Wednesday, July 23, 2014

Oh weekends... I remember when I had nothing to do.

So with Pattaya under my belt, I feel the last few weekends have been completely booked by all sorts of nonsense. It's not that I don't like hanging out with my friends - I love it, but I really appreciate the scant free time that I have. The latest project has been grading midterm exams, which is a bit of a tiresome ordeal. And I assumed that Thailand did more or less the standard thing the rest of the world does, where 90-100 is an A, 80-89 is a B, or something along those lines. Nope. In Thailand, a F is below 50, and an A is 80-100. I mean, with most tests being multiple choice, simply by dumb odds you could get halfway to a passing grade. Not that it matters, because students aren't allowed to fail. Because it would make them sad? Coming from the "do 5 hours a night of homework to pass with a D" kind of attitude of the rest of Asia, it's kind of nice, but way too far in the opposite direction. I think Thailand needs to rethink its education system.

So, future Weg, what have we been up to? Well, the school cancelled some classes for some random reason of the week to have a festival. I have no idea what it's about except I got to light wax, flower shaped candles and put them in water. I know it's some religious thing, which is weird how integrated religion is in public things. The country is 95% Buddhist, but for the State to officially sanction it just feels a little theocratic-y to me. Oh well. Pretty stuff.

I set out to find the tallest building in the city, the Baiyoke. The Baiyoke appears to be the center of two things - an expensive, though slummish, clothing market, and a lot of tall buildings. So first to the clothing market, it was like a series of small warehouses rather than proper stores. Set in what I would consider, a pretty run down part of town. Yet prices were high, perhaps driven up by the "luxury" Baiyoke. But even the building itself hosted these shabby clothing flea markets. And then if you want to go to the top, its 300 baht ($10). I'd consider it, but tbh it's only marginally taller than the other buildings around it. Plus there's nothing to do up there except to eat at a 1000-baht-a-plate restaurant. Yikes. I instead popped over to my old home in Silom to say hello and get a haircut before heading out in the evening to a night market.



YES, night markets are back baby! Well, sort of. It was out by Ella's place, and they called it the train night market. I don't know why. There were no trains, just a statue of fire flower Mario. We got some food, and then stopped in a bar for some beers. Except it was a Buddhist holiday, which meant no alcohol. SERIOUSLY Buddhism - I like you and all, but you're really starting to push it.

The next outing was with Ella to Chatuchak Market. It's been a while since I popped over to Chatuchak, and it's maze of stuff. I bought a silly T-shirt with sushi fighting on it. I'm sure it will show up in a photo at some point. Like in idiot, I took the wrong bus back to my place and it was a while before the next stop. When we finally got off, we were at MOCA, or the Museum of Contemporary Art. I don't like art. I vowed to never go to another artsy thing again. But it was kind of staring me in the face. So in we went. It was actually kind of interesting, and Ella pointed out some things I never would have noticed. Also there were motion activated escalators, which are tons of fun. Anyway. Later that weekend I met a friend I had been chatting with online for months, but she was never in town to hang out. We got along quite well, and chatted up a storm. We passed by the American Embassy, and they were a bit cross with us when we tried to take a picture. But then they relented anyway. America, you've got a swanky embassy. UK, your embassy looks like a maximum security prison. Seriously, fix that. The reason we were there though, and I swear I am not making this up, was to see a penis shrine. It was actually on the grounds of some 5-Star Swiss hotel, so we just kind of walked in. It was quite small, but yup... lotta penises. Thailand is weird.

Speaking of the UK, penises, and backing up a little bit to the World Cup (yay Germany), I met a new guy in my building who seemed to not be Thai. Turns out he is from England, and I was meeting some folks out in Sukhimvit to watch the game. I invited him along and he agreed after knowing me for 10 seconds, because he is a cool guy. So Dan and I got to know each other that night, him having lived in Thailand for 48 hours. Dan is here to do a TEFL course, and through him I met his classmate Heather, who also lives here. The 3 of us have become fast friends in this island of people who can't really speak English. Dan's apartment also has a swanky balcony, which has been used for a series of night time drinkings. In fact, the 3 of us, Ella, Sandra, and Sandra's friends on vacation from Malaysia went out to Asiatique, a weird pedestrian shopping area thingy on the river. We got pizza (it's been soooo long!) and rode a big Ferris Wheel. I didn't even know this place existed until a few hours prior, but it was quite cool! We also did a fish spa, which I am a huge fan of. While there I met some Chinese guy, who I need to hang out with at some point.

And finally almost up to date - Ella found a website that is "101 Things to do in Bangkok" Some of them are pretty generic like "Ride in a tuk tuk", but some are much more specific. We're going to set out on weekends to accomplish as many as we can. One we both wanted to do was the Jim Thompson House and the zoo. The Jim Thompson House (Or the JTH, for all the cool kids) is this house about some American dude who ran the Thai silk industry, and built a fancy house on the river. He was a bit of an art collector, so it was a swanky place. Check. The zoo was not too far, a bit small but nice place. They had a lot of snakes, camels, goats that escaped from their cages... ya know, zoo stuff. Like all places in Thailand, they had a different, higher price for foreigners. I tried my usual "One Thai ticket please" as a joke, but this time the guy laughed and went along with it. So, right on! I'm going to continue my stupid joke, as it has saved me 50 baht so far. Start the counter! After the zoo, it was off to Khao San to meet Boom's friends. Boom is a socialite Thai guy, who knows everybody, is super friendly, and just a great person to know. Josh from the party a few weeks ago also showed up, and we got into a really heated, long discussion about opinions. Like, we gave our opinions on opinions. And now I'm writing my opinion on opinions on opinions. I think it would be best to end the blog here, before the universe collapses in on itself.

