Thursday, April 9, 2009
political tensions, but we're ok
For those of you who follow the news: Yes, Bangkok has "ground to a halt" (most government and transportation in gridlock) because of the most recent ongoing coup attempt, this time by Thaksin supporters). If you haven't seen the news, see the Bangkok Post. No, it doesn't affect us at all: our out-of-the-way neighborhood is the same as it ever is, tasty food and friendly people and brisk traffic and all. We're planning to leave the city anyways this evening for a week-long holiday in Chiang Mai in the northern mountains, so if it gets more touchy here we'll be well out of it. We'll keep you updated, but seeing as it hasn't affected us yet and that previous coups have been ambivalent and even kind to foreigners, I expect we'll be just fine.
koh tao
My journey to tropical island paradise began at 10 p.m. on Friday evening boarding an ornate, curtained, double-decker bus at the Bangkok train station. My seatmate was a lovely environmental engineer from the Netherlands. In between intermittent bouts of paying attention to the bizarre post-apocalyptic sci-fi action movie dubbed inexpertly into Thai and inexplicably starring Sir Ian Mckellen, we talked through the night about environmental sustainability, human trafficking, and travel in South East Asia.
In the photos below you’ll no doubt be struck by the incredible beauty of the port of Chumphon, the bus’s destination, in the early morning light. Sadly, I am unable to tell you anything much about the loveliness that seems to have been. Erika took the photos. I spent almost the entirety of my day-lit time in Chumphon asleep on the ferry floor in a puddle of dirty water. I wasn’t in the puddle when I fell asleep – the puddle shifted when the boat started moving. I was so tired that at first I didn’t realise that damp had become definitively wet and once I did, I didn’t care.
My first impressions of Koh Tao, aka Turtle Island, are somewhat fogged by a dearth of sleep and a wealth of sweet-starchy green mango dipped in chilli and salt (which is good at any time, and more delicious than you can imagine at a 1 a.m. pit stop). The boat pulled up to the dock just as the skies began their daily warm-ups for the coming monsoon season. I got soaked to the skin wading up to my ankles across the main street. But of course, the clouds then parted and passed. The sun appeared, the water became brilliant turquoise, and as I spread my sweatshirt out on the sand to steam if not dry, I thought . . . wow. This is pretty nice. The island is ringed alternately with gleaming white beaches and magnificent tumbles of boulders. In the centre a series of mini-mountains jostle one another, rumpling their drapery of palms, ferns, banana trees.
Resting in the Gulf of Thailand on the Eastern side of Thailands isthimus connection to Malaysia, Koh Tao is a reef island. Wade about 15 meters off the beach and you hit coral. Much of the coral immediately accessible to the most populus areas is unsurprisingly less-than healthy, but a community environmental group is rising to the challenge and the next few years will hopefully see positive changes for marina life. The beach off of which we took ourselves snorkelling is crowded with busy, beautiful, happy fishes: schools of tiny blue fish that glow electric blue, two-foot long skinny needle-like fish with Dr. Seuss noses, yellow fish with spots, a big fish striped orange and white hiding coyly under a coral shelf, an iridescent rainbow fish the size of a salad plate receiving a thorough scouring from two industrious cleaning fish no bigger than salt shakers . . . we even saw tiny stonefish (too small to be scary) and what might have been a lion fish (chose not to get close enough to be sure). I chased a school of five baby sharks as they meandered around the bay, eventually losing them because I got tired right around the same time they got tired of me and picked up the pace.
Our time in Koh Tao was brief and magical. So far removed from the mass and noise Bangkok, it was an excellent reminder of the incredible diversity this relatively small country actually supports. Wherever you may be, it’s all too easy to slip into a routine and forget to explore. Koh Tao is an excellent antidote to such complacency, its beauty at once restful and inspiring.
In the photos below you’ll no doubt be struck by the incredible beauty of the port of Chumphon, the bus’s destination, in the early morning light. Sadly, I am unable to tell you anything much about the loveliness that seems to have been. Erika took the photos. I spent almost the entirety of my day-lit time in Chumphon asleep on the ferry floor in a puddle of dirty water. I wasn’t in the puddle when I fell asleep – the puddle shifted when the boat started moving. I was so tired that at first I didn’t realise that damp had become definitively wet and once I did, I didn’t care.
My first impressions of Koh Tao, aka Turtle Island, are somewhat fogged by a dearth of sleep and a wealth of sweet-starchy green mango dipped in chilli and salt (which is good at any time, and more delicious than you can imagine at a 1 a.m. pit stop). The boat pulled up to the dock just as the skies began their daily warm-ups for the coming monsoon season. I got soaked to the skin wading up to my ankles across the main street. But of course, the clouds then parted and passed. The sun appeared, the water became brilliant turquoise, and as I spread my sweatshirt out on the sand to steam if not dry, I thought . . . wow. This is pretty nice. The island is ringed alternately with gleaming white beaches and magnificent tumbles of boulders. In the centre a series of mini-mountains jostle one another, rumpling their drapery of palms, ferns, banana trees.
