Home Sweet Bangkok
Tuesday, May 8th, 2007Last night we went to an Irish pub in our neighborhood. To my left was an impeccably dressed and red-lip-sticked Thai woman in her late fifties. She was a prostitute. To JR’s right was an overweight American man with a stuffed bra and a pixie-cut wig who introduced himself as “Karen”. Before long a Yugoslavian pilot joined in, and we had a party. A transvestite, a prostitute, a pilot and us. We clanged our pints of Singha beer and had conversations spanning normal bar banter, politics family & traveling. The Thai woman has decided to adopt me as her daughter, and the transvestite admitted to JR that his kids don’t speak to him. This is why Bangkok is such a special place. Where else in the world would this hodge podge group of individuals gather in the same place, a place that accepted all of them equally? (Granted, I did secretly wince when saying “So Karen, where are you from”…I wanted to adjust the socks in his bra like my mother corrects crooked picture frames in doctor’s offices)
Bangkok is a savvy modern metropolis with an old village surviving in the alleyways. Our apartment building is amongst tall office buildings, malls and entertainment options to suit the tastes of both the refined and smutty. The surrounding labyrinth of alleyways transforms into a bustling market during the work week, creating an aromatic cloud of hot noodle soups and curries. We weren’t planning on settling down anywhere, [read on]
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