Bangkok, Thailand
(part 1)
January 11th, 2016
I arrived in Bangkok from Hong Kong exhausted on zero sleep. Big surprise, huh? After an excruciating two-hour customs line in which I was positive I was going to pass out standing in, I left the airport on an overstuffed bus with no AC that reeked of leaking oil. I took the bus to the SkyTrain terminal and boarded it, heading for Samson’s work in Siam. This is when Bangkok’s weirdness instantly became noticeable. The guy to the left of me was straight up watching hardcore porn on his phone, volume up, no fucks given. The guy to the right was manically snorting a menthol nose inhaler every few seconds. People kept cramming onto the train until I was shoved into a corner with a tiny little lady gyrating on my crotch. It didn’t end there… when I finally got off the train at the Siam Discovery Mall where Samson works, it was complete bedlam. It was National Children’s Day and there were hundreds of kids running around with Pikachu hats jumping on everything in sight. Oh, and just about everyone here picks their nose in public. My sleep-deprived brain was losing it; I couldn’t handle this.
I finally found Mike’s building and took the elevator to the 16th floor where his English teaching school is located. I walked in sweating like a pig, eyes bloodshot, probably stinking like a nightclub trash can, but oh so damn happy to see a familiar face. It was so surreal seeing one of my best friends over here! Unfortunately, he had to teach for another three hours, so I was on my own as far as entertaining myself. I dropped my pack and set about exploring downtown.
There was a tourist destination about half a mile away called the Jim Thompson house, so I decided to waste some time there. I followed my GPS through some very gritty neighborhoods along an absolutely filthy canal. I witnessed people just throwing all of their garbage into this canal, as motorboats tore through at breakneck speeds, sloshing all the disgusting water up the walls of the canal onto my shoes. Half-naked children jockeyed for position on the best playground equipment, which I’m pretty sure was just old tractor pieces left in a field. Then I kept stumbling across trees that had makeshift shrines erected in front of them with candles, bottles of beer, little Buddhist figurines, and old clothes and ribbons. I later asked Mike about this and he explained the locals believe there is a dead person living in it. Essentially ancestor worship in all of the trees of Bangkok… surreal and confusing, yet beautiful.
I finally arrived at the Jim Thompson house, but the tour had already started, so I grabbed some beers at the cafeteria to cool off in the sweltering heat. Jim Thompson was an American CIA operative who had visited Thailand extensively in the 60’s and fell in love with it. He realized they were producing silk of unrivaled quality here, and was the first to start importing it to America and Europe, making him incredibly wealthy. He spent his vast fortune on his house, which is actually several centuries old traditional Thai homes from across the country that he had dismantled, shipped to Bangkok, and reassembled on his land. He then filled them with ancient Thai treasures like tapestries and statues. However on a hike in Malaysia, he mysteriously vanished with no clues to his whereabouts. Some say tigers got him, others say it was the CIA that took him out for knowing classified information about the Vietnam war. Nevertheless, his house is a museum now, and it was awesome walking through. However, I was losing energy at a fast rate. One thing about Bangkok… it is hot. No wait, it is H-O-T. Like 95 degrees at sunset hot, with humidity that just clings to you. It was killing me.
After a couple hours here, I decided to walk back to that massive mall by Samson’s work to get food. Walking through it and seeing all the super expensive stores like Gucci and Armani, the gap between rich and poor in this country became vividly evident. Here is a super futuristic mall that puts the International Mall in Tampa to shame, a block from unbelievably poor people living in bamboo huts.
I found the food market in the mall and was super stoked to see a Japanese-style restaurant where the food and sushi is served on a conveyer belt. You sit down in front of a pot of boiling broth, and grab the raw meat as it passes by and cook it yourself. I ate 17 plates of food. I’m not kidding. There is photo evidence.
I left and met Mike at his work, and we crushed a few beers outside 7-Eleven with his coworkers. We headed home to meet up with his fiancé, Jess, at their awesome apartment on the 30th floor of a building that has amazing views of Bangkok. I took the second best shower of this trip (after the north pole flight shower) and the three of us set about getting drunk as shit drinking beer and some Thai rice liquor. We needed a good buzz, because tonight, we would descend upon Soi Cowboy, probably one of the most insane places on earth.
We arrived by cab and the sight was truly ridiculous. It’s a half mile long road lined with countless go-go bars, each club trying to stand out more from its neighbors with eye-burning bright lights, eardrum bursting music, and countless girls wearing lingerie, cat-calling you from the front door. We just started popping into each and every one of them, grabbing beers and laughing at the spectacle. Then the shots started. I was getting hammered, and so were Jess and Mike. Unfortunately, Jess had to leave early because she had work in the morning, thus leaving Mike and I to our own devices. We went into the final club on the strip and posted up near the stage. The girls were dragging westerners up for limbo on stage, and Mike insisted I go up. As I hung back to try and get under the pole, the Thai stripper did a rolling backflip maneuver, dragging me down with her, where she began to hump me to the delight of everyone in the bar.
