Thai style or the loss of your hearing!

Bangkok says good bye to us with a heavy thunderstorm and while driving to the airport and preparing for Koh Samui I once again think, that this city is certainly worth a visit. Will I come back though? Probably not - and if, then only for one more fix of the history of Buddha and some original Thai food. Most of the other stuff I can have in Los Angeles.

Bangkok Airlines takes us in 40 minutes to the little island of Koh Samui. The small counterpart of Phuket, an island very well known by German / European tourists. The small airport operates golf cart type of transportation from the aircraft to the baggage claim. It took less than 10 minutes from the moment we touched down until we met our Hotel driver. Definitely record time for me. The island feels 'un-Asian' to me. Green, lush vegetation, many palm trees, motor bikes, cars, decent streets and everything really clean. This could also be somewhere in Hawaii or the Caribbean. The hotel consits of only 40 suites and 10 bungalows. A dream including ocean front. Huge, very well appointed rooms with the contemporary touch we like so much. I am happy that all 3 hotel choices were good and we can start into the last few days of the vacation.

After a good massage (of course, Eva!!!), we made our way to the little town center to learn that this town isn't so small. Top notch restaurants sharing the sidewalk with street food, lounges and bars. It is packed and especially with younger crows. We learn that many 'Bangkoknese' go here for the weekend to party and / or relax. Basically the Ibiza of Thailand.

We follow out tour book and find a decent looking Thai restaurant, but there are no people eating. So we decide to sit down next to the recommended restaurant in a small family run street restaurant. After ordering the Tom Yum Soup - a must have for me - and some other savory dishes, we become best friends with the wait staff. Especially for us prepared 'Thai style' tom yum soup. I should have listened to the driver in Bangkok who told us that the food in Bangkok is spicy, bu the food in Koh Samui is almost not eatable, as it is traditional. I love spicy food - but this one was a bit over the top. The second time in my life I lost my hearing ability on one ear....
What else can you do than gulping down a few cold Singha to ease the pain. 2 hours and many beers later, we pay the $38 on our tab and promise everybody to be back tomorrow. This is our new favorite restaurant!

To conclude the night we follow the waitress recommendation and walk over to the party zone, with bar competing for clients with blasting sounds from this months top 50 and cheap buckets full of whiskey and cola. This is 'ballermann' pure and we decided to have one or 2 drinks. 5:30 am we are greeted friendly by the security of our hotel when we get home.

Recuperating

I guess it's no secret that we needed to recuperate a bit the following day, so we got up around noon and rented a scooter for 200 THB ($8) for the day and drove around the island. It's about a 3 hour ride with the motorbike excluding sightseeing. We stopped at some Temple and Pagoda's and kept the hole day really low key. For dinner we are back at that Thai style restaurant. This time we asked for some more moderate spice - all for sudden we were actually able to taste food. No party tonight - just a DVD and lights out!

"Mister, make me good price'...

Friday we dedicated to work on our bargain skills. Jason had particular interest to buy souvenirs and giving the sales people a hard time. Funny to watch 2 Asian trying to outsmart each other… It worked very well though and after 60 minutes hard work we were able to walk away with almost one luggage full of stuff for a pretty decent price. The afternoon was spent to relax and to use a spa facility including massage to recharge the batteries for another night in Bangkok with a few drinks, food and party time. It’s vacation - remember?

One Night in Bangkok...

We are leaving Siem Reap in a tuk-tuk during a massive thunderstorm. Bangkok welcomes us with clear weather, a cultural mix of modern architecture and traditional Asian culture. Traffic - I thought Los Angeles is bad, but Bangkok is impossible to drive in. One hour to the Peninsula Hotel - a luxury hotel placed on the Bangkok riverbank with great views over the city and river. The room reminds me of James Bond. Thousands of buttons throughout the room to make it easy to control everything from curtains, TV, radio, temperature, shoeshine, lights and everything else which is adjustable. The first 10 minutes are being used to play with all of them. :-)

Bangkok has a wealth of Buddhist temples and relict's of the European occupation. The Grand Palace and Wat Phra are certainly the highlights we visited today and with the incredible amount of art and love to detail I really start learning to appreciate history again. Once more during this trip I feel privileged to travel and am grateful for that.
Before moving on with our sightseeing tour we stop at a small Thai restaurant. Rather dirty and weird - right at the river. We are having a few dishes including our favorite: Tom Yum Soup. The cook herself is checking us out through the little hole in the wall and coming to our table to explain that one of the dish we ordered is not very good and we should change the order. After Jason is utilizing his Asian charm, we are best friends with her and she starts feeding him. LOL ... Having a good time!
In the afternoon we visit Wat Pho - not the Vietnamese noodle soup, but the birthplace of Bangkok and a 46m reclining Buddha.