Resting in the Gulf of Thailand on the Eastern side of Thailands isthimus connection to Malaysia, Koh Tao is a reef island. Wade about 15 meters off the beach and you hit coral. Much of the coral immediately accessible to the most populus areas is unsurprisingly less-than healthy, but a community environmental group is rising to the challenge and the next few years will hopefully see positive changes for marina life. The beach off of which we took ourselves snorkelling is crowded with busy, beautiful, happy fishes: schools of tiny blue fish that glow electric blue, two-foot long skinny needle-like fish with Dr. Seuss noses, yellow fish with spots, a big fish striped orange and white hiding coyly under a coral shelf, an iridescent rainbow fish the size of a salad plate receiving a thorough scouring from two industrious cleaning fish no bigger than salt shakers . . . we even saw tiny stonefish (too small to be scary) and what might have been a lion fish (chose not to get close enough to be sure). I chased a school of five baby sharks as they meandered around the bay, eventually losing them because I got tired right around the same time they got tired of me and picked up the pace.
Our time in Koh Tao was brief and magical. So far removed from the mass and noise Bangkok, it was an excellent reminder of the incredible diversity this relatively small country actually supports. Wherever you may be, it’s all too easy to slip into a routine and forget to explore. Koh Tao is an excellent antidote to such complacency, its beauty at once restful and inspiring.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
under the sea
Imagine standing around with a group of fit hip college students in your bathing suit. Then stretch on a vey tight, damp, rubbery wet suit, adjusting your flesh to fit its cling. Pull on an inflatable lifejacket, with four hoses and a big metal tank longer than your torso attached: the thing weighs about 40 pounds, and has five different clasps to keep it on. You want to sink to your knees with its weight, even though you think yourself strong. Add a weight belt with another 30 pounds. Then slap a mask on your face, covering your eyes and nose. Oh wait, you forgot, take the mask off, you have to spit in it first so it doesn’t fog up. Snorkel on the side. Squish your feet into two flapping fins. Now take that right-hand hose, put the respirator at its end in your mouth, draw in the dry air with the slightest delay, the slightest catch, frighteningly recalling pneumoniatic breaths. Now, don’t fall over on those fins, make your way to the front of the boat. And, with all that weight pressing on you, with all your senses gone except your cloudy masked vision, your breathing already impaired, jump off the edge of the boat to the deep water 15 feet below. It’s terrifying. Despite so much careful practicing, despite that our rational minds were trying to dryly remind us through the “aaaaa no no no no can’t breathe will sink going to die no no no” of our lizard brains that the thing in our mouths would give us fresh air, we were all convinced we would drown. Two women threw up. A few cried. One man almost passed out. I went mute, dizzy, totally panicked. But then…
The second you start to sink down (thank you, boat boy, for pushing me), the air in your mouth from the respirator is a cool and real presence. You aren’t drowning. And there are bubbles! And it’s so blue! Beautiful bubbles. You have no idea. All the gear is instantly weightless, already forgotten. You’re an astronaut, a bird, your own dream, microscopic. The ocean is so HUGE. The fish – surely they can’t exist? striped, glowing, then one brushes your hand! And the shock of it, this vista so totally alien, which no recording or aquarium could prepare you for, is real and you are in it. It’s like discovering an additional sense, an epiphany, faith. And the coral, the anemones, haven’t even appeared yet. It is so, so beautiful. And being weightless is so, so fun.
As of the end of last week, I officially completed my Open Water Diver scuba certification. My plans to complete the Advanced and then Underwater Photo Specialty certifications (the whole point of starting scuba) were thwarted by an untimely head cold. Another time. I’ll be back. I can’t wait to be under the sea again.
(Sorry, no photos. Next time!)
The second you start to sink down (thank you, boat boy, for pushing me), the air in your mouth from the respirator is a cool and real presence. You aren’t drowning. And there are bubbles! And it’s so blue! Beautiful bubbles. You have no idea. All the gear is instantly weightless, already forgotten. You’re an astronaut, a bird, your own dream, microscopic. The ocean is so HUGE. The fish – surely they can’t exist? striped, glowing, then one brushes your hand! And the shock of it, this vista so totally alien, which no recording or aquarium could prepare you for, is real and you are in it. It’s like discovering an additional sense, an epiphany, faith. And the coral, the anemones, haven’t even appeared yet. It is so, so beautiful. And being weightless is so, so fun.
As of the end of last week, I officially completed my Open Water Diver scuba certification. My plans to complete the Advanced and then Underwater Photo Specialty certifications (the whole point of starting scuba) were thwarted by an untimely head cold. Another time. I’ll be back. I can’t wait to be under the sea again.
(Sorry, no photos. Next time!)
Monday, March 30, 2009
erika is employed
I have a job! I’ll be working at a local public/government primary/elementary school, teaching introductory English to cute kiddos. Should be fun – lots of games and acting and singing, and good teaching experience: if I can get metagrammar across to 5-year-olds with whom I share no language in common, teaching anything else will be easy. I’ve been contracted through a nearby language school, Fun Language International, which will not only handle all the administrative things like my paychecks, etc., but will also provide lesson plans and materials, teacher training support, transportation, etc. Pretty good setup for a new language teacher like me.
(added later: Erika teaching Thai kids)
I found the process of getting a job here to be bizarre and slightly bewildering. It was nice to be in high demand: there is such a desire to learn English here that native speakers of English who are certified to teach the language and who have teaching experience are like gold. I had schools fighting over interview times, and could easily have argued for much higher salaries. I didn’t feel right about demanding more money, though, since what they offered generally was about 6 times the rate for the Thai-citizen teachers at the same schools: there’s only so much privilege I’ll put up with, and what they’re paying me will be enough to live quite luxuriously here.