Around this time, the beer-munchies set in, so we headed out to the street vendors cooking up amazing pork and seafood dishes. This is when Mike really impressed me with how much of the Thai language he had already learned. He was describing exactly the food he wanted, while haggling and low-balling tuk tuk drivers. Not one to be upstaged, I just started eating leaves of Thai basil out of the guy’s ingredients bag, thus confirming my idiocy.
While we were eating, a local came up to us and asked if we wanted to go to the best club in Bangkok, where white boys have the most fun. Well sure, that sounds lovely! Let’s follow this random sketchy Thai bro to a bar! We followed him into a nondescript building, where he lead us to a very brightly-lit room with leather sofas for us to sit on. Across from us were 30 glassy-eyed Thai girls, just staring off into space, not saying a word. Our beer-soaked brains could not comprehend what the fuck was going on. Why weren’t these girls dancing or partying? We stared at each other for a few seconds, utterly confused, then the light bulb went off for us simultaneously. This bro had brought us to a legit brothel, and these poor girls were prostitutes waiting for western clients. We abruptly got up, and walked out. The Thai guy came back up to us and asked what was wrong? We told him that was decidedly NOT what we were looking for.
So Thai dude says sorry, and now he will bring us to the best club, where people party for real until sunrise. At this point we’re obviously skeptical, but we follow him again for absolutely no good reason at all. But he came through this time; the club, which I forget the name of, was pretty badass. They were playing awesome EDM and the people were raging at 5 am still. However, it dawned on me that I had not slept for 48 hours again, and I couldn’t bring myself to dance anymore. I needed sleep. So we hopped in a tuk tuk and headed for home… but not before I tried to unsuccessfully buy beer at 6 am (they stop selling at midnight) and hurling myself into some bushes… again, for absolutely no good reason at all. Also, the tuk tuk driver insisted on dropping us off one block shy of Mike’s apartment, which angered Mike, causing him to yell “No pay! No pay!” to which the driver exclaimed “FINE!” and so we got a free tuk tuk ride home apparently.
Well guess what I did the next day in Bangkok? Nothing. Literally nothing. Samson and I slept from 6 am to 6 pm! When we did finally arise from our comas, we needed dinner. So we headed out to meet Jess at a fantastic Thai restaurant where we ordered a hot pot of seafood, curry dishes, fish fried rice, and some northern Thai sausages. We also crushed a half dozen huge beers, and the tab was only $30 total for all of us. I love this place!
After dinner, we walked around some of the night markets by their apartment and this is when I started to notice other oddities of Thai life. There are no trash cans… anywhere. I literally carried my empty beer bottle for a mile looking for one. Yet the Thai people just toss their trash everywhere, like the aforementioned canals. Then you see a city-employed woman sweeping up the roads… with a tree branch. During the day, the city is a lot more open, but at night, food markets and vendors pop up EVERYWHERE. Every street is lined with people selling amazing grilled and stewed food, or Chinese-made plastic tchotchkes. And then the traffic… omg the traffic. It’s a nonstop assault. My cab ride this morning was a terrifying ordeal. I was gripping the head rest for a solid 30 mins fearing for my life. And there are no stop signs or street lights at intersections. If you want to cross a street, you have to hope there is a break in the flow and then run as fast as possible before you get hit by a bus or motorcycle. I asked Mike how many people die in fatal accidents here, and he said no one knows, because the government censors that information, along with tons of websites and any negative press related to the royal family. I wasn’t expecting Chinese-level censorship here, but it’s quite egregious. Oh and the Royal family are like gods here. You can’t walk 20 feet without seeing a humongous mural or picture of either the king or queen or both.
After dinner, we just came home and chilled out. I went to bed early, but my sleep cycles are still completely ruined, so I was awake at 4 am yet again. I started writing this blog on the patio until Mike and Jess woke up, listening to a massive storm that was pounding the city.
At sunrise, we set out for their crossfit gym, and I was really excited to get my first workout in in nearly 3 weeks. But holy shit… now I know what working out in a jungle feels like. It was already 90+ degrees at 8 am, and the sweat was just pouring from my body. All the alcohol from this trip dripped from my face, and it felt SO GOOD.
We headed back to their apartment, and now they are getting ready for work. I have to pack up my bag and catch a cab across town to Khaosan road where my hostel is located. I will be there three days until I leave for Chiang Mai, and I am hoping to do some good sight-seeing today, despite the crappy weather. Let’s see what other trouble I can get into in this crazy ass city!
-Batty
