More Impressions During My Visit To Bangkok

InterNet Cafes
The Internet cafes are not like some of the dinghy dark places here. They are brightly lit, spacey and have plush leather seats. Again the OSIM massage chairs kind. For 30 baht an hour which only expires in 30 days, it is DIRT CHEAP.

And they are conveniently located within the major cineplexes.

I had no problems connecting or with the connection speed on that one occassion I surfed the INTERNET.

Communication
During the one week I was in Bangkok, I found myself grinning from ear to ear most of the time. I had such a fabulous time trying to communicate verbally with the Thai people in English. If I couldn't, I had to resort to signing and sounding and we laughed when we finally realised what we were trying to say to each other.

I signed "swimming" when I was looking for a public pool to swim in. I signed again when I wanted a press-on ciggy lighter, not a tumble-turn one. I even sounded "frustration" when I couldn't have ice-cream for my dessert because the dumb eatery doesnt serve any.

The best conversation I had was with the escort serviceboy. I mean I couldn't help it. It wasn't my doing if the hostel I picked happened to be right next to an escort service and from the Internet, I found out that it caters to a gay clientele.

But I am not sure who serviced who. I BJ him and he got paid for my service! What do you think of that? Nutty right?

All The Beautiful, Handsome And Young Thai Service Boys I Met (I Wanna Bag One Home To Be My One And Only True Beau)
I mean I knew he needed money to buy his house and he looked pretty worn out from waiting for clients and waiting on what must be a motley clientele with different sex needs.

The go-go boy I brought home could speak Mandarin. In fact he looked Chinese and I wouldn't be surprised as Chiang Rai is right up north so close to the border with China.

In fact it was a tussle between No 1 and No 31 (which was him).

I just had to get one off the stage so he could put on his clothes and join me at the table. It must be shivering cold going topless under the air-condiitioner with a tacky number tag hung on his tight swim shorts.

Almost all the masseurs I met were University students at various universities around
Bangkok. They probably needed the money to finance their studies. They invariably had one style of working your body from toe to shoulder.

But some deviate. They used their full body strength and energy, their knuckles and their elbows to massage you at the right spots for maximal relaxation effect. I really can't deny them their just dues when they gave so much of themselves in every rub they effect.

I learnt one thing: I will never judge anyone ever again. Especially people working in the sex industry.

Bankok Is A Haven And Escape Hatch For Various Different People
Back in Singapore, I just couldn't smile as much. There is that unspoken tension and grind of daily living. You seem to be more competitive, combative and cold here maybe because you know these people and what they are up to.

Most of all, you could pick up most of the languages spoken here and know what is going on.

In Bangkok, I dont understand a word of Thai. Like when I was trying to fish out money for my movie ticket, the GALL cashier spoke something in Thai. She could be cussing moi for all I know but as long as I hear NO EVIL, hey, I FEEL AND KNOW NO EVIL TOO.

There are so many "farangs" in Bangkok. Mostly men. Usually older men. Some must be single, some divorced and some even married. They must be here for reasons only known to themselves.

Perhaps to escape their matrimonial traps. Perhaps Bangkok offers them that chance to be truly at ease and to be themselves. A haven for gays where they can break free of all restrictions. Perhaps to be young again and to arouse a flagging libido.

Like this lone Singapore man on the return airplane who has a woman and a toddler girl as a screen saver on his laptop.

Some Confessions
Of course the real reason for refusing to ride the tuks tuks or the motorbikes, apart from the grime and natural elemental thingy, was that there wasn't any red-hot sexy biker or driver helming them. I would if there were.

And that sexy young dude standing on the steps of an old dirty rickety non-air conditioned public bus makes it seems like he was a rodeo cowboy doing the horse jerk stunt.

I never had any safety or security issues while out on the sttreets either. Bangkok Streets are safe. There are police patrols and security patrols. Women, and not just the harlots, traipse the streets late into the night. So what more moi who is A MAN (or woman?)!

Movie Going And Boy Watching
The cineplexes rival ours, and some are really much better. The Siam Paragon cineplex has the IMAX theatre and a GOLD CLASS theatre with plush leather seats (like the OSIM massage chairs) going for 500 Baht. Otherwise a normal seat would only cost 100 to 120 baht.

They offer a whole range of Thai moviefare and boy, are the Thais really as movie-prolific as Bollywood or Hollywood is! I suppose a 62 million domestic market is just too good to pass up.

I had so much fun watching "Final Score" which was about the typical school lives of some typical Thai male students studying for the O-net and A-net to prepare them for the university which wasn't very much different from ours.

This reminded me of that short afternoon I spent at the National Stadium watching a group of hot dudes in white tops and brown khakis, belts and shin-length socks playing futsal, while sittimg on a spread-out piece of Starbucks serviette lining the stadium steps.

