February 6, 2008

Gung Hay Fat Choy……..Chinese New Year tomorrow. This really means “wishing you prosperity”. Think we’ll head to Chinatown tomorrow morning and see what it’s all about.

When I wrote back on January 23^rd I was hoping for some rain. Well, we’ve certainly had our fair share. I almost feel like we’re back in BC. Only problem is, the rain cools nothing off. It just seems hotter and so damp. One day there actually was a chill in the air – it was only 80F. That’s when you sort of have to give your head a shake and stop complaining!!

Things seemed to let up on Friday February 1^st so we took off and had a full day of touring. Took the sky train to the river taxi and headed up river to the zoo area. There is just so much to see. We landed at the pier (Tha Thewet) and spent some time at the markets along the canal – one side was devoted to flowers, trees and shrubs and the other to food stuff.

We then headed to Wat Benchamabophit. All temples and government buildings are decorated with black and white sashes in honor of the death of the King’s sister. There are memorials for her everywhere. All government employees must wear only black and white clothing to work for 100 days. She was very respected and did a lot of good for the Thai people. Wat Benchamabophit was originally built in 1827 and then rebuilt in 1899 by Rama V as the “Marble Palace”. The whole thing is made of white Carrara marble brought in from Italy. When we entered the courtyard it dawned on me that we had been here on our first trip in 2000. There are a total of 53 Buddha images representing famous figures and styles from Thailand and other Buddhist countries all displaying a particular “attitude”. We only have pictures of 20 of them…………… but I’ll just share a few with you for now…..The temple area is beautiful of
course with all the buildings, gardens and canals. The temples are so ornate and the doors and windows and roofs all have such detail and color. I never seem to tire of seeing different temples and we’ve hardly seen any – yet!! Of course we did manage to get our “monk” pictures too.

From there we headed to Dusit Park. This is where Dusit Palace, the Throne Hall and various Royal residential halls are located. As you approach there is a huge statue of King Rama V on horseback and behind a fenced area you can see the Ananda Samakhom Throne Building. Apparently Rama V was the king who was responsible for bringing Thailand into the 19^th century and there are constant references made to him as you sight see. We had to walk quite a distance before we actually found the entrance. I had read in my “Lonely Planet” guide that because this is royal property visitors should wear long pants or long skirts and shirts with sleeves. However, I really did think that this rule may have been relaxed – but I was wrong!! So, they hand you wrap skirts to borrow while you tour the Throne Hall and the Palace. We headed to the Throne Hall first. The building is remarkable. It was built by Italian architects in the Renaissance and Neo Classic style and completed in 1915. It’s a two story marble building with a large dome in the centre surrounded by six smaller domes. On the interior of the domes are paintings depicting the history of the Chakri dynasty – Rama I – Rama V. Of course no cameras are allowed inside and you leave your shoes and purses, cameras, phones behind in a locker for a small fee. Next we headed to Vimanmek (Dusit) Palace. What a beautiful mansion. It was Rama V’s residence. Totally made of golden teak, not a nail in the place and only 72 rooms!! Loads of staircases, octagonal rooms, lattice walls. There are 2 right-angled wings that are 3 stories high and the part where the king resided was octagonal and 4 stories in the middle. This was a guided tour through 31 rooms. In the grounds there are also 7 other residential halls for the kings consort, princesses and younger sisters. We didn’t see them all because we simply ran out of time. We did visit the Royal Elephant Museum though.

It is actually two large stables built in the early 1900’s to house white elephants. These are considered very auspicious animals and automatically become crown property. One of the stables houses a sculpture of a living Royal elephant that belongs to the current king (Rama IX). We also visited two Royal Carriage buildings and the Royal Paraphernalia of High Rank hall. We did stop for a little lunch by one of the halls. I had fresh spring rolls (again not as good as the ones I got in Chiang Mai) and Tom had Shanghai noodles and chicken. It was very different looking - the noodles were sort of clear - but quite tasty. Then we finished it with Basil seed ice cream. It was very nice but of a different consistency than we’re used to………. After spending all day here and still not seeing everything we decided it was time to head home.

