Last night was a fabulous Bangkok evening, mainly because of great company and good conversation. Adding to the evening's impact, though, was the fact that we saw a fully-grown elephant making a left-hand turn in hardcore city traffic.

In truth, elephants in Bangkok traffic, or walking down the city's pavements, are not usually all that funny. There's something very desperate and depressing about seeing these majestic animals plying such a tawdry and unnatural trade in the city's centre. In the past, I've mainly seen little ones - being led about on chains - moving from bar to bar in the hopes of 'entertaining' patrons. As I say, it's pretty harrowing.

But this elephant sighting occurred as we were whizzing along in a cab, hanging out with Patrick, a good friend from Sydney. Mid-conversation, out of the cab window behind Patrick's head, I glimpsed the massive behind of an elephant looming out of the nighttime smog. Its hairy, wrinkled rump was slowly arcing around the corner of a busy Bangkok street as it made a left-hand turn along with the rest of the traffic flow.

What made this elephant special was that it had a red flashing 'taillight' literally affixed to its tail - traffic safety must come first, it would seem.

Just like that, and we were gone. Its slow-moving hide loomed up, was glimpsed and then disappeared as we careened away - very surreal, very Thailand.

It got me to thinking about how much strange stuff you get treated to on the roads here. It's like non-stop experimental theatre, with a healthy dash of the absurd. This evening, we've just alighted from a run-of-the-mill taxi - which is to say, its ceiling was extensively decorated with lucky numerological patterns interspersed with squares of gold-leaf that had been painstakingly applied. On the dashboard, right in front of the steering wheel, one tall gold buddha and a shorter, silvery one loomed up serenely. Hanging from the mirror and swinging wildly was another enormous clutch of buddhas, strung togther with fake rose and jasmine garlands, and red satin ribbons.

And to think my mother warned me never to put fuzzy dice on a car's mirror.

Idling at a red light, we pulled up alongside a motorbike driver who, although wearing a helmet, was steering with only one hand and drinking a yellow Bacardi Breezer with the other. I guess safety first has its limits.

I hope my elephant from last night got home safely ...