Bangkok - Take Two

It was fun to return to Bangkok, especially with our familiarity of the city from our prior visit. Bangkok has a lot to offer tourists and Kristin and I both agree you could find things to see and do for months or even years. We used the internet to find a very nice serviced apartment - Ascott Somerset brand which was in the downtown financial district - a good place to pick up taxis or ride the BTS. The hotel offered a free "tuk tuk" service (which is basically a motorcyle with a cage behind it holding passengers) to the BTS, if you didn't want to take the 10 minute walk. We had a nice two bedroom, two bath condo on the 19th floor with an incredible view of the city. It also had a nice excercise room, pool, laundry room and spa. The hotel spa offered a 2 hour massage and salt body scrub treatment for $38.....expensive for Thailand, but worth every second of it.

We really enjoy walking the streets here and taking in all the street vendors selling food and a variety of products. It's so different and is hard to explain without the sights, sounds, and smells (both good and bad smells). You have to be careful when you walk the streets because some of the sidewalks have large gaps or cracks. Crossing a street can be dangerous, if you aren't careful with the fast paced traffic of buses, cars, motorcycles and pedestrians.

We had another nice dinner at Robert and Michelle Gibbons home. Their housekeeper (named Apple - she is from Burma) prepared a wonderful Thai dinner. One of the dishes was full of my favorite nuts (cashews) which are plentiful here in Asia. The entire dinner and fresh fruit was delicious. Adam and Lexi attended the youth church activity that evening and Anna went to activity days with Michelle. What did Kristin and I do??? What any good parents would do without children - we hit the spa and tried the swedish massage. The massage was very nice and made us want to visit Sweden someday, ha. We also toured the International School where the Gibbons children attend school (IBS - International Bangkok School). The school has about 1,900 students attending and they represent 52 countries using a US based english speaking curriculum. It was fun to see students after school playing baseball, swimming, and running track and field - in February. Adam also had a chance to practice his piano for the first time since we left in the Gibbons home. Adam said he felt rusty after not playing for a month, but those of you who have heard Adam play can imagine he sounded awesome as usual. We also had a chance to "hang out" with the Gibbons family and their good friend Mary Phelps and her daughter on Friday evening. Somehow, Adam and I found ourselves with a bunch of girls going out for Mexican food (very yummy) and then to a beautiful brand new mall to see a movie...we were totally out-numbered and saw "Confessions of a Shopaholic". Guys back home....I'm sure maybe some of you did worse on Valentine's Day, right? At least I am admitting it. We bought 5 tickets for the movie, had drinks and popcorn at a cost of about $19. It always feels like we are back home when we do something like a movie or a mall, until we walk outside into the warm air, sights and different sounds.

My mom flew into Bangkok late Friday night and I took a taxi to the airport to pick her up. She was tired from the long flight, but happy to be here. It was fun to watch her face as we drove to our hotel and through the streets. The kids were excited for her to come and to experience Asia with us over the next 3 weeks. We also stayed at the same hotel, but upgraded to a room they had for $60 more a night. The room was almost laughable when we saw it. It contained 3 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms on the 25th floor. We told our kids not to get used to the spaciousness we were experiencing over the next few days.

Adam and I finally got to see a Muay Thai kickboxing fight. We had to spend some quality "man to man" bonding time, after watching a ""shopping" movie with all the girls. We bought ringside tickets (3 rows from the center ring) for $28 each. It seemed pricey at the time, but I would recommend it to anyone just for the experience. It was very interesting to see the entire fight, which starts with a very interesting dance by both the fighters. They walk around in a fighting costume and calmly dance by each other. Next thing you know they are coming out hitting and kicking with elbows, legs, and boxing gloves. If Muay Thai was a video game, it would be rated V for violence, as one of the scoring methods involves receiving points for wounding your opponent. A band plays music like we have never heard before during the pre fight war dance and during the bouts. They fight for about 3 minutes for each of the five rounds. The main event was a fight that had their heavy weights weighin in at a whopping 135 pounds. I'm not sure what division they would put me in, but I don't think I have to worry about it, thank goodness.

We also visited the Grand Palace which was built in the 1700's for their King, as well as some administrative buildings. Great to look at and for picture taking. We saw the very large reclining budha, the emerald budha, gardens, temples and some artwork.

Another fun thing I would recommend to anyone was seeing a show called Siam Niramit (sp?). We bought tickets that included an awesome dinner and show for about $43. This was probably the most expensive ticket we bought in Thailand, but with the dinner, and a visit through what reminds me of the polynesian cultural center in Hawaii, and then the show - it was definitely worth it. We stood for the Thailand national anthem, which is also played before movies in theaters in this country. Didn't they used to play the US National anthem in theaters years ago? I can't remember.... The show had a theme of the history of Thailand and contained great technology, dance costumes, an on stage river, animals and even elephants walking through the isles. Very impressive.

The last item I will mention was our last minute decision to hire our own longboat for the day and to travel through the canals of Bangkok. It was very interesting to see how people live along the river. We had a few boats pull up next to us looking to sell us something. We bought some drinks for us and our driver. He seemed very appreciative. Our long boat driver also stopped a few times along the way and we got out to look around. The most memorable stop was a snake farm that cost about $4 each. The kids had a chance to hold a young monkey and feel a king cobra that was held by one of the workers. The snake show had pythons and cobras leaping at the workers, catching poisonious snakes with their mouths, milking snakes a few feet in front of you. You know, like any other snake show back home.....yeah right.

We ended our trip to Bangkok by celebrating Adam's 14th birthday. We toured through Jim Thompson's home (famous American exporter and developer of Thai silk), attended a world class aquarium (it allows one to dive with their sharks...we are saving this one for next time), and we ate at a fun Italian restaurant at the Four Seasons hotel. They actually lit a candle for Adam and placed it in his dessert.

DEAL of the WEEK: Probably an internet cafe we found for twenty eight cents per hour or holding a monkey for fifty cents. Seemed like decent rates...

FUNNY story of the week: We had a taxi driver that didn't speak english and yet he didn't want to take us back to our hotel after getting into his taxi. He kept chanting the number 50 (50 baht equals $1.50), slowly hitting his head on the steering wheel and making these obvious loud breathing noises. I would ask him if he was okay and he just ignored me. We think he was upset because of the traffic and downtown location of our hotel. Or maybe it was because we had six of us in a taxi. I don't know, but we have laughed about this story several times always wondering what was concerning him.

As sad as we were to leave our "home base" of Bangkok, we are now excited for all of us to see a new country - Cambodia. We hope our friends and family are all well. We just about hit the mid point of our trip.

*****A special thanks to Duane, Jonathon and Brandon for doing some snow removal from our driveway while we are traveling. We heard about the snow and the plow leaving us a six foot snow mountain at the end of the driveway. Not sure how to thank you for your kind acts of service. Maybe we can go get a massage on your behalf?????