There was no way on earth that we were going to cook so decided to hit a “little” spot called Faces not too far from home. We knew it was Indian and Thai. Well this little spot turns out to be a very big spot with locations in Jakarta, Shanghai and Beijing. The décor was beautiful and the prices matched. We paid more here than I think we would have paid in Canada. We had some wonderful dishes though – Punjabi samosas (vegetable), tandoori murgh chaat (a cold chicken salad dish in a tomatoey sauce with green mango), tandoori lal tamater (tomato stuffed with 9 chopped vegetables), kashmiri pullao (rice with dried fruit and nuts) and garlic naan of course. I’ve decided I much prefer Indian food to Thai food.

Good thing we had such a good day because it rained off and on all weekend. We took the boys for a walk to a fish store. The apartment owners had put an aquarium in the place but we said no to fish cause we knew we’d be in and out so much. Well, the sides got pretty yucky with algae so Tom took Oliver to get 3 suckers. Nicky and I waited at Burger King for them to get back. Nick walks so slow that our wait was only a few minutes!! The kids had fries and ice cream and we came home. Well, I couldn’t believe how fast those fish got rid of the algae. We actually had to go out and buy some food for them today. It’s crazy!!

Monday February 4 – Dad and Jean flew out of Toronto for six weeks of golfing in Portugal. Hope they have a great time. Don’t think they’ll miss that rotten down east snowy weather too much. Another day of rain here and it was all day. Tom was so disappointed that he couldn’t watch the Super bowl. There was soccer, car racing, basket ball and even ladies boxing (which really pissed him off) but no football. We were supposed to meet Jennifer at the skytrain at 4:00 PM so we grabbed a taxi from the apartment. This was the only day she felt was free to go shopping for the boys birthday presents. Off we headed to Toy’s R Us. Didn’t get anything there though. It is really quite expensive here in Bangkok. We went to the department store “Zen” and managed to find a couple of items. Even bought a traveling Scrabble game for us. Had supper out at a place called “The Garage”. We’d eaten there with Jennifer before and she really likes their burgers. Besides the give free dishes of popcorn, nachos and buy 2 get 1 free beer.

Tuesday February 5 started out rainy but by noon it looked better so we decided we’d had enough of hanging around and took off. There was a place I wanted to investigate called Lingham Shrine. But guess it wasn’t meant to be. We walked all over and couldn’t find it. Apparently it is a fertility shrine with a phallus garden. Not something I needed though… We just spent the rest of the time walking around the streets, Checked out the Ratchaprasing Intersection Shrines – Hindu shrines credited for making this commercial corridor a success. Erawan Shrine has been there for about 50 years and because the Erawan Hotel is

perceived to be so successful
with the upper crust society the
businesses on the other corners decided they should erect shrines as well. Also visited the Erawan hotel lobby. It was gorgeous. I wish there was a tour here similar to the one we went on in Chicago, that exposes you to a bunch of different architecture

designs. There are so many beautiful and different old and new buildings on Bangkok. Had dinner at the Food Loft in Central World Plaza. It was similar to the Market in Toronto. You’re handed a passport as you walk in and then you wander around the various stations picking out what you want and having it charged to this passport. Again we had Indian. One of the dishes we had was Biriyani vegetable rice. It was excellent as were the samosas, butter chicken and garlic naan.

Today Jennifer and Gone wanted to get out to buy presents for the boys so we picked them up from school and brought them home. Because Jennifer had scouted stores out their trip was quick and easy. They stopped at the Great American Rib restaurant for dinner. We got a call saying “don’t eat”. They didn’t realize how big the portions of food were so brought some home for us – ribs, pulled pork, chicken and pork tenderloin. Tom and Gone did a good job of polishing the meat off. I’d already had my gourmet dinner with the boys – hotdogs ummmm!!

Well, that’s it for another week. Managed to get our hotel booked for our stay in Vietnam. We’ve decided not to spend any time in Saigon. Instead we’re being picked up by car after our cruise down the Mekong and taken to Mui Ne beach and will have a car drive us directly to the airport for our flight back to Bangkok. I still have to book the flight though. Just want to wait for that hotel voucher for confirmation first. So, things are winding down. Will have to get real busy these next two weeks to get out and see all the temples, museums etc that we want to see. Hope all is well with everyone back home. We hear no Canadian news and very little US news here. I try to pick up a paper most days but nothing much in it either about the Western world. Sort of like when we’re home – nothing much about South East Asia.