Bangkok’s nightlife is certainly pretty busy. We had a drink at the sky bar - a rooftop bar on one of Bangkok’s  tallest buildings. The thrill was that there weren’t many security precautions. You could take your glass outside on the platform and easily drop it the x-meters down to the street. No nets or fences. Certainly an experience, since the 2 Heineken cost us as much as the entire lunch including 4 beers we had a few hours earlier. What the heck - it’s vacation! http://www.lebua.com/bangkok/dining/sky-bar/

Later we took a cab to the ‘WeHo’ of Bangkok to observe the fashion / drama show of Bangkok’s gay youth. I could write pages about that, but let me tell you only this: There were many ‘Western’ business men - some of them married, mingling with young Thai guys who could easily be their sons. Not a pretty experience, but there are always 2 sides of the story….
A word about the cab driver in Thailand: It seems that all you really need is a car and a minimum of 10 Buddha arranged throughout the vehicle as well as a Sony sound system. Have a little meter installed and off you go with your new profession. No need to know the area. Lucky us - we had a map with us. The 3 times we took a cab in Bangkok, we had to explain the driver the way. ‘I just drive’ was the answer whenever we asked if he would know where the Peninsula Hotel was….

Angkor What??

We made it on the afternoon flight to Siem Reap. It’s only an hour away from Saigon, but the initial feeling was that this place actually is more ‘Asian’ than the other ones I have seen so far. The small town of Siem Reap is hosting the majority of Angkor Wat visitors. Streets are clean and people are extremely friendly. Not once during our 2 night stay we heard a ‘no’ from any hotel employees, tour guide or wait staff in one of the countless restaurants.

The Hotel De La Paix is an oasis in the middle of the busy town center of Siem Reap. The rooms are outstanding and  with their little I-pod sound system we felt really spoiled. I would rate this hotel into the top 3 hotels I have ever stayed in. Highly recommended.

We got up early around 4:30 am to meet our tour guide at 5:00 am. Seeing the sun rise over Angkor Wat is a once in a lifetime experience and I was happy to sacrifice the good night sleep for this indescribable event. Pictures can’t judge the beauty, myth and incredible peace you feel, when standing with a few people in the early morning and see this world wonder for the first time while the day awakes. I will carry this experience with me for a long time.

The temples itself set you back in some sort of ancient times. You can only imagine how things must have been back then. While Angkor Wat is certainly the most impressive of the temples we visit, Ta Prohm is the one, which can and has been used in Hollywood movies like Tomb Rider.  The unbelievable age of all these master pieces and the amount of work force needed to complete them is just mind lowing.

After a full day of temple touring, we were ready for a few Angkor beer and the local Khymer food. A fusion mix of Thai and Vietnamese food. Very tasty indeed!

Update

Jason’s mom had the surgery and it looks OK. The doctor showed Jason the tumor they extracted - I didn’t want to see it, but he took a picture of it and I don’t want o get to graphic about it…
Can’t believe she only got local anesthesia. We hope she will recover soon and will be able to join us for Mui Ne.

Bad News!

Sorry for not writing for a while. I was sick - got some sort of stomach flue and basically stayed in the last 3 days here in Saigon.

Jason’s mom went to the doctor to get a check up - they found a tumor and is currently in surgery. We changed our flights slightly and still planning on flying out today to Cambodia.
I took a few pictures of the hospital where she is staying. YOU BETTER DO NOT GET SICK IN VIETNAM!. People smoking inside the hospital - well - there is not really an inside. There are no windows. Air conditioners in the rooms are installed for decoration and hygiene is something they never heard about. In the hallways they posted pictures from successful surgeries 7 years ago. Thank you letters and proud posting doctors. One positive note: The doctor in charge of Jason’s mom has studied in Germany and also speaks German. Hopefully he took some of the knowledge home to Saigon.
Sure to have better news tomorrow.

p.s. I would have posted this earlier from the coffee shop I was having breakfast in, but they block certain domains. No western news, blogs or you tube available here - the downside of visiting a communist country.