Tuesday, August 5, 2008

One night in Bangkok

Do you remember this 80s song by Murray Hill?

Neeracha's parents were kind enough to watch the kids last night while she, Sean and I went out.

We started with dinner at Breeze, on the 52nd floor of the Lebua Hotel in the Silom district. We dined outdoors (until it began to rain, at which time an army of hip, white-Thai -silk-clad staff moved us and the other diners indoors in record time) and feasted on elegant, modern Asian seafood. The entrance to the restaurant is across a 25 meter glass skybridge suspended above a lily pond. Dramatic doesn't even begin to describe it. Oh. And the skybridge is underlit in soft neon, like the walkway to the satellite United terminal at O'Hare. So we're looking down at frenetic Bangkok and eating an elegant meal. In Thailand, labor is inexpensive. So there was one gentleman whose job it was to stand near the edge of the patio and caution you against going too close to the edge. Another stood at the bottom of the single step leading to the skybridge and held a flashlight to the already underlit step. The service was beyond attentive.

After dinner we hopped into a taxi (orange, I think -- more on this taxi stuff in another post) and went to the Patpong Silom Market, an open-air market in Bangkok's notorious red light district. Dave, Eldest Daughter and I came on our last trip to Bangkok and I was in search of more inexpensive silk pajamas. Patpong is eye opening for sure. The sex industry is alive and well in Bangkok. I found it disturbing but it is what it is -- I am the farang, or foreigner, here. We saw quite a few gorgeous Girl Boys -- I need a makeup lesson from one of them!

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