Somber Anniversary

October 13-14

Friday the 13th was the anniversary of the king’s death. It would be a day of genuine mourning. The Thai people universally loved the late king.

We had no idea what to expect.

Joanna and I walked to the Somthep Market, near the northeastern corner of the Old City, early in the morning while it was still cool. 

Markets anywhere are fun to visit, but may be best in Asia, where stalls seem to offer everything: produce, clothes, candy, live fish in buckets. There is always someone cleaning squid or prawns.

The color, the smells, the noise all together can make you feel like Indiana Jones.

We stopped at Mountain Coffee, for my caffeine fix. 

From there we strolled out to the moat and back in the general direction of the coffee shops near the Tha Phae Gate. 

Monks were chanting at Wat Dok Kham, a temple that faces the eastern moat. It appeared to be a service for the late king. 

We went to Top Coffee, the luncheonette on the corner by the gate, for some porridge to hold us till everybody got together at brunch time. 

Today we had the alternative of yesterday. That is, I had the cheok with egg and Joanna the rice soup.

She chose the option with pork, which was in small meat balls. They were actually familiar to us. I forget when, but we had eaten them somewhere before. At the time, I had guessed they were chicken.

Like most serious observances here, it was a dry day. Many places were closed, including Annie’s.

Archer’s was open, but of course not serving beer or liquor. One of the specialties of the house is English breakfast. Kimberly had some time before her flight so she joined us there for brunch.

I hadn’t had grilled tomato for breakfast in a while, so I opted for the small English breakfast. The large version, which Larry ordered, has more parts, including the traditional baked beans

After the meal, Kimberley took off for her hotel and then the airport. She was going back to Bangkok for a night and then off to the Philippines.

When Larry went back to the hotel, Joanna and I went to Wat Chedi Luang. 

Chedi Luang means Great Stupa. According to anything I’ve been able to learn, it is still largest historical structure in the Old City and stands 60 meters high. It lost two dozen meters, more than 50 feet, to an earthquake in the 16th century.

In the chief building, or vihara, the main hall was lined with chairs. We also saw a collection of saffron cloth bundles. 

I learned the significance of that later in the day, when all the Thai TV stations carried a ceremony from the palace in Bangkok. Monks were chanting while the new king and an array of officials and royals sat at attention—that is, straight up and never moving.

At the end of the service, the king presented monks with new robes.

We walked around the Great Chedi, which is partly reconstructed. Like many we have seen, it is built with elephants around the base so they seem to support the structure. About half of them are missing.

Each face of the base is surmounted by a large niche that holds a monumental image of the Buddha.

To come from the other side of the world and move among these things astonishes me.

We may have come out of the rainy season. There had been occasional downpours every morning or night since we arrived. Accuweather keeps predicting possible showers, but for the past few days we have had some clouds, but no rain.

The temperature is high, though. It is always hot here by New Jersey standards. Right now the highs are in the upper 80s and low 90s. The humidity is intense.

By the time we had gotten around the stupa, I was wiped out. 

Thank God or Buddha for coconuts. One of them may have kept me out of an ambulance.

Chedi Luang is a top tourist site, and even charges admission—40 baht, or a buck-twenty a head—to get into the grounds. It also has a small market, mostly for souvenirs. 

Apparently, we all have a survival mechanism left from the old days so that when the heat is about to knock us out, we can spot coconuts from a long distance. I made straight for them.

Joanna and I shared one and so made it out to the tuk-tuk line on the street. Our driver, a cheerful young man in stylishly ripped jeans, had no clue how to get to our hotel. 

He was starting to take us out of the Old City when we stopped him. We had to give him directions one turn at a time.

Later Larry joined us at the hotel and we all took a tuk-tuk across the moat to the Night Bazaar district to have dinner at a Western-style place called Duke’s Grill.

The pizza was surprisingly good. A little too much garlic, maybe, but the sauce wasn’t sweet, which is one of the usual downfalls of outlander pizza—the sort you get in Upstate New York or Phnom Penh. 

