Bangkok, Thailand (Part 2 of 2)
Cooking lessons, crowded palaces, and a very large Buddha
Getting to my class at the Sompong Thai Cooking School was itself a comic adventure.
Half an hour before class, I called a Grab taxi for the 10-minute ride to the cooking school. Since no taxi appeared after 15 minutes, I gave up on the app and waved down a taxi on the street. The kicker came when we arrived at my destination, and the driver had no change for my bahts. Solution: he waited in the car, while I ordered a coffee nearby, to get some change in smaller bills so I could pay him.
By the time I turned a corner into the cooking school, a group — each with a small basket and a bamboo fan — was walking towards me. Nancy the teacher figured out I was the one missing student, ran back to the school for my basket and fan. Soon enough, we were on our way to the market across the street.
Nancy first gave us an introduction into important Thai ingredients we would be using: coconut cream (first press of the coconut flesh), coconut milk (second press), dried shrimp, chilis. She then set us loose to explore the market and buy whatever we wanted. I picked up some fruit — dragon fruit, guava, small plums that looked like miniature mangoes.
Suddenly I sensed someone following me — an Asian girl with a basket like mine. At first I thought she just happened to be behind me, but then she stopped when I stopped and walked when I started walking, without any introduction or greeting, just creepily following me. Suddenly, she pointed to my basket and asked me what the mini fruit were; I told her they were plums and gave her one. She took it and… blank stare. I eventually got out of her that she was from Taipei; I tried to stir some tidbit of conversation by mentioning some factoid about the city. Blank stare. I gave up trying to elicit a response from her and made my way back to our market meeting point; the group walked back to the cooking school. Blank Stare Girl and I were facing each other in our cooking stations.
The class itself was so well run and so fun!
All the ingredients for the four dishes were prepped by the team: mango sticky rice, chicken and prawn salad, drunken noodles, yellow chicken curry. For each dish, we gathered around Nancy who explained ingredients and techniques and went on to demonstrated each dish. She demo-ed while her assistants set everything we needed — ingredients and tools — in our stations. Then we went back and cooked. While we gathered around Nancy for the next dish, her assistants cleaned our stations and again set our ingredients and the needed tools — each dish was delicious.
***
I signed up our little group for a Bangkok by Night Tour: Temples, Markets and Food by Tuk-tuk, both because it would be a good introduction to the city for all of us, and also because the late start would give our aunts enough time to recuperate from their red-eye flight. Our guide’s name was Kevin, obviously made-up for the benefit of westerners. Our stops were
a local market walk where we got samples of street snacks
Phrat Borommathat Maha Chedi, a white temple, beautiful against the evening sky
The Giant Swing, the location of all Thai national ceremonies
The Naval Club in Rattanakosin Island, where the best item on the dinner menu was the AC
The Flower Market
Chinatown, which on this night was mercifully less crowded
***
We arrived in the city only three days ago, but the heat and chaos of the city makes everything feel heavy, somehow as if we have been living here forever.
The taxi ride to the National Museum Bangkok took longer than expected, with roads closed here and there, leading to surprised and frustrated exclamations by the driver who had make several U-turns. There was some event or other going on around the Grand Palace grounds, but we were able to make it to the museum in one piece.
The museum had a wonderful collection of artifacts from all aspects of Thai history, from textiles to ceramics to weapons to musical instruments. In particular their collection of royal objects — from palanquins to funereal pyres, all colorful and ornate — provided a glimpse into a rich and beautiful cultural history, although all of us were left wondering how the common people felt about all this extravagant and ostentatious luxury bestowed upon just one family.
Aunt Number One did her best to walk around with us; she paused near air conditioner units whenever she found them. It was also fun to see Aunt Number Two delighted and amazed by the beautiful objects. She kept exclaiming that she needed to really go back and study Thai history, that their artifacts were all so much more beautiful than what she saw in Korean or Japanese museums.
My favorite thing to see in museums is schoolchildren on field trips.