One of the toughest parts was conducting an interview when the people interviewing me spoke imperfect English with very heavy Thai accents. There’s only so many times you can ask, “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” without seeming either incompetent or rude. Added to that is that often I actually had heard them right, and just couldn’t believe that they were asking what they were asking. What the interviewers were mostly interested in were my life story and personal characteristics, from my opinion of my elementary school to my current religion and marital status. Some actual questions (not made up): Father’s/mother’s/spouse’s occupation? Family’s financial status? Who is the person you love most? How intelligent are you? What kind of diseases do you have? What are your opinions on this obscure Buddhist theological debate? Quite unlike any interviews I have conducted before. All my reading of Thai social anthropology texts before coming over seemed like overkill at the time, but every tidbit proved useful: I understand the reasons for most of their questions, and so could answer the questions behind the questions.
School doesn’t start until the first week of May, so I have a bunch of time free. No money, but time. So I’m off this evening on a month-long adventure exploring the natural environment of Thailand from southern tip to northern tip by mountain biking, swimming, hiking, rafting, on elephant back, and occasional cheating train bits. Stay tuned for lots of pictures!
(added later: Erika teaching Thai kids)
I found the process of getting a job here to be bizarre and slightly bewildering. It was nice to be in high demand: there is such a desire to learn English here that native speakers of English who are certified to teach the language and who have teaching experience are like gold. I had schools fighting over interview times, and could easily have argued for much higher salaries. I didn’t feel right about demanding more money, though, since what they offered generally was about 6 times the rate for the Thai-citizen teachers at the same schools: there’s only so much privilege I’ll put up with, and what they’re paying me will be enough to live quite luxuriously here.
One of the toughest parts was conducting an interview when the people interviewing me spoke imperfect English with very heavy Thai accents. There’s only so many times you can ask, “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” without seeming either incompetent or rude. Added to that is that often I actually had heard them right, and just couldn’t believe that they were asking what they were asking. What the interviewers were mostly interested in were my life story and personal characteristics, from my opinion of my elementary school to my current religion and marital status. Some actual questions (not made up): Father’s/mother’s/spouse’s occupation? Family’s financial status? Who is the person you love most? How intelligent are you? What kind of diseases do you have? What are your opinions on this obscure Buddhist theological debate? Quite unlike any interviews I have conducted before. All my reading of Thai social anthropology texts before coming over seemed like overkill at the time, but every tidbit proved useful: I understand the reasons for most of their questions, and so could answer the questions behind the questions.
School doesn’t start until the first week of May, so I have a bunch of time free. No money, but time. So I’m off this evening on a month-long adventure exploring the natural environment of Thailand from southern tip to northern tip by mountain biking, swimming, hiking, rafting, on elephant back, and occasional cheating train bits. Stay tuned for lots of pictures!
venice of the east
Though their prominence has lessened in the last 100 years, it used to be impossible to discuss Bangkok without talk of its canals and rivers. Bangkok is where it is at all because of the massive Chao Phraya river, upon whose banks the city stretches, empties just south of here into the Gulf of Thailand, and there’s a convenient deep-water tight S-curve here. Originally located north of here and on the other side of the river (long story), the city has always made excellent use of the monopoly this estuary gives to the import and export of anything relating to the entire Mekong delta (i.e. northern Thailand, Burma/Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos). The river is still busy today with barges, taxis, tourist boats, and more. The commerce and culture visible from the water gives an excellent glimpse into the true nature of the city: inspiring temples, copious market goods, luxury hotels, and dangerously derelict hovels all line the banks.
The river is only the beginning of the watery nature of the city, though. European visitors of old dubbed Bangkok the “Venice of the East” for the hundreds of miles of liquid lanes that crisscrossed the metropolis, and for the ornate architecture that lined the waterways. Roads were only introduced in the late 1800s for the equestrian enjoyments of the foreign diplomats, and remained lesser avenues of transport through the early part of the 1900s. While some of the canals were filled in or paved over to create today’s roads, most still remain tucked between or beneath buildings and are girded with filthy cement as coping mechanisms for the 6-month monsoon season that threatens to drown this marshy, low-laying sprawl every year. Now, in the dry months, most of the canals are little more than fetid slime tracks that listlessly slosh the trash about and shock the nose, though some are still navigable and utilized pathways for the various water-busses that speed overcrowded with commuters along the old routes. I prefer getting around via canals, as it’s much quicker and cheaper than along the roads or by train.
From what I’ve been told, the city will show its true swampy self when the rainy season starts in about two months: all this extreme humidity and rivers and canals are nothing compared to wading through the streets up to your chest in the muck. I guess I’ll enjoy this relative dryness while I can.