Joanna’s hamburger seemed to be good. It looked right, and she finished it.

From what little I saw, the Night Bazaar consists of stalls jamming the sidewalks to sell junk to tourists. There may be an authentic section for locals, but it takes a lot of patience to explore environments like this because they tend to make people lose all sense of civility. I wasn’t up for it.

Saturday was the kind of day when you have to be lazy.

We set out for the Somthep market again, but this time there was no cool of the morning. The day had heated up by 7:30.

We stopped for breakfast in the courtyard of a guest house. We shared yogurt, fruit salad, a couple of waffles. 

Most mornings in the States I eat yogurt, sometimes but not always with a muffin or toast. So it was fun to sit under a palm tree and eat something so familiar and routine.

We retreated in short order to the air conditioning at the Boonthavon.

On the way back, we were walking in the shade along the soi and saw someone bent over a Kindle at the Mountain Coffee shop. It was Larry.

He had phoned and said he was getting coffee, but hadn’t said where. We stopped and arranged to go to Annie’s for lunch before Larry had to leave for the airport.

We did that. 

Annie’s is new to us. It opened since the last time any of us had been to Chiang Mai. Larry and I had been there for the beer, but hadn’t looked into the food side of the place.

We were all surprised at how Thai the menu was and how extensive.

Joanna ordered Pad Thai and a side of a green vegetable that I found a bit too fibrous. The Pad Thai was very savory.

My dish was a yellow curry with pork. Thai curry tends to be sweeter than Indian, but even so, this one was very good, especially over white rice.

I had a King Mule IPA. At my recommendation, Joanna tried the Belgian white beer with strawberries, the Limburgse Rose.

I thought she might like it because she once told me about how much she enjoyed the punch at an office party, when she had no idea that it was spiked and got loaded.

She actually preferred my bitter IPA. Good for her.

Larry was on his way back to Bangkok in the afternoon. Joanna and I spent the rest of the day hiding out from the heat.

Good night, all. Stay well—and keep cool.

Harry

Heat Inside and Out

October 11-12

With my karma carefully dusted off by the monk’s good wishes, I was good for at least a few days’ worth of delinquency.

Joanna was out shopping and taking a Lanna massage with Kimberly. Larry and I set out for a couple of Euro-style bars near the temples on Phrapokklao Road.

Actually, when you’re in the Old City here, everything is near a temple. Their gold filigree work in the gables is inset with glass or shiny ceramic color panels. It’s almost scary to see how graceful and eye-filling these things are.

We started at a new place called Annie’s, which has a damned good IPA called King Mule on draft. Sharp and dry, lightly fragrant. The other drafts were whites, one of which was called rose because it was flavored with strawberries. 

The owner, an ex-pat Londoner, gave us a sample of that. It wasn’t bad—for a white beer with fruit, that is. Plain white beer runs a little too sweet for my taste. The strawberries made this one taste almost like punch. As I say, not bad, but not quite for me.

We also split a half-liter bottle of Young’s London Ale before we headed a few yards up the street to Archer’s.

This is an old hangout, also run by a Brit. He is a fan of the Premier Soccer League team West Ham United. The wifi password at Archer’s is “gohammers.”

The only other person I know who roots for West Ham is Wayne, the former art director at Mechanical Engineering magazine.

We stopped in for a half pint of Little Creatures, an American pale ale developed and brewed in Australia. The benchmark American pale is probably Sierra Nevada.

These fellows from Oz have come up with something in the same league.

We caught up with Joanna and Kimberly late in the afternoon and went to dinner at a place across the soi called Cooking Love, a small restaurant that also runs a Thai cooking school.

We had an array of food, including two plates with what amounted to pork cracklings—crispy fried pork fat. One had a green chile paste and the other with red. There was also a sweet pork curry. 

I also sampled some of Joanna’s morning glories. There was one craft beer, Red Truck IPA, which we had first tried a few days earlier in Bangkok.

