I've always marched to a slightly different beat and celebrating holidays is no exception. Last year's holidays were spent in Malaysia, Singapore, and Hong Kong. This year, Christmas was spent in Bangkok, Thailand. Even though 95% of Thai people are Buddhists, they go all out with the Holiday theme and decorations. This is especially true at the major malls and stores where there is Western money to be made. I quickly became annoyed with the cheesy Christmas songs they played at the grocery store. And I think it was out of place when I would hear the songs "White Christmas" and "Let it Snow" in Thailand - perhaps it will be appropriate after global warming occurs.
The morning started out as any typical Christmas eve would by cooking a breakfast of bacon, eggs, and toast. Next, was a 30 minute car ride through the legendary Bangkok traffic to Amber's job followed by an hour and a half long car ride to the immigration office in the small coastal town of Sri Racha (pronounced 'see rah-cha') to get an extension of stay on my visa. Why go to the immigration office in Sri Racha instead of Bangkok? Apparently, it is much easier to get a work related visa approved in Sri Racha than in Bangkok. The way they see it in Bangkok, you can only get a work visa if you provide a service or skill that a Thai person can not perform. In other words, a foreign work visa is a way to potentially take away a job from a Thai person. Since Bangkok is a huge metropolis with many skilled workers, it is very difficult to justify getting a work visa in their eyes. However, Sri Racha is a small town with lots of construction work and not too many skilled workers, especially in the technical or managerial fields. Therefore, it was easier for Amber to get a work visa approved. As an expat spouse, I had to apply for mine at the same location.
Mind you that Amber and I spent over an hour at the Sri Racha immigration office the previous day. The small building (maybe 10ft by 20ft) had about 8 desks filled with stacks of paper and an army of stamps manned by Thai government workers donning their official uniforms. The waiting area was in front and contained about 30 chairs, which were always occupied. Each desk had two sitting chairs opposite of the government worker for the applicants to sit and show documents. It appeared that each desk had a different function and an applicant had to flow through each desk to show documents, get paperwork stamped, and move on to the next desk. Thankfully, Amber's company was kind enough to provide a Thai-speaking HR representative to handle the bureaucratic maze for us. During the previous day's encounter, Amber was able to get her extension of stay, but I was told that my 'documents' needed to be checked. I guess it took them less than a day to check my documents, and so there I was at the immigration office for the second day in a row. I noticed on both days that just about every applicant coming into the office brought a gift basket and presented it to the Thai government workers. There was a table in the back filled with baskets that overflowed to the floor! These weren't special Christmas baskets (as I mentioned Thailand is a largely Buddhist country) and the applicants bearing these gifts weren't denied stamps and seemed to have their paperwork processed faster. *Lesson learned* - bring a gift basket to the immigration office. Luckily, I only waited for 15 minutes this time and got my needed stamp for my visa on my passport. I'm positive that if we would have brought a gift basket during our first trip I wouldn't have needed to make another trip. Oh well, a trip to the immigrations office was an interesting way to start Christmas eve.
I was dropped off at Amber's job and we decided to have lunch together at the cafeteria in her building. The cafeteria resembled a typical food court at a mall with many food stands along the wall and tables spread about in the middle. The only thing was that everything was in Thai - the people, the food, and the menus. By method of pointing at pictures, we ended up getting some dumplings, a chicken plate with rice and cabbage for 2, bottled water, a fresh fruit smoothie, and a scoop of coconut ice cream for dessert. All this cost about $8 and it was delicious and filling!
I spent the rest of the day lounging about at home while Amber finished her day at work. When she got home, we went to the gym and worked out (thanks to my nagging). We were undecided on where to have dinner but we eventually settled on Moroccan food at Nomads. The restaurant also has a club that was hosting a salsa party. Cool, nothing like a little dinner and dancing. Unfortunately, the taxi ride took almost an hour! It should have taken only 15 minutes, but this is Bangkok where the traffic is unpredictable and a traffic jam can occur at any time of the day or night. We did drive by a guy walking his elephant. Pretty neat, how many people can say they saw an elephant on Christmas Eve? One of these days I'll have my camera with me to get a picture of an elephant on a busy street with a Seven-eleven or Starbucks in the background.