The river is only the beginning of the watery nature of the city, though. European visitors of old dubbed Bangkok the “Venice of the East” for the hundreds of miles of liquid lanes that crisscrossed the metropolis, and for the ornate architecture that lined the waterways. Roads were only introduced in the late 1800s for the equestrian enjoyments of the foreign diplomats, and remained lesser avenues of transport through the early part of the 1900s. While some of the canals were filled in or paved over to create today’s roads, most still remain tucked between or beneath buildings and are girded with filthy cement as coping mechanisms for the 6-month monsoon season that threatens to drown this marshy, low-laying sprawl every year. Now, in the dry months, most of the canals are little more than fetid slime tracks that listlessly slosh the trash about and shock the nose, though some are still navigable and utilized pathways for the various water-busses that speed overcrowded with commuters along the old routes. I prefer getting around via canals, as it’s much quicker and cheaper than along the roads or by train.
From what I’ve been told, the city will show its true swampy self when the rainy season starts in about two months: all this extreme humidity and rivers and canals are nothing compared to wading through the streets up to your chest in the muck. I guess I’ll enjoy this relative dryness while I can.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
our new apartment
We love, love, love our apartment. After moving in a week ago and spending the last six days cleaning and outfitting the place, it finally feels like home.
The neighbourhood is focused on the main arterial road, colloquially called Ekkamai, officially called Sukhumvit 63. If you want our proper address or new phone #s, let us know. It’s a very mixed area, with everything from abject poverty to extreme wealth (I’m talking diseased homelessness and Ferraris here). These contrasts, combined with the astounding traffic, bustle, and fumes make it rather overwhelming. It’s got a lot going for it, though, notably being right where I work (I have a five minute walking commute), as well as having accessible affordable food and household goods stores, and access to the main city public transportation.
The layout of our place is reminiscent of an American motor-inn, with walled and gated grounds, parking on the ground floor of the building, balconies facing in to the central pool (!!) and courtyard, and four different shared stairwells. It’s an older building, maybe from around the 1940s or so, but we could be wildly wrong in that guess.
Our apartment is way bigger than we need, with two bedrooms, a huge dining/living room, a study, a kitchen, two bathrooms, six to eight closets depending on how you count, and a balcony. Our money, little though it is by our standards, goes an awfully long way here. And this place is quite a find, even given our price range. Quite a change from last year’s shoebox: Erika and I are having to adjust to being in different rooms from one another. And what rooms! There are dark, polished hardwood floors throughout, with dark woodwork framing and built-in cabinets, all around thick white plaster walls. Each room has copious large, nicely-proportioned wood-framed windows with views of the gardens next door and/or sliding doors to the balcony. At first glance the overall effect reminded me of Japanese minimalist architecture, but since being here I can see how it’s actually very Thai. Something in the proportions: like those great Thai wardrobes, they’re just proportioned in a very Thai way.
Our apartment is on the top floor and on the corner farthest from the street, so it’s quiet and gets a fresh breeze. Our neighbours are a mix of Thai and American/British people, heavier on the Thai than the white. It’s very much a family place, quiet and safe, with a few kids playing outside at almost all times. The kids largely favour the pool – did I mention we have a POOL?! A perfect pool?! It’s right at the bottom of our stairs, surrounded by a lovely lawn, with shading trees and decorative shrubbery and lounge chairs and sweet little tables and convenient umbrellas all around. Some of the shrubberies lend a romantic air to the pool by casting their pink petals down to float across the water in light breezes. The water itself is delightfully clean and not too salty or chlorinated, and is the perfect temperature without being heated (yes, it’s that hot here). It’s a great size for both playing in and swimming laps – not too big and not too small. The deep end is quite deep, allowing for a diving board and general jumping-in fun. There’s no closing or opening times, so we’ve availed ourselves of quite a few midnight swims, as well as swimming in the rain, during the midafternoon, and really at any and all available times. There is nothing quite so wonderful as swimming when you’re really hot and sweaty. Like right now, for example, or any other time that we are not a) in an air conditioned space, b) showering, or c) in the pool.
I love our apartment. But it is so nice that I feel embarrassed because it is more than we need and is so luxurious, even though it’s the same price per person as what my colleagues have. On the other hand, if I have to have a problem with my housing, it might as well be that it’s embarrassingly nice. Here’s to miraculously good real estate agents and dual incomes (see Erika’s forthcoming post about her new job)!
Photos both of our neighbourhood and our apartment:
View Larger Map
The neighbourhood is focused on the main arterial road, colloquially called Ekkamai, officially called Sukhumvit 63. If you want our proper address or new phone #s, let us know. It’s a very mixed area, with everything from abject poverty to extreme wealth (I’m talking diseased homelessness and Ferraris here). These contrasts, combined with the astounding traffic, bustle, and fumes make it rather overwhelming. It’s got a lot going for it, though, notably being right where I work (I have a five minute walking commute), as well as having accessible affordable food and household goods stores, and access to the main city public transportation.
The layout of our place is reminiscent of an American motor-inn, with walled and gated grounds, parking on the ground floor of the building, balconies facing in to the central pool (!!) and courtyard, and four different shared stairwells. It’s an older building, maybe from around the 1940s or so, but we could be wildly wrong in that guess.
Our apartment is way bigger than we need, with two bedrooms, a huge dining/living room, a study, a kitchen, two bathrooms, six to eight closets depending on how you count, and a balcony. Our money, little though it is by our standards, goes an awfully long way here. And this place is quite a find, even given our price range. Quite a change from last year’s shoebox: Erika and I are having to adjust to being in different rooms from one another. And what rooms! There are dark, polished hardwood floors throughout, with dark woodwork framing and built-in cabinets, all around thick white plaster walls. Each room has copious large, nicely-proportioned wood-framed windows with views of the gardens next door and/or sliding doors to the balcony. At first glance the overall effect reminded me of Japanese minimalist architecture, but since being here I can see how it’s actually very Thai. Something in the proportions: like those great Thai wardrobes, they’re just proportioned in a very Thai way.
