More Catching Up

I was internet-starved for most of the week. The problem is, I manage most of my life through this vehicle. Imagine trying to avoid expensive cell-to-cell international calls via email/chat while trying to work out New Year's plans (or confirm that they could not be worked out), plus trying to double check the protocol for my visa and making it work with possibly exiting the country (for New Year's) with no internet? I could go downtown to Siam Square, where they have a free outdoor WiFi zone, but let's see - going downtown takes about an hour, which is not too terrible considering Bangkok traffic (actually, if it's not rush hour, I'm downtown in half an hour by bus), but is still a lot of effort just to check my motherfucking email.

So this week I:
-registered up for Thai classes, beginning in January
-successfully used Skype to call my parents - so call me! (leenleem)
-bought maps
-canned going to Bombay for New Year's because a last-minute plane ticket is costly (fine), but additional cost for a visa to take four-day trip was not worth it (nearly $90 because I'm American)
-worked up to doing an hour on the elliptical runner
-learned how to say "where is the bathroom" and "I'd like a plate of chicken fried rice" in Thai; ordered my lunch in Thai
-explored "hip" Bangkok - Soi Thong Lor off Sukhumvit Road and sat on my ass at the Au Bon Pain
-finished another book ; now it is on to some Tim O'Brien (Going After Caccioto)

More Thai culture for you: when you order "sausage," what you get is a very pale, fatty hot dog that falls somewhere between a white and a red dog. Thai people eat their pizza with ketchup. My cousin ordered a Hawaiian pizza and it had hot dog and pineapple, with some sort of creamy orange sauce. I tried this ketchup on pizza thing and it wasn't half bad. Then this morning, I ate a banana and was about to try to pronounce the Thai word for it, before I remembered that if I didn't so it perfectly, then you know, I'd be saying "penis..penis...penis." Hua told me a story about how my dad was yelling it at someone ("penis" not "banana" which comes as no surprise), and my mother didn't know any better and started saying it too. He didn't bother to correct her, while all my cousins (on a visit to the U.S.) laughed hysterically.


This is the entrance to Playground! on Soi Thong Lor, halfway between Th. Petchburi and Th. Sukhumvit. I see a little Donatella Versace in the entrance. Like their outpost, Manga, the proprietors of Playground! really enjoy having gigantic, not-so-plush versions of stuffed animals guarding their entrances. They call this a concept mall, but really it is just one gigantic Urban Outfitters type place, but you are paying boku bucks for designer garments, not things made out of snoopy sheets that were fished out of a garbage dump in Idaho.


Inside, the ground floor has the Playsino, where DJs spin every Thursday-Saturday nights through the first week of January. I'll have to check this out sometime. Also on the ground floor is a Starbucks, the music section, magazines, various "office" type things, a cafe and...


...the bathroom.


See, this is what happens when Thais venture away from the one-name wonder concept. And these dudes were outside of IceBar. I stared at them in awe because I was sweating like a pig in a tank top and a skirt. But, that's Soi Thong Lor and Bangkok in general for you. This is two blocks down from Playground! and across the street from Au Bon Pain, which I'd read in the New York Times was the epicenter of creativity in Bangkok. I'm not so sure about that, but what do I know? I'm an east coast American snob.