Hanoimoon

Best Experiences: Anna

Meditating on impermanence to the background music of Buddhist chanting at the glorious Wat Suthat Thepwararam.
Chatting pleasantly with the lovely owner of Mitramit Teahouse while nibbling on Thai confections and sipping milk oolong.
Making friends with every cat at Caturday Cat Cafe. Aaron and I have really been missing our pets.

Best Experiences: Aaron

Making friends with Hip-Hop, who is undoubtedly the stupidest, ugliest cat I’ve ever seen. He was amazing.
Being engulfed in the chanting at Wat Suthat. It was really special.
The Temple on the Golden Mount was a beautiful view, and the mount itself was neat. Bonus points for a great conversation with Anna at the coffee shop halfway up.

Best Meals: Anna

I ordered the fried eggplant balls from Il Bolognese twice for a reason
Chilli Chill had some of the best butter masala paneer I’ve ever tried, at half the price of everywhere else
Babaganoush, hummus, and falafel at Shoshanna: I never dreamed I would get to have good Mediterranean while I was still in Thailand

Honorable mention goes to the two kakigoris from After You Dessert Cafe.

Best Meals: Aaron

Anna’s number 3
Anna’s number 2
Anna’s honorable mention

Blooper Reel

When Anna ordered a taxi on Grab and got the following text message from the driver: “Can’t pick u up. On toilet (diarrhea).”
We found out that the canal water that had been sprayed on us during our boat-ride was basically raw sewage when I was doing research for my post on this blog.
Somewhere on Instagram, in the background of a model’s impromptu pool party photoshoot, is Anna flailing as she gracelessly falls off a giant inflatable unicorn.

Today, we were going to the Bangkokian Museum, but first, we needed food. I did some Googling and found BBQ Delight, a Bengali (I think) restaurant a few blocks from the museum. We’ve decided that we’re going to eat at mostly holes-in-the-wall, with the occasional peppering of somewhere shmancy. BBQ Delight is definitely the former–meaning its decor is minimal, but its dishes are mouth-watering. Aaron got some chicken boti kebabs, while I went with the waiter’s (who may have been the owner) recommendation of beef boti curry. Both were devoured in their entirety, which is saying something, because neither of us have been able to get that into meat dishes as of late.

The Bangkokian Museum was a short walk away. Museum is an interesting designation for this place. It’s more like Colonial Williamsburg, if Colonial Williamsburg was only two houses and the time period it was frozen in was the early 20th-Century, and the place it was frozen in was Bangkok. While the furniture and trappings of the era were interesting, the houses themselves were the highlight for me. One of the houses even included an old doctor’s clinic (once upon a time, some doctors used their residences as their clinic). Canopy beds draped with crocheted mosquito-netting were placed in rooms with fine Benjarong ceramics. A wind-up phonograph sat in a hall across from a non-flush toilet. Signage was minimal and confusing, but we still learned a lot just from wandering around.

After, we took a ferry across the river to ICONSIAM (yes, its name is all-caps; ICONSIAM is extra). ICONSIAM is the sixth-largest mall in the world by gross leasable area, and we wanted to see it. You know, cause we hadn’t seen enough malls yet. This mall was sort of like a theme park, if the theme of the park was consumerism (which, come to think of it, actually is the theme of all theme parks, they just don’t advertise it as blatantly as ICONSIAM). We found the After You Dessert Cafe here and got a Thai tea kakigori, before riding the maze of escalators all around to gawk at the storefronts. It had everything from luxury designers to a Lego store, but it didn’t have a bookshop, so we left to find one.

We whiled away the afternoon in Candide Bookstore. It turned out that it didn’t have an English-language section, but that didn’t stop us from buying coffees and loitering for hours in its cafe. When the sun went down, we found our way to Lhong 1919. It’s a historic, Chinese-designed mansion that’s been turned into a shopping center. Jesus. Even I’m getting tired of hearing me talk about all the malls we went to in Bangkok. Lhong 1919 was a bit different, though. Mostly, it contained art galleries and craft shops. Aaron and I ate burgers from a food truck and picked our favorites from among the various exhibitions, popping into gallery after gallery. We made one final stop at the Confucianesque shrine at the end of Lhong 1919’s courtyard before finally heading home for the evening.

The next morning was a busy one. It was our last day in Bangkok, and we had a lot of temples we still wanted to squeeze in. We’d been putting it off because Bangkok is so hot and temples aren’t air-conditioned, but this morning we woke up early so we could see them before the sun was high. Wat Pho was open the earliest, so Wat Pho is where we started.