Our apartment is on the top floor and on the corner farthest from the street, so it’s quiet and gets a fresh breeze. Our neighbours are a mix of Thai and American/British people, heavier on the Thai than the white. It’s very much a family place, quiet and safe, with a few kids playing outside at almost all times. The kids largely favour the pool – did I mention we have a POOL?! A perfect pool?! It’s right at the bottom of our stairs, surrounded by a lovely lawn, with shading trees and decorative shrubbery and lounge chairs and sweet little tables and convenient umbrellas all around. Some of the shrubberies lend a romantic air to the pool by casting their pink petals down to float across the water in light breezes. The water itself is delightfully clean and not too salty or chlorinated, and is the perfect temperature without being heated (yes, it’s that hot here). It’s a great size for both playing in and swimming laps – not too big and not too small. The deep end is quite deep, allowing for a diving board and general jumping-in fun. There’s no closing or opening times, so we’ve availed ourselves of quite a few midnight swims, as well as swimming in the rain, during the midafternoon, and really at any and all available times. There is nothing quite so wonderful as swimming when you’re really hot and sweaty. Like right now, for example, or any other time that we are not a) in an air conditioned space, b) showering, or c) in the pool.
I love our apartment. But it is so nice that I feel embarrassed because it is more than we need and is so luxurious, even though it’s the same price per person as what my colleagues have. On the other hand, if I have to have a problem with my housing, it might as well be that it’s embarrassingly nice. Here’s to miraculously good real estate agents and dual incomes (see Erika’s forthcoming post about her new job)!
Photos both of our neighbourhood and our apartment:
View Larger Map
bangkok jungle
Yesterday I went to a neighbourhood in Bangkok that totally and completely redeems the entire rest of the overcrowded smelly urban city. It’s known as Bang Kra Jao by the locals, but you’ll not find it on any maps. On my most excellent and detailed of maps (link to Nancy Chandler’s map of Bangkok) it’s represented merely as a large greenish smudge, with text saying that only the most adventurous should venture here. Well, of course I went the first free day I had. How could I pass up the cartographic unknown?
As it turns out, there are two very good reasons why it doesn’t appear on maps. The first is that it would be nearly impossible to map, as it is an astoundingly complex maze of mud pathways and stilt houses built above a swamp that drastically floods and alters the landscape every year. There are a very few roads passable by cars, but most of what must be hundreds of miles of passageways are narrower than one of my arms is long, some notably so, and are usually built on stilts about 10 feet above the ground/water, and are shared by two-way bike, foot, peddler-cart, and dog traffic. It made for some hairy, though thrilling, biking. See the video which is hopefully embedded below for a good glimpse.
The second reason it remains undepicted is that the locals like their area the way it is, thank you very much, and don’t want developers and tourists “discovering” (i.e. ruining) their remarkably anachronistic neighbourhood. This is a refreshing sentiment in a country that, in its heartbeat city at least, seems happy to sell its grandmother to the highest bidder. Sometimes literally. (See forthcoming post on Petra’s work here.) And its commitment to steadfast ways of life goes back a long time, making this peninsular knob in the S-turn of the Chao Praya river a snapshot of what Bangkok must have been like hundreds of years ago, with tiny gilded temples and stilted homesteads with palmfrond roofs nestled in amongst dense but delicately cultivated jungle, complete with hooting parroty things, wild kimodo dragons and Siamese cats, and a traditional floating market, not a speck of it for show. All this just 2 miles from the arching skyscrapers of modern finance and the throngs of urban slums and jet-setting fashion malls.
It took about a half hour to bike/boat there from my house, and you can bet I’ll be going back often, hating cities as I do and relishing un-human surroundings. I have plans for a certain shack that serves drinks in the middle of the jungle, with only cicadas and sloshing water to hear, and its hammock in the shade… Maybe even tomorrow. :)
Where the jungle is and how to get there from our apartment:
View Larger Map
As it turns out, there are two very good reasons why it doesn’t appear on maps. The first is that it would be nearly impossible to map, as it is an astoundingly complex maze of mud pathways and stilt houses built above a swamp that drastically floods and alters the landscape every year. There are a very few roads passable by cars, but most of what must be hundreds of miles of passageways are narrower than one of my arms is long, some notably so, and are usually built on stilts about 10 feet above the ground/water, and are shared by two-way bike, foot, peddler-cart, and dog traffic. It made for some hairy, though thrilling, biking. See the video which is hopefully embedded below for a good glimpse.
The second reason it remains undepicted is that the locals like their area the way it is, thank you very much, and don’t want developers and tourists “discovering” (i.e. ruining) their remarkably anachronistic neighbourhood. This is a refreshing sentiment in a country that, in its heartbeat city at least, seems happy to sell its grandmother to the highest bidder. Sometimes literally. (See forthcoming post on Petra’s work here.) And its commitment to steadfast ways of life goes back a long time, making this peninsular knob in the S-turn of the Chao Praya river a snapshot of what Bangkok must have been like hundreds of years ago, with tiny gilded temples and stilted homesteads with palmfrond roofs nestled in amongst dense but delicately cultivated jungle, complete with hooting parroty things, wild kimodo dragons and Siamese cats, and a traditional floating market, not a speck of it for show. All this just 2 miles from the arching skyscrapers of modern finance and the throngs of urban slums and jet-setting fashion malls.
