songkran and easter

Songkran is new year's eve here and it's traditional to 'bless' people by sprinkling their heads with water. Over the years this sprinkling has evolved into full-body drenchings via super soakers and/or packs of bloodthirsty teens on the backs of utes armed with GALLON DRUMS. These whippersnappers sneak up behind you really quietly until they're close enough to throw a metric tonne of water over your head and scream in your face. Then you may get talcum powdered. So might your car. And you have to say 'thank you' cos of the blessing thing.



The whole of Silom was soaked. I managed to take a few pics from the cab, hence the shittiness of quality. Everyone wears Hawaiian shirts (obviously) and no one goes to work and approx 37000 people get injured on the road over just that long weekend every year. AIn't I just a font of knowledge.



PLUS in all the excitement we still managed to find chocolate bunnies. Aw.

See you cats soon.

xx

Open Letter to Bangkok

Dear Bangers,

Let me start out by disclaiming that I still love thee thoroughly. I love your people, your vibe, your dirty streets, your 90 percent humidity, your rabid soi dogs, your tight police uniforms, your working girls, your ladyboys and your cheap, cheap whiskey. BUT, it's not all roses. I've been here in you long enough now for you to shit me in a special way, and by golly if it doesn't feel good to get the following you-related vexations off my chest.

1. The staring
OK, so I know I'm technically a whitey and I'm about a metre taller than most Thais and I'm more boob-proportionate to the old Nicole Richie than the new one, but Hell's bells, Bangers, what's with the staring? I'm pretty sure your locals, existing as they do in the interntional hub of BKK, have seen white people before, either for real or on the magic box, so what gives? Stop looking at me!

2. The service
Everywhere you go here the service sucks. Department stores have WAY too many sales staff, none of whom can help with anything. At least three of them will follow actually on your heels right around the store, right up until you're ready to pay when they all either fuck off into thin air or form a protective ring around the register, untangling coathangers, chatting on their phones or doing some other non-serving-you activity.

Then in resturants no one fucking ever fucking gets served at the same time as anyone else and the asparagus is getting cold while the sea bass is still in the tank and the 50 superfluous waitstaff are hovering around the table the whole time rearranging the salt and pepper shakers and watching you like you're the TV because they are Lilliputians and you're big and eat like a big, grotesque ogre woman.

3. Dawdling
It's hot, I get that. And the sun is punishing and no one wants to get sweat patches cos only falangs sweat and the footpaths are all cracked and difficult to negotiate in 20-inch heels and skirts the girls appear sewn into, but please for the love of Buddha, try to move in a little bit if you sense a gawky, lumbering falang loping up behind you.

4. The queue jumping
So I understand the lack of urgency and the laidback vibe of Thailand and how people don't rush or lose their tempers and the sabai sabai thing, but I don't understand how the same people who walk minus two kilometres an hour are suddenly prepared to machete you in the head just to get one person closer to the front of the queue. What, are they in a hurry to get back to not serving anyone or just anxious to resume mincing up and down the footpath in slow-motion?

5. The farang sleazes
It's a bit stupid to come to Bangers and have any type of night life then complain about the sleaze factor. But after five months it's getting harder and harder for me to quietly observe one more pack of drunk, overweight, middle-aged Western men piling out of a mini bus at the end of soi cowboy without wishing them instant death.

I understand that most of these guys haven't even seen their dick for fifteen years much less got it anywhere near their wives, but they should at least go for a prostitute too old to be their daughter. And they should understand - there should be a sign or an hourly announcement - that hanging out half sauced in a Thai go-go bar and salivating over bored naked teens only compounds how pathetic they are, only makes them less digestable to any woman who might see more in them than their money.

And the young guys make me sick, too. Since when was sticking your dick in a human petrie dish better than a good wank? If you're lonely and/or need the ego boost, why don't you call your mum, you lame fuck.

6. The traffic lights
Some of them take 15 minutes to change. Seriously.

In addition, I would appreciate it if someone made a more interesting tribute to the King for the cinemas. Like, he's an interesting guy in and of himself (being careful here not to mention the Prince), so why not make his short film a little more relevent to the movie-going populace? We want jazz and Elvis, not rice fields and cheap dissolve effects.

And also, the wine prices. Jacob's Creek is not high-so. And Peter Lehmann's is nice, but $35 a bottle? And what's with only serving takeaways at special times (the Prince again, I know), or with recommending a more expensive wine after I've already made my decision?

And the elephants, dear lord, the elephants. And the coolness with animal cruelty as a whole. You seem to dig the torture of small animals, which is way too Dahmer a cultural thing for me to get into. And I don't like how I can't point to things with my feet and how I have to cover my shoulders all the time and how those Muslim women sat on me on the skytrain that time and my landlady not understanding her own passbook and the people at the markets laughing when they saw the size of my feet and ...

the last few weeks

As predicted by Nostra Edus, I slacked off on the blog. I know people have been champing at their bits for an update, but unless you're into reading a blog that looks like an order form for Liquorland it wouldn't have made for an exciting few weeks.

The best thing since sliced bread has been Biddy coming to town. At last, someone else who constantly trips on the office carpet, leaves important personal items on public transport, drinks too much on a school night, speaks fluent Thailish and looks like a freak in photos.

Other things that happened:

- nothing
- not much
- nada
- fuck all

So as you can see, it's been a full month. I'm heading home to Sydney for a week on the 22 April, so leave some biscuits and milk out on the front lawn for me and I will attempt to be more interesting.

xx