They make you take your shoes off to go in, like a temple. We were sitting in front of a fan, but even so, the place was so hot I couldn’t wait to escape.

The next morning we were up by six a.m. and so took a morning walk, to get some exercise before the heat of the day. We crossed Ratchavithi Road and strolled up the soi to Mountain Coffee, an open-air coffee bar in a family’s backyard. 

They weren’t open for business till seven, so we continued up the lane to visit a couple of temples. Wat Lam Chang (which may translate as Temple of the Elephant Stupa) is the first you come to from that direction and is the smaller of the two. 

The colors of the gables are astonishing. It has cats in the yard and is distinguished by a very realistic, near life-size effigy of an elephant.

Across the street from Lam Chang is Wat Chiang Man, the oldest temple in the city, almost as old as the Chiang Mai itself. This is where the actual elephant stupa seems to be.

Ladies sit on the temple steps and sell caged pigeons, so you can earn merit by letting them loose. The monks don’t stop them, but do post signs warning people not to buy the birds because it will encourage people to cage more of them.

Mountain Coffee was open when we got back, so we stopped for a couple of Americanos. Well, I drank the coffee, and Joanna had a cup of hot water, which is her preference.

A flower tree was dropping its petals on the stone pavement near our table. The whole area was dressed in a gentle pink rain. It made Joanna think of Prince.

We took breakfast near the Tha Phae Gate at Top Coffee. Joanna had the congee, a thick rice porridge with egg, sausage, and ginger. I had rice soup, just to see how it differed from Top Coffee’s congee, which I had eaten the day before. 

It was more watery and had chunks of chicken. It was mild, but tasty enough for first thing in the morning.

Joanna and Kimberly took off to the masseuse and the markets again. Kimberly saw so much stuff, much of it suitable for her business project back home, that she had to buy an extra suitcase to get everything home.

Larry and I went back to Annie’s for a King Mule. The man had to change the keg. 

I am snake-bitten whenever a bar taps a new keg. The bartender couldn’t get pressure in the line, so he could only draw one. Larry gave that one to me and took a wheat for himself. 

We walked down the road and around the corner in search of a khao soi shop. Khao soi is a northern Thai specialty, a soup made with curry and (I believe) coconut milk. I had the chicken version. 

Larry, meanwhile, didn’t even try the soup, but ordered a couple of salads. 

I sampled one, which looked like minced pork, but was in fact jackfruit. It was more savory than you’d expect of fruit because it was green. 

It is probably an acquired taste. That small mouthful didn’t make me want more, but it could be one of those things that, if you try it a few times, you get to crave it.

It has been hellaciously hot here during the day. Temperatures fall enough at night that I have to turn off the air conditioner. I may have sweated off a couple of pounds getting from Annie’s to the khao soi bar.

So when Larry asked where we should go next, I had an answer ready: Any place air conditioned.

We took a tuk-tuk to a neighborhood frequented by foreigners outside the Old City. Larry told the driver to pull up at the first large hotel.

Talk about a welcome relief. This was one.

We sat over beers—draft Chang for me and bottled Heineken for Larry—rambled on about this and that.  

We were supposed to meet Joanna at the Boonthavon around 5:30. So Larry and I left our refuge around five. 

We went up to a tuk-tuk right outside the hotel and the driver wanted 120 baht to take us the mile or so to the Boonthavon.

We had come from farther away than that and the charge was 70 or 80.

Now, I know that 120 baht is less than $4, and by New York standards, that’s a free ride for two people. But the guy had seen us coming out of the hotel and took us for a couple of farang on expense accounts. 

We both hate to indulge the smug. So we walked to the corner and hired a guy who asked for 65. We gave him 80 or something like that.

Dinner this time was at Lert Ros, which specializes in Northeastern Thai food. The specialty is red tilapia coated in salt and grilled with a filling of lemongrass.

The first one wasn’t as good as we remembered, but we still managed to polish it off.

The second one we ordered was far better. 

There was also green papaya salad. The hottest dish I remember having eaten was a version of this salad served by a street vendor near the Victory Monument during my first visit to Bangkok at the end of 2011.