I gulped and drooled, what else.

Shopping
For the first time on all my overseas trips, I actually shopped and bought stuff in Bangkok. Really expensive stuff. Prices comparable to the deparment stores and boutique shops here in Singapore.

I was actually eyeing a pair of designer jeans at a shop called "Seven Steps". It had this nice leopard patch on its back pocket and when I tried it on, I realised how tight and lowly hip-hugging it was!

But of course! It was meant for the ladies! That is how they get to show off their belly and navel and the crack between their bums. And it restricted their movement so much, they would walk very much more like a lady. Something like the Chinese ladies of old who had their feet bounded.

Then there were these few limited edition jeans which would have cost moi something like 15000 to 25000 Baht (SGD1000). Studded with gemstones and uniquely designed, they could boast of no rival copycats, I suppose.

Puma had three mid-ankle socks which I couldn't find in Singapore so I promptly mopped them up.

At the end of the day, I lugged a huge and long red CASTRO sling bag back home to Singapore as a sign that I SHOPPED TILL I DROPPED.

The only consolation is that I could claim the 7% VAT as a tourist. Just as long as I remember to stamp the PP10 before passport control and actually claim the money after passport control.

Dining
I have also never eaten quite so much like I did in Bangkok. I just had to try the Rosselle and Gooseberry drinks. The durian ice-cream with sticky rice dessert (Now I know why the Malays eat durians with rice - not the cooked steamed rice but the sticky sweet glutinous kind). And a special kind of vermicelli served with sweet potatoes and yam in a sweet paste and soup.

I had all kinds of fried noodles served up with chunky chicken pieces, whole eggs, prawns and vegetables - fragrant, spicy and tasty. When the stalls display the ingredients in the windows, it shows they put in authentic ingredients into their cooking.

Ironically, I ate at a Shanghai eatery in Bangkok. I sampled the ma-po-tou-fo and it was really spicy and good.

When I tire of shopping, I popped into Starbucks where I could have time-out smoking, observing the traffic and people-watching by the road at street level, although on a raised platform sometimes.

And yes Bangkok loos have water sprays and raised pedestal squat pans.

The Chao Phraya, The Wats, The Grand Palace, The Ministry Of Defence, The Origins Of Thai Massage And The Thai Language
When I crossed the Chao Phraya River in a cab on bridgelinks which had designs shaped like a harp and another shaped like the Eiffel Tower, it was like being transported to another side of a life separated by the river.

At the riverfront on one side, there are ferries to ferry you across and boat cruises. There are street eateries, vendors and buskers and shops here.

I visited the Wat Pho where the ignormous gold-plated lying Buddha rests. It was quite a magnificent sight to behold.

The Grand Palace was grand (what else) and I couldn't help noticing how the murals on the walls of the Wat inside this palace, like the Wat Pho, have drawings of male and female figures with marks spotted at the exact places where the masseurs work on.

Lo and behold there is a Wat Pho massage school somewhere near the Wat. So massage must have originated from the temples themselves with the monks as the master masseurs then?

Opposite the Palace, the Ministry of Defence Building impresses with canons cramming its compound space and is actually a tourist hotspot.

The Thai spoken language has many of its numerical pronunciation sounding like our Teochew and Cantonese dialect. Thai culture must be so influenced by the Chinese, Thais and Tamils that its language also got entangled in the ethnic mix because it is written so much like in Tamil or Sanskrit.

What We Have Going For Us And What We Don't
Singapore has done well in many areas. We have our clean streets, beautiful green parks and reserves with water in some areas. We also have our well developed land and water sport facilities. Our stadia, our gyms and our swimming pools. Our kayaking activities around the waterfronts, the WIFI connection almost everywhere and our superb libraries.

But the Thais are serving up authentic, tasty, real, value-for-money, traditional Thai foodfare that comes with assorted spices, condiments and sauces at foodhall prices, easily available and affordable.

I suppose tourists when they visit, would be just as interested to see the grime of street life like in Chinatown or the street markets and night bazaars. Not a cleaned up and sanitized environment which they can see back home, assuming they are First Worlders and they are just as clean and sanitized.

To me, this offers another angle of life and as a tourist or even as a resident, as long as I can get back home to a clean hot bath in a clean nice cosy home at the end of the day, I am fine with it.

Most of all, at all service levels, we get to interact with Thai people (be they looking like Thais, Chinese or Malays) speaking the Thai language.

I just have this awful feeling that Thailand is seeing a lot more visitors than we are, going by the places I visit and the head counts I made of foreigners I see in Bangkok at different destinations.

This must surely be what a foreign visitor wants to see and feel. Thais and Thailand. Much like Singaporeans and Singapore.