Sunday, July 6, 2014

Pattaya is really NSFW. Actually it's just "NS". Which, it really confused me why I saw so many Russian families on vacation there. I saw the same in Phuket - what is it with Russian families visiting the most family-unfriendly places in Thailand? I suppose though, by the time a Russian child has entered his/her teens, there's not much left in the world that could phase them.

So off Tommo and I went to Pattaya for the weekend... a sort of farewell, I suppose. We stayed in his regular, a hotel that was themed in Bugs Bunny and other Warner Brothers characters. Completely licensed, I'm sure. It was a nice enough place, but I liked their breakfast most of all. Proper, black, filtered coffee. Oh my god! Unless I make it at home, getting real black coffee is not possible in Thailand. It's always Americano, which is OK, but it could be better.

We got in pretty late the first night, and headed straight out to the bars to watch the football match. It was a bit of an interesting Pattaya primer - while we're watching the game at a roadside bar, there's ladyboys in various levels of undress parading behind us, children walking up to your knee with a sad look on their face, and people wanting to sell you sunglasses at midnight. You know, standard Thailand. But, way to go Germany.

After, we went to the (in)famous Walking Street. Essentially it's exactly that, a road on the coastline that closes to traffic at night, and is full of various sorts of bars, go go clubs, you name it. We stopped into The Walking Street Bar, which Tommo said made a proper mixed drink. He's not wrong, the LIT was quite strong, and completely uncharacteristic of the watered down stuff you usually come across in Thailand. After taking a stroll around the bar, I realized that I am the youngest person here by quite some margin. And I'm apparently 30 now, so that felt odd. Eventually I did find someone else, a student in her mid 20s and her friend. We all stuck out like sore thumbs. After chatting for a bit I walked down Walking Street for another drink, Tommo seemingly vanishing. I got a beer at another bar, and went to 7 to buy some water. I saw 2 Thai guys fighting for unknown reason, and it ended when one put his hands on his thighs as if to hurl. He didn't, and they went their separate directions without a word. That is my new defense strategy. If some guy ever gives me trouble, I'm going to put up a finger, crouch, and start dry heaving. 60% of the time, it should work every time.



Next day, I didn't crawl out of bed until 1. Fortunately the hotel serves breakfast all day - hooray! I decided to check out the town of this crazy place I am apparently staying at. I walked down towards the beach, and one thing about Pattaya - the food is pretty good and diverse. Completely uncharacteristic of other Thai cities which have generic Thai food after generic Thai food, and due to the expat population Pattaya is filled with an array of Indian, German, Italian, you name it kind of restaurants. What is it with westerners, that we're the only ones who like variety in styles of cuisine? I mean, yes you can get it in Asia, but its usually few and far between - which means the price is high and quality low. But, every city of 10,000 people or more in the States will have an Italian restaurant, Chinese restaurant, etc. Don't you guys get bored of rice or noodles?

Anyway, back to Pattaya. I cut through Central to see the beach. It's... fine. Nothing to write home about (Ha!), but it's very crowded, filled with hawkers, and people who refuse to believe they are 60. I thought Patong beach in Phuket was nicer, and that's saying extremely little. I heard Pattaya was once a lively, beautiful beach town back in the day. That day seems to be very far away.

Not the guy - but you get the idea
I had a massive burrito for lunch, and then for dinner Tommo and I went to get Tex Mex. Yessss! 3 Mexican meals in 2 weeks? I'm down. But first, we each had a carafe of wine from the hotel. You can apparently get wine by the carafe. It's only 200 baht. Cheap red, but not terrible. The enchiladas were great, and a good start to the 2nd night of nonsense. This time, it was to a go go bar just a little off of Walking Street. They had a show that involved this girl dancing around with a snake, and some sort of weird audience participation. But the real star was this guy who was upstairs, and decided he's going to make it rain 20 baht notes. Then he slid down the pole onto the stage, the whole time wearing the Borat-style underwear. And boom, just as quickly as he appeared, rich Thai exhibitionist Borat vanished.



Because Thailand.





Eventually Tommo and I split ways, and I had a drink at another place nearby. I talked to a Thai bar girl with surprisingly good English, and who has probably traveled more than I have. She told me about her boyfriend in Sweden, life in Pattaya, and was quite good at holding a conversation - and she was very upfront she was not for sale. Which sounds like it's strange, but in Pattaya, it's not. I really enjoyed talking to her, as she was very frank about her job and the kind of people that come here.

 
The next morning I had another burrito (god, Mexican food!), and walked around town for a bit, shaking off my hangover. I wanted to get something spicy for lunch, and I got some Tikka Masala from a small joint. Oh my god. This was the spiciest thing I have eaten in my life. My sinuses kicked into overdrive, and every part of me that could exude a liquid began to on full throttle. After a milkshake back at the hotel, our driver showed up to take us back to Bangkok. And that was the end of my crazy Pattaya weekend.

With Pattaya down, I'm really running low on places I still want to get to in Thailand. I'm glad I did go with someone, as I think I would have been quite bored wandering around on my own. But Pattaya is a strange bird in general. It's a weird cross between the sin of Las Vegas, and a Florida retirement community. I saw maaaaybe 5 people that were my age in that city, and honestly they could have been older than me. Outside of Russian children, I did not see a single young person. It was filled with western men, usually in their 40s, 50s, or 60s, who still believed they were in their 20s. Most had Thai girls around their arm 10 years their junior, and were wearing shirts that showed off the muscles they used to have. While there were some younger girls there, 90% were far too old, and I didn't really feel I could connect with someone old enough to be my dad... or mom. But I suppose when I get to be that age, Pattaya could be the place to go - somewhere you can feel young again, because at 40 years old, you're still a spring chicken.