It took about a half hour to bike/boat there from my house, and you can bet I’ll be going back often, hating cities as I do and relishing un-human surroundings. I have plans for a certain shack that serves drinks in the middle of the jungle, with only cicadas and sloshing water to hear, and its hammock in the shade… Maybe even tomorrow. :)
Where the jungle is and how to get there from our apartment:
View Larger Map
Saturday, March 21, 2009
thai food
Real Thai food is tasty, though it takes some getting used to. It’s a distant but recognizable cousin to the food you’d get at a good Thai restaurant in the US or Australia. The most similar-to-their-foreign-counterpart dishes are the red curry and spring rolls, though here they are served spicy and lukewarm.
Foods in general here are cooked, served, and eaten at roadside carts. This adds the dubious spice and taste of diesel fumes and street grime, together with the trashy uriney smells of the sidewalks and gutters, to the meals. This becomes ignorable surprisingly quickly. Most people eat about 7 little mini-meals a day (which I like a lot), and very little differentiation is made between times of day and what you eat: a curry is just as fair game for breakfast as for dinner, as are sweet rice-gluten cubes or spicy fried chicken. Breakfasts usually include some mixture of the following: creamy corn chowder, very spicy ground pork, stir-fried cabbage, fried rice, cold corn kernels, fresh fruit, an omelettey scramble, etc.
Many of the foods are very, very spicy. And I mean spicy. It’s generally a diced fresh and/or powdered dried red chilli pepper spice, plus fresh ground black pepper, and various mysterious insidious other spicinesses. The heat is cumulative, though you can usually tell by the second bite whether or not the dish is beyond your abilities. A fried rice meal we had last night, which the cook made super-mild for us whiteys, was still too much for my palate, though we’re both getting much better at eating the hotness.
Other than throat-imploding spiciness, things which we have not eaten and are not inclined to try but which are readily available include deep-fried cicadas, fried shrimp pancakes (made from whole shrimps, with eyes and legs and antennae still in), fried pig-head skin, fried chicken feet, fried internal organs of questionable origin (if you’re getting the impression that they will fry and eat anything, you’re not far wrong), various dried salted whole fish, and this gloppy brown stew that smells like rottenness and has bones floating in it but which the folks in our neighbourhood line up to eat. Other than that, so far we’ve been willing to eat and have enjoyed almost anything safe-seeming that passes our way.
Some of the delights we have most enjoyed so far include: A bagful of golden-brown deep fried bananas, dough-balls, and sesame-covered dough-balls filled with crushed peanuts: fresh dragon fruit with exceptionally pale flesh: a mango possessed of a markedly paisley and oblong shape, splotched and golden skin, and a smooth and non-fibrous texture, whose flavour was especially sweet and reminded us of wild raspberries: a fruit that looks like an lumpy apple with skin like a green pear, the texture of jhimika and a light, mild flavour reminiscent of unripe watermelon and honey: green curry with liver (which we ate around) and little round green vegetables that look like tiny watermelons on the outside and cucumbers on the inside and taste like pumpkin: silver dollar pancakes that are custardy in the middle and are made with coconut milk and either corn kernels or scallions: layered balls of marinated dried coconut, rice paste, and more coconut: little corn muffins with fresh flaked coconut: red curry with bamboo shoots: spicy ground mystery meat with diced mystery vegetables and chillies: green mango/papaya salad with shredded carrots, cabbage, dried roasted garlic, and chillies: stir-fried tofu and mushrooms: lots of thai iced tea (a red tea with milk poured over ice and then with sweetened condensed milk poured over it): chilled lemongrass juice: crispy deep-fried chilli-flavoured broad beans with skins: roasted fingerling sweet potatoes with a very nutty and starchy taste: simple fried chicken done so, so well: a variety of gloppy Chineseish veggie-and-brown-sauce dishes, and more.
In addition to these street foods, there are also fruit and veggie and fish and meat markets, Thai-stocked grocery stores, international (i.e. American, British, Chinese, and Japanese) grocery stores, and restaurants ranging to mom-and-pop to fancy. Petra and I have now frequented examples of all of the above, and can happily report that the fancy restaurant across the street makes a better pasta alfredo than most Italians, and Thai-made baguettes and butter are sublime. As we’re on an insanely small budget, such very expensive luxuries as wheat and dairy products will be infrequently enjoyed. We feel very blessed, though, that what for us is a very small budget is relative wealth in this country, and that we have the opportunity to explore so much of what is available to eat here.
P.S. Yes, our bellies hurt. But we’ll get over it.
ADDED: the sights and sounds of our local pad thai stand!