Although our vows were to eat only in restaurants with doors — good bet for air conditioning — we arrived at a highly recommended northeast Thai restaurant to discover that it had large doors open to the heat. The food was prepared in a kitchen behind the counter and arrived quickly. It was fresh and delicious — papaya salad, cold pork salad, seafood salad, fried chicken meatballs and Chang beer with ice because nothing was cold enough in this heat.
But the heat evaporated when we discovered the resident canine owner, a light-colored shih-tzu who kept wandering around the shop trying to find different spots of cold concrete in which to cool off. The little cutie reminded us of our own little shih-tzu. (Offspring later saw the pictures and said it had more Lhasa Apso vibes).
After a nap in the hotel to avoid the hottest part of what is — everyday! — a hot day, we arrived at the King Power Mahanakhon Building, to do that thing that all tourists feel they must do when they arrive in Bangkok — ride an elevator of a tall building with a see-through skywalk.
The place was crowded as expected, especially since we arrived close to sunset. The crowds, however, were made worse because of bad management. All they had to do is implement the simple economic rule of supply & demand. They could have instituted a timed-ticket policy, or even a limited number of visitors per day, but that would have meant a cut in profits. So in order to maximize the ka-ching, they first thought it a great idea of conduct bag checks — as far as I could see not to check for weapons or anything dangerous, but to check whether people were smuggling water, to force people to buy drinks from the rooftop bar. Four stars.
On the 78th floor open air observatory, anyone could see it would not take much to start a stampede: there were too many people in the area, all jostling to snap photos, which was fine, but which put everyone at risk of pointy elbows and short fuses. The perimeter by the glass barrier walls were 2- and 3-people deep; the stadium-style seats were filled with people whose eyes were glazed with numbness; the staircases were dangerous — people going up, people going down and people stopping mid-step to take yet more photos. Three stars.
Even the see-through section cantilevered over the air was an example of stupidity: they cordoned off most of it. Everyone could clearly see where the two “entrance” breaks were; they could also see the containers of foot booties meant to protect the glass from scratches. What was not clear was the one cardinal prohibition: no selfies allowed. But how was I to know? No signs mentioned this rule.
So when I walked in, sat by the side bench — not even in the middle of the see-through floor — and lifted my phone to snap a picture of my shoes, a young man started to yell at me, while waving a laminated sign (8”x11”) with the prohibition in tiny print. That’s when I understood what he was yelling about and noticed all the other workers in blue shirts yelling at people trying to take pictures they had thought they could take after having paid a $30 USD entrance fee. I tried to tell the young man I understood, but he still stomped away grumbling, probably using Thai expletives he knew I would not understand. Two stars.
I can only imagine his responsibilities — working for minimum pay to yell at tourists all day cannot be a fun job or anybody’s idea of a career — but the experience did not make me inclined to recommend the hike to King Power to anyone. I am sure there are many rooftop bars in this city, so a humble suggestion: if you find yourself in Bangkok, go to any other rooftop bar but this one — you will have less chaos and a view of this interesting looking building. Bonus: you’ll not be yelled at by grumpy people in blue shirts. One star.
In the midst of this mayhem, an announcement started to blare: the lightening warning had been triggered, people were told to leave the rooftop, party was over. Zero stars.
Dinner was familiar and not familiar. It was the type of restaurant that would have blended well with small bistros in any big city in the US — clean, modern, hip. It was the cuisine that made it special: the Thai flavors in the lychee and passion fruit cocktails, the eggrolls, cabbage pickle, and deep fried pork belly; in the beef stir fry, the steamed sea bass with garlic and soy sauce, the fried soft-shell crab with chili and garlic. Our first great Thai food experience.
***
We went to check out Chatuchak Weekend Market today, but our enthusiasm for the capitalistic exercise of souvenir shopping was counterbalanced by the heat and humidity of yet another hot day. We did not linger. So without further ado, here are simply a couple of pictures of the market and our dinner afterwards.
***
And I had thought that buying entry tickets to the Grand Palace online made me smart! How silly!