This one wasn’t nearly as hot, but was still sharp enough to get my attention.

That was it for me and the day.

Wishing plenty of merit for all, and may your new kegs work the first time every time.

Harry

Oct. 13

May God bless your and Joanna's travels, Harry.  Reading these is always a hoot, especially before breakfast!  Sounds like incredibly tasty & healthy food. Pink rain, purple rain, Prince, one of my all-time faves.

Safe journeys!

JackT

Oct. 13

Harry, have you ever eaten a durian? I’d read about them  years ago—the smell is vile but the taste divine. BBC World News just did a piece on them—an expensive Southeast Asian delicacy. Has Joanna?

Beatrice

Oct. 13

I won't go near any food that smells like broken plumbing.

I told as much to a street hawker once in Singapore.

Harry

Oct. 13

Harry: Ever read hard boiled novel: Bangkok 8 ( or 9?)

Art

Oct. 13

The title sounds familiar, Art, but I haven't read the book.

The boat ride on the canal put me in mind of the Bangkok made famous by action movies.

They often include a meeting of gangsters in a stilt house and a boat chase.

Harry

Boats and Lots of Sleep

October 8-10

The first big thing on Sunday was the boat ride. Actually two boats.

Joanna and I went around the block and took the metro one stop south to the Asok station and walked to the pier. Larry met us there and got onto one of the boats with us.

A year or two ago, he used to commute to work along this canal.

The boat is like a bus. You sit, if there’s room, or you stand and hold on. Only on this route there are no stoplights, just junk in the water and sometimes boats coming in the opposite direction.

We took the big bus to the end of the line and then transferred to a smaller boat, which was a tiny bit more challenging to board without knocking my hat into the water. But we all managed.

Larry pointed out his stop as we went by. It’s called Hua Chang, which means “elephant head,” named for a nearby bridge decorated with stone elephant heads. It is pronounced “Watchung,” just like the rail stop back home.

That makes it an easy one to remember.

We went a little farther and left the boat to go to a place called Bobae Market. We walked along looking at the exotic produce—piles of papaya, mango, pineapple, and dragonfruit.

That’s where Joanna got the photo of the day.

Larry took us to one of his old lunch spots, a pavilion serving street food. Joanna wanted unspiced vegetables with rice. Larry ordered a spicy dish for him and me. He told me it’s called Pad Prik Pow Moo Grob, stir-fried chili paste with crispy pork.

We also stopped to visit a large temple complex called the Temple of the Metal Castle. 

This was in the neighborhood of the Democracy Monument, which is one of many public structures, including the Queen’s Museum, that overlook a large boulevard designed for public processions.

Crowd control gates are already up in anticipation of the king’s funeral on the 26th of this month.

We took a cab back to the boat and got off at Hua Chung to stop at Larry’s apartment, far up in the sky with a balcony.

Joanna had some coconut water. Larry poured some for me and him, too, but added a shot of Pastis. Licorice and coconut are a surprisingly good combination.

After a short while, we were running low on beer and feeling a bit hungry besides. So we reconvened at a bar called Helter Skelter (complete with a line drawing of Charles Manson’s head on the sign). 

This place specializes in Thai craft beers, which are technically illegal. One, according to the label at least, is brewed in Laos and brought back to Thailand.

I had some damned fine ales, including two that went with dinner.

We waited for Kimberly to catch up to us and then went next door.

We don’t know the restaurant’s name because it is only written in Thai. It has a Chinese menu and I must have already been going downhill because I don’t remember what I had to eat, any more than I can remember the names of the ales. 

We had a date to meet Greg and Eugenia at their hotel for brunch, so we actually had to get up in the morning.

When morning came, I wasn’t ready for it.

Joanna had the name of the hotel, Okura Prestige Bangkok, and its address on Witthayu Road. She handed it to the first cabbie, who looked at it once, then twice, and said “no, no.”

The second driver didn’t know the hotel but said he knew the street. “50 baht,” he said.