Foods in general here are cooked, served, and eaten at roadside carts. This adds the dubious spice and taste of diesel fumes and street grime, together with the trashy uriney smells of the sidewalks and gutters, to the meals. This becomes ignorable surprisingly quickly. Most people eat about 7 little mini-meals a day (which I like a lot), and very little differentiation is made between times of day and what you eat: a curry is just as fair game for breakfast as for dinner, as are sweet rice-gluten cubes or spicy fried chicken. Breakfasts usually include some mixture of the following: creamy corn chowder, very spicy ground pork, stir-fried cabbage, fried rice, cold corn kernels, fresh fruit, an omelettey scramble, etc.
Many of the foods are very, very spicy. And I mean spicy. It’s generally a diced fresh and/or powdered dried red chilli pepper spice, plus fresh ground black pepper, and various mysterious insidious other spicinesses. The heat is cumulative, though you can usually tell by the second bite whether or not the dish is beyond your abilities. A fried rice meal we had last night, which the cook made super-mild for us whiteys, was still too much for my palate, though we’re both getting much better at eating the hotness.
Other than throat-imploding spiciness, things which we have not eaten and are not inclined to try but which are readily available include deep-fried cicadas, fried shrimp pancakes (made from whole shrimps, with eyes and legs and antennae still in), fried pig-head skin, fried chicken feet, fried internal organs of questionable origin (if you’re getting the impression that they will fry and eat anything, you’re not far wrong), various dried salted whole fish, and this gloppy brown stew that smells like rottenness and has bones floating in it but which the folks in our neighbourhood line up to eat. Other than that, so far we’ve been willing to eat and have enjoyed almost anything safe-seeming that passes our way.
Some of the delights we have most enjoyed so far include: A bagful of golden-brown deep fried bananas, dough-balls, and sesame-covered dough-balls filled with crushed peanuts: fresh dragon fruit with exceptionally pale flesh: a mango possessed of a markedly paisley and oblong shape, splotched and golden skin, and a smooth and non-fibrous texture, whose flavour was especially sweet and reminded us of wild raspberries: a fruit that looks like an lumpy apple with skin like a green pear, the texture of jhimika and a light, mild flavour reminiscent of unripe watermelon and honey: green curry with liver (which we ate around) and little round green vegetables that look like tiny watermelons on the outside and cucumbers on the inside and taste like pumpkin: silver dollar pancakes that are custardy in the middle and are made with coconut milk and either corn kernels or scallions: layered balls of marinated dried coconut, rice paste, and more coconut: little corn muffins with fresh flaked coconut: red curry with bamboo shoots: spicy ground mystery meat with diced mystery vegetables and chillies: green mango/papaya salad with shredded carrots, cabbage, dried roasted garlic, and chillies: stir-fried tofu and mushrooms: lots of thai iced tea (a red tea with milk poured over ice and then with sweetened condensed milk poured over it): chilled lemongrass juice: crispy deep-fried chilli-flavoured broad beans with skins: roasted fingerling sweet potatoes with a very nutty and starchy taste: simple fried chicken done so, so well: a variety of gloppy Chineseish veggie-and-brown-sauce dishes, and more.
In addition to these street foods, there are also fruit and veggie and fish and meat markets, Thai-stocked grocery stores, international (i.e. American, British, Chinese, and Japanese) grocery stores, and restaurants ranging to mom-and-pop to fancy. Petra and I have now frequented examples of all of the above, and can happily report that the fancy restaurant across the street makes a better pasta alfredo than most Italians, and Thai-made baguettes and butter are sublime. As we’re on an insanely small budget, such very expensive luxuries as wheat and dairy products will be infrequently enjoyed. We feel very blessed, though, that what for us is a very small budget is relative wealth in this country, and that we have the opportunity to explore so much of what is available to eat here.
P.S. Yes, our bellies hurt. But we’ll get over it.
ADDED: the sights and sounds of our local pad thai stand!
Thursday, March 19, 2009
bangkok so far
An elephant just walked by. I love it. I’m sitting in a pleasant, air-conditioned, European-style coffee shop (hey, I’m in culture-shock, I need a little jazz and milk to soothe my soul) and I’m looking out over a garden hanging thick with vines and thick waxy-leafed trees and, yes, some lizards, all grown in amongst about two hundred tangled electric wires, then beyond that to a busy street with whizzing hot-pink and yellow luxury sedans and tiny pickup truck/ute busses and myriad motorcycles, beyond that to a tiny sidewalk chicken curry cart, and then to a highrise apartment building with clothing shops on the street front. It’s a fairly representative Bangkok scene: fairly modern, very busy, very full, with some slightly worrisome elements (the wires, the speed of the cars, the dubiousness of the un-refrigerated meats).
Bangkok is really a very liveable city, with excellent public transportation, a lot of activity on the streets, really friendly and helpful and patient people, excellent food, proliferate shopping, very affordable prices, beautiful temples, generally awesome wildlife, and more delights. We could easily have ended up in a worse place: spending time here for a year shouldn’t be too taxing.
The main two downsides that we’ve experienced so far are, most notably, the heat and the mosquitoes. It’s really hot here: it’s been in the upper 90s F (upper 30s C) and extremely humid every day, with hotter and more humid weather supposedly on the way. Sweat just pours off of all us farangs (foreigners), making our clothes and skin very uncomfortable. I’ve been taking about three showers a day. Were we able to walk around half-naked, it might not seem too bad, but the reasonably-conservative dress mores of Thai culture requires much more covering (long pants, often long shirts too, sandals discouraged) than I would choose in this climate. The fact that many stores and offices are aggressively air conditioned makes it very hard to adjust to the heat. And the mosquitoes – well, they’re what you’d expect, but they’re still frustrating. Petra currently has 86 bites on her legs alone. We’re looking forward to installing mosquito netting. We’ll try not to get malaria and Dengue fever, we promise.
