bands -- cover bands are what there is to see and hear in Bangkok. Barry is trying to whoop up interest for his plan to start at Bowie cover band with Lady Boys as back-up singers. He thinks it's brilliant! But I digress.

Bangkok Rocks I'm afraid does not. One word: lame. It wants to be Dante's but there are a few fundamental flaws. It's white, for instance, and shiny chromed and spare. Blue lights. Bare open windows. Office building tile floor. The band we saw was abysmal -- I mean three bad chords bad. Talent show bad. Go back to the garage bad. The stage had a decent light rack but nobody knew how to use it. Not even a stage wash. Occasional strobe flashes and sometimes the green cans came on -- ???

I could stand it for only so long, which is just as well because I had given up drinking hours ago and had been feeding all my drinks to Barry, who by now was way past tipsy. We went to the kabob guy and I plied B with my kabob as well as his, and then we came home. I poured him full of water and put him to bed. He woke up fresh as an Asian daisy. Now we are eating fresh ripe mango and feeling bad for everybody who is not us right now -- miss you!