That, I learned soon, was toll for the expressway. But that’s all right. By any other route, we would still be waiting in traffic. 

The lights hold for a long time in each direction here. As a result, stopped traffic backs up interminably. 

Earlier in the morning, Joanna and I were waiting at one intersection to cross a road not far from the hotel. The line of motorcycles waiting to turn got the green first. That let loose a river of kids in helmets pouring in an endless stream around a bend. Every once in a while a lone car was carried along by the current.

On our ride to the Okura Prestige, the taxi was creeping along a few feet at a time for the longest while after we left the toll road. In addition to the congestion of the roads in Bangkok, people feel it’s OK to park wherever it’s most convenient, like the right-turn-only-lane for instance. 

That’s why God invented cell phones. So you can call people and tell them why you are getting later and later.

The driver ran past the hotel because he had no clue where it was and was going too fast to see it. 

He eventually pulled into an area where we talked to four doormen. The first three had no clue and each sent us to the next.

The last one took one look at the paper, smiled, and then went inside to get directions.

The rest was easy. We had to go back to the start of the road. The hotel was close to the intersection.

The 24th floor was easy enough to find. So was Greg. He’s a tall, slender man who shaves his head.

I was trying to make conversation, but the voices in my head kept interrupting. I don’t think I walked into any walls or furniture, but can’t be sure.

 Nobody asked me to leave, and that’s a good thing.

Kimberly was with Greg and Eugenia when we arrived. Much of the conversation was about Kimberly’s activity in the Philippines. She and her boyfriend are updating a resort that has been in his family.

It seems they are doing much of the work themselves. Among other things, they expect that it will serve as a meeting venue for the many local organizations.

I managed to scarf down a couple of pieces of fruit and a small croissant. That and two cups of coffee.

I don’t know what was wrong with me. All I wanted to do was curl up and pass out. It may have been jet lag. I had only taken five or six beers. There was that cocktail, though.

Maybe it was the coconut water that did me in.

I spent the afternoon in bed. 

We had been talking about another boat ride and dinner with Larry but I had to beg off that.

We went to the hotel dining room for supper. I had some fried rice with crispy pork, but can’t say if it was good or mediocre. 

I was so far out of sorts that even the bottled water tasted off. 

The one hit of the meal was a surprise soup. It had a clear broth and some kind of tofu lumps. The broth had hint of chile, but overall it was soothing.

Thus soothed, I went back to bed.

Tuesday we had a 2:20 flight out of Bangkok’s other airport, Don Mueang (pronounced more or less like “Don Mwahn”) to take NokAir to Chiang Mai.

We stayed at the hotel till about 11 and had plenty of time to take lunch at the airport—more gyoza dumplings and some teriyaki pork. I still wasn’t back to beer, so I had tea.

Larry joined us because he’s going to Chiang Mai for a few days too. So is Kimberly, although her flight was considerably later than ours.

The flight takes an hour and a half. I didn’t sleep on the way but did put my head back with my eyes closed from time to time.

We are staying at the Boonthavon again. I was getting better all the time, but it was nap time again for me.

We caught up with Larry later at the U.N. Irish Bar, an ex-pat hangout about a block away on one of the main drags of the Old City called Ratchawitthi Road.

I ventured a few half-pints of Heineken, and they went down well. We ate dinner there.

Joanna had a BLT on whole wheat toast. I had a Cornish pastie. That’s pronounced “pass-tee,” I guess to distinguish it from a stripper’s accessory.

This morning we got up early, waited for the downpour to subside and then walked to the end of our soi to Ratchadamnoen Road near the Tha Phae Gate. 

We found the Black Canyon Coffee Shop open, where Joanna and I both had the same thing, pancakes with slices of banana cooked into them. The coffee is very good there, too.

On the way we met a monk out for his morning alms. We made a wei and gave him 100 baht. He chanted a much-needed prayer over my head.

God or Buddha bless you all.

I’m feeling better now. The beer-drinking is about to commence.

Harry