But so far these discomforts have definitely been outweighed by the delights of the city itself, especially the tasty food. I suspect I will only come to like Bangkok more as we complete our settling-in tasks and have more time to be tourists and get massages and meditate in temples and bike along rice paddies and sit on beaches and learn to cook and ride on riverboats… the options for fun are almost endless. I already wish we had more time.
Note: these photos are a really bad mish-mash, I’ve been too overwhelmed to really do any photography so far, but at least here’s a glimpse at our surroundings.
Bangkok is really a very liveable city, with excellent public transportation, a lot of activity on the streets, really friendly and helpful and patient people, excellent food, proliferate shopping, very affordable prices, beautiful temples, generally awesome wildlife, and more delights. We could easily have ended up in a worse place: spending time here for a year shouldn’t be too taxing.
The main two downsides that we’ve experienced so far are, most notably, the heat and the mosquitoes. It’s really hot here: it’s been in the upper 90s F (upper 30s C) and extremely humid every day, with hotter and more humid weather supposedly on the way. Sweat just pours off of all us farangs (foreigners), making our clothes and skin very uncomfortable. I’ve been taking about three showers a day. Were we able to walk around half-naked, it might not seem too bad, but the reasonably-conservative dress mores of Thai culture requires much more covering (long pants, often long shirts too, sandals discouraged) than I would choose in this climate. The fact that many stores and offices are aggressively air conditioned makes it very hard to adjust to the heat. And the mosquitoes – well, they’re what you’d expect, but they’re still frustrating. Petra currently has 86 bites on her legs alone. We’re looking forward to installing mosquito netting. We’ll try not to get malaria and Dengue fever, we promise.
But so far these discomforts have definitely been outweighed by the delights of the city itself, especially the tasty food. I suspect I will only come to like Bangkok more as we complete our settling-in tasks and have more time to be tourists and get massages and meditate in temples and bike along rice paddies and sit on beaches and learn to cook and ride on riverboats… the options for fun are almost endless. I already wish we had more time.
Note: these photos are a really bad mish-mash, I’ve been too overwhelmed to really do any photography so far, but at least here’s a glimpse at our surroundings.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
bangkok!
We’re really actually in Bangkok, Thailand. Erika is pleased to report that this city does, in fact, exist. That’s two mythical lands now whose existence she has definitively proved!
I arrived last week to get oriented by the folks running the program that’s funding my position (it’s a little complicated). The orientation has been really really helpful, covering everything from setting up bank accounts and cell phones to language classes,Thai massages, and cocktails.
While I was being pampered and overwhelmed, Erika was holed up in Melbourne at the home of my cousins Nick and Tina, where she began conducting an astoundingly thorough search for English teacher positions in Bangkok. She already has four interviews lined up for this week, and is excited about a number of the jobs. Here’s hoping!
Erika finally arrived in Bangkok Monday morning, since the main business of my orientation was over. She spent Monday feeling hot (it’s really hot here) and sleeping while I house-hunted. We spent Tuesday retrieving our bags from customs, which took 6.5 hours and a number of fees.
Speaking of: this blog should be understood to be written with a certain sensitivity to my professional position here, and that we are… guided in what we discuss by Thai laws and customs, which are not analogous to, for instance, the first amendment. If you don’t know what we’re talking about here, ask someone else, we can’t tell you, as we fully intend to be law-abiding Thai residents.
Moving on – Yesterday we struck gold in the accommodation arena, securing a beautiful, huge apartment right next to my workplace. We move in on Sunday, and I start work Monday. We’ll tell you all about Bangkok and our new apartment and my job and hopefully Erika’s new job too, whatever it turns out to be.
I arrived last week to get oriented by the folks running the program that’s funding my position (it’s a little complicated). The orientation has been really really helpful, covering everything from setting up bank accounts and cell phones to language classes,Thai massages, and cocktails.
While I was being pampered and overwhelmed, Erika was holed up in Melbourne at the home of my cousins Nick and Tina, where she began conducting an astoundingly thorough search for English teacher positions in Bangkok. She already has four interviews lined up for this week, and is excited about a number of the jobs. Here’s hoping!
Erika finally arrived in Bangkok Monday morning, since the main business of my orientation was over. She spent Monday feeling hot (it’s really hot here) and sleeping while I house-hunted. We spent Tuesday retrieving our bags from customs, which took 6.5 hours and a number of fees.
Speaking of: this blog should be understood to be written with a certain sensitivity to my professional position here, and that we are… guided in what we discuss by Thai laws and customs, which are not analogous to, for instance, the first amendment. If you don’t know what we’re talking about here, ask someone else, we can’t tell you, as we fully intend to be law-abiding Thai residents.
Moving on – Yesterday we struck gold in the accommodation arena, securing a beautiful, huge apartment right next to my workplace. We move in on Sunday, and I start work Monday. We’ll tell you all about Bangkok and our new apartment and my job and hopefully Erika’s new job too, whatever it turns out to be.
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