 |
| Carolyn, Sam (AirBnB hosts), Mark and me - Bangkok |
Reflections on
Bangkok – 13 July 2014
Sitting in Don Muang airport on way to Krabi then
Railay. Looking forward to some time by
the beach and warm seas and climbing.
Four days in Bangkok have been pleasantly surprising. I was here in 1997 (I think, or thereabouts)
with UCOM (Motorola Thailand) project managing an SAP implementation for 9
months. It was a hectic and none too
pleasant experience. That said, it
taught me many lessons which I am grateful for.
The Bangkok of now compared to then is completely
different. The BTS (sky train) system
has really made the city accessible and reduced much of the crazy traffic I
remember. The system is efficient modern
and very comfortable. It rivals
Singapore for transit (in fact, slightly better!).
In terms of traffic, they have switched the motorbikes from the smoke generating
and screaming 2 strokes to 4 strokes – so far less noise, far less
pollution. You can see blue sky – but
still cant see the sun (so pollution still a factor). There are far more Europeans now and far more
Thais in the shops and streets who speak and understand English quite well
(more fools us who have not bothered to learn Thai).
On that note, a special thanks to my first AirBnB
www.airbnb.com hosts, Sam and Carolyn, an American couple from Chicago who
are helping a local set up a kindergarten system for teaching local kids
english. They are enterprising,
intelligent and good company. Great
hosts and very helpful in bringing local knowledge to the table. I was amazed when we were sharing a taxi on
the way to a restaurant when fluent Thai erupted from the back seat passenger –
talking with the driver about directions and things in general; turned out to
be Carolyn who, in her 6 months in the country has mastered a level of Thai I
think many “local“ westerners would be jealous of. Their apartment was a short (7baht) bus ride
away from the Tong Chit BTS (Sky train) station.
 |
| rooftop pool at the apartment- a nice balm after the madness of Bangkok malls |
 |
| Rules to live life by really! |
Back to Bangkok – still the frenetic street markets and
explosions of colour of flowers and food and the corresponding beautiful smell
of food. The smell of open drains and
sewers I remembered from my earlier year here have been replaced. The many stray dogs now gone, replaced by the
odd cat and some healthy looking dogs that are owned by the local street stall
folk. Bangkok is by no means the
clinical and precise nature of Singapore – it reminds me now of the interesting
medium of east meets west of Malaysia (KL) except with a Buddhist undertone.
32 degrees each day since landing, humidity around 80-90%
(that’s what takes it out of me as I have been doing a lot of
walking…preference is to walk rather than wheels). Although this is low season (rainy season),
has not rained yet, the evenings and mornings are balmy and nice cooling
breeze.
Max Headroom
There are two things I quickly remembered about the
Thais. Firstly, you can be forgiven when
entering a mall or stepping out into the street for thinking that you have just
accidentally walked onto a cat walk. The
Thais carry themselves with poise and grace and many are impossibly thin and
beautiful. Along with that is their
height. I’m walking around like a modern
day Gulliver in Lilliput – everything in slight miniature – including the
height of the ceilings in buses, shop awnings – and electrical overhead
wiring!
Which brings me on to…
The Chaos theory
Alive and well and proven in Bangkok by two things – a./
traffic and b./electrical wiring!
 |
| Electrical safety inspectors, avert your eyes! |
 |
| Mobile baby changing station - latest invention for Bangkok buses
Driving back to the old (Don Muang) airport in a taxi we
passed the old UCOM towers. Building
still there, UCOM not. Didn’t see the
Ebina hotel on the way either.
Now I’ve exorcised my Bangkok demons it’s time for some
physical exercise.
So long for now and see you in Railay – for an update by the
beach.
|
No comments:
Post a Comment