Wat Pho is known for two things: having the largest collection of Buddha images in all of Thailand, and one of those images being a 46-meter-long, reclining Buddha statue. The first claim to fame was already enough to pique Aaron’s and my interest. We have been to a lot of places with very large collections of Buddha images; Wat Pho has over a thousand. It’s also one of the oldest and largest temples in Bangkok. After a while, the seated Buddha statues all started to blend together. We couldn’t tell which Buddha-lined courtyards we had already visited. But Wat Pho also had some magnificent, mosaic chedis and a number of smaller temples we could pop out heads into. We saved the reclining Buddha for a finale. It was, indeed, a very large, reclining Buddha. Metal bowls ran the length of its back, and tradition dictated that we needed to place a small coin in each one. The temple makes it easy, though, allowing you to trade a small amount of paper baht for the correct amount of coins. I found myself wishing that the Buddha were housed in a larger structure, so that it could be viewed from further away; as it was, I could only really take in one small section of him at a time.

Next up was the Grand Palace and its temple, Wat Phra Kaew. The Grand Palace was the seat of the King and his royal government from 1782 to 1925. It is a complex of buildings, none of which are enterable (a fact that was elided when we bought our tickets), aside from the temple. We started our visit there. Wat Phra Kaew is perhaps most famous for housing the emerald Buddha. The emerald Buddha is perhaps most famous for being housed in the royal temple. The whole thing is sort of famous for being famous. I can say from first-hand experience that the emerald Buddha has not earned his fame by being large, beautiful, or in any other way impressive. He’s not even actually emerald–he’s jade. On the walls surrounding the temple, however, is a gorgeous mural depicting the plot of the Ramayana. The Ramayana is a integral Hindu religious text that tells the story of Rama, the prince of Kosala, and his wife Sita. The incomparable beauty Sita is abducted by Ravana, a rival king. Rama then enlists the help of Hannuman, the monkey king, and his army of monkey soldiers, in order to free Sita. With Sita by his side, he takes his rightful place on the throne. Aaron and I had a lot of fun trying to identify the main characters and plot points in the mural. After, we walked the palace grounds and paid way too much for lattes just so we could sit in the sweet, sweet air-conditioning of a cafe in the complex. We walked past a few of the palace buildings, whose architecture was an interesting East-meets-West blend, then headed out.

By this point, I was so hot that I didn’t want to take the short ferry to our next temple. We got a cab, and even the driver mentioned that we were being silly and should have just taken the ferry. You know you’ve done something wrong when even the person making money off you thinks you’re making a mistake. He got us to our last stop in our temple farewell tour, nonetheless.

Wat Arun is smaller than most of the other temples in Bangkok, but the giant white prang (a Khmer-style spire) and its smaller siblings are iconic symbols of the city. A distinctive feature of this temple is that you may actually climb some steep stairs to walk around on its spire. It was encrusted with thousands of glass mosaic tiles, making the already blindingly-white structure even more fulgurant. Alas, we didn’t stay long–we were already too hot. After making one full circle around the prang’s second level, we left to find lunch.

All Meals Sawasdee was another hole-in-the-wall, and in this case, even the wall was a hole-in-the-wall. We walked through some pretty depressing markets to get there–the ones in the parts of the city that tourists don’t go to (not because they’re dangerous, but because they’re extremely impoverished). The meal was a bit meh really, but we were too tired and hot from the morning’s events to complain. We returned to our room to collapse immediately after.

Our last night in Bangkok was spent at the complete and utter sucker-trap known as Asiatique. It’s a shopping complex (I know) that seems to specialize mostly in overpriced, mediocre restaurants. We wandered into one that tried to charge us three dollars for a lime for my soda water, then we left in protest. We found another, whose name I can’t even remember, that only charged me one dollar for a soda-water lime. A perfectly average pizza later, we went home. What a shame that our last night in this wonderful city left such a bad taste in my mouth.

Bangkok: Days 7 & 8

Wat Traimit was our first stop this morning, once we had some hostel coffee in us. The temple is known for its gigantic, solid-gold Buddha. The five-and-a-half ton statue was discovered when a crane dropped it and broke its stucco-and-mosaic-glass exterior. This facade is believed to have been placed around it to protect the golden treasure from Burmese invaders. The gold it is composed of, alone, is worth over 250 million dollars. So, yeah, that’s a big ol’ golden Buddha.

Wat Traimit itself was sort of nondescript. The biggest draw is definitely the enshrined Buddha, who sits at the top of a newly-constructed, white building with several sets of stairs. Unluckily, we arrived at the same time as at least two large tourist groups, so we were stuck behind them on the stairs, and vying for views of the Buddha at the top. It was exactly what it says on paper: a very big, very gold, very Buddha, statue. This was probably the most touristy of the temples we’ve been to. I saw nary a monk, and the only locals were tuk-tuk drivers waiting for a fare. Aaron and I did a short, distracted meditation on some steps behind the building, then we got out before we could be trampled by the hordes of tourists.

It was, as always, a very hot day, but Aaron and I decided to walk through Chinatown to the boat pier on the Chao Phraya. After asking a local police officer (I think–maybe he was like… dock security?) a lot of questions about which boat we needed and how to pay, we took a short boat ride to the neighborhood of our chosen lunch