We arrived at the entry gate, joined the multitudes into the entrance by flashing my phone with our QR codes, entered the first area in the palace compound and were overwhelmed by the sheer beauty… No, wait, that’s not right…
We were overwhelmed by the sheer crowds upon crowds upon crowds of people. It was horrifying, actually. The one interesting encounter was the artisan who was sitting by a wall with a lamp and paintbrush, touching up a panel.
Here was a variation of the same problem that we ran into at Yaowarat Road or at King Power Mahanakhon building: The Grand Palace obviously was historically important, so it came up in everyone’s list of places to visit in Bangkok. The well maintained temples sparkled with mosaic tiles, golden details, manicured greens. Buildings with detailed stupas, intricate rooflines, and statues littered the grounds. And crowds and crowds and crowds… and, yes, mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.
***
We took our shoes off to enter the temple of the Emerald Buddha — photography prohibited — but it was absolutely fantastic. A single large room with high red ceilings detailed in gold was the setting for a buddha statue carved in emerald — surely not a single piece — high on an altar about 25 feet from the floor. And this was no ordinary altar: it was filled with golden bowls and other knickknacks set up in higher and higher heights. Devout pilgrims had arrived with flower offerings which they went on to deposit into large plates or urns. A quick online search revealed that the buddha was currently dressed in his summer attire — as opposed to his fall or winter attire — although that was merely a technicality, since all his attires were equally intricately ostentatious. Solid golden robe, anyone?
Once we got back to our hotel, Aunt Number One needed rest. N. and I went with Aunt Number Two to a nearby dim sum place that served delicious little bites.
Although it seemed impossible, the afternoon did get hotter, so after lunch we also retreated to our hotel rooms to wait for heat to loosen its grip on the city.
We made a quick visit to Wat Samphanthawongsaram Worawihanra and then headed to dinner at a small restaurant in a nondescript alley was the best food we’ve had so far.
Unfortunately, N. was starting to feel a bit under the weather.
***
The performance of the traditional Khon Dance at the Sala Chalermkrung Royal Theater was included in the tickets for the Grand Palace, so all we had to do was show up on time.
They began with short snippets of dances from different periods — beginning in the 6th century to the present — in different parts of Thailand. All the costumes were wonderfully bright — silky reds, deep blues and bright golds — and the dances focused on light steps and intricate hand forms. The second part of the show involved the story of Hanuman who had to carry a mission from the prince, something about fighting the underwater nymphs who were preventing the building of a rock bridge. The main character even made a little girl in the audience part of the show by pretending to ask her help in finding the evil sea queen.
My enjoyment of the show was marred, however, by the obnoxious woman sitting in front of us who, despite the clearly announced and often repeated prohibitions, started video-recording the show from the minute it started. She had clearly understood the prohibition because, when some of the dancers came down between the aisles, she put her phone away and pretended she hadn’t been recording. I kept making up things in my head of what I should say to her at the end of the show. “Hello, whenever you watch that video, I hope you remember that you ruined the show of the people sitting behind you!”
By the time the Hanuman portion of the show began, I couldn’t stand it. I tapped her on the shoulder, wagged my finger, and she put her phone away. I should have done that sooner.
When the show ended, N. mentioned that he was feeling better and that he could make it to the Reclining Buddha nearby.
But by the time we got into a taxi — we had been in a large 4-way intersection and missed the first taxi because we were on the wrong side of the road — and arrived at Wat Pho, the heat had done its daily chore and drained both N. and Aunt Number One. Thankfully, the Reclining Buddha was reclining right inside the entry gate. We paid 300 bahts per head, grabbed a green bag to put in our shoes, and made for the line filing into the temple to make our way through the length of a very large Buddha.
It was another deja-vu moment: we had made the same visit with our children almost twenty years ago..
And so we came back to the hotel: Aunt Number One was just withering under the heat, but N. did her one better and had fever, headaches and muscle pain. It was now official: he had the flu.
Perhaps some rest away from Bangkok would help him recover?