This was our second time eating at Nomads. The restaurant had the whole Moroccan theme going on, complete with hookahs standing among the tables. We chose to sit outside because the weather was great, probably low 80s F and we could hear the salsa music in the adjacent bar/club. We had a couple of cocktails and ordered fish, chicken, and lamb. They forgot about the fish, but were apologetic and brought another one for us. The food was good, better than last time. But I think that's because we chose better dishes this time. By the time we finished our food, the salsa party at the club was kicking. The dance floor was surprisingly packed. We found our usual group of salsa friends inside and danced the night away - all the way into Christmas morning.
When we awoke, we realized that we had overslept. We had dinner reservations with a friend at 7pm - less than an hour! We quickly got ready and saw that we had 20 minutes to go. I looked out the window and could see the long line of cars backed up for rush hour traffic on the street leading to the restaurant. Should we take a taxi that could take 30 minutes or longer, or take the skytrain (above ground subway) and get a boat to the restaurant? We opted for the latter option. Good choice! The skytrain was not busy at all, and we got off at the last stop which was within walking distance to the boat dock at the river. The Chao Phraya River is a major river in Thailand that flows into the Gulf of Thailand and runs through the heart of Bangkok. Its banks are lined with 5 star hotels and condos, and further downstream it contains the Royal Thai Palace. Taxi boats, hotel boats, and dining boats can always be seen on the river, especially at night. This night was no exception. We were at a dock where the hotels sent their boats to pick up guests. After two boats came and went, our boat for the Mandarin Oriental Hotel docked. We hopped on and arrived directly at the riverside terrace restaurant in about 5 minutes. Whew! We made it on time.
The buffet style restaurant had a lovely view of the river. It was set up such that the tables were by the water and the various buffets were arranged by different foods according to the course. In the middle was a large island dessert station that featured custom made crepes. We were seated near the front of the outdoor stage where a spanish guitar player and a singer were performing soothing bossa nova tunes. Within minutes we met up with Mike, a co-worker of Amber, and we were on our way stuffing ourselves. In addition to the western Christmas traditions of ham, turkey, dressing, etc., the buffet also included foods such as tandoori chicken, lobster, hummus, fish, and pasta. I think I made 3 trips to the main buffet and 3 trips to the dessert island! It was certainly a feast. The food was plentiful, the wine kept flowing, and the music entertainment was very nice. Not a bad way to spend Christmas dinner.
For the after dinner entertainment, we decided to check out the hotel's 'Bamboo Bar'. We had been there before and very much enjoyed the live house jazz band. Sure enough, the same band was at it again. The bar had a classy yet tropical look to it, yet the space was small enough to give it a 'hole in the wall' appeal to it, especially with the jazz band occupying it front and center. The band consisted of an up-right bass player, a drummer, a pianists, a saxophonist, and a soulful lead singer that was engaging both on and off the stage between sets. Feeling a bit festive, Mike and I ordered a couple rounds of flaming B-52 shots for ourselves while Amber sipped on a cocktail. For the rest of the night we listened to jazz, drank, conversed, relaxed, and snacked on Durian chips (*see note below).
*Note on Durian Chips
For snacks, the Bamboo Bar served fried chips that were hands down the best chips I'd ever eaten in my life. The chips had a silky taste to it that, to me, somewhat resembled pistachios with a touch of sweetness. The waitress told me that they were chips made from the Durian fruit. Known as "the king of fruits", this is an interesting Southeast Asian fruit that will get a blog of its own. The fruit itself smells like raw sewage but tastes incredibly good - the smell is so bad that it is banned in many public places and hotels!
Gross Durian Chips? I tried Durian which taste good if you cover your nose. I cant get over the smell though. Its like hundreds of rotten eggs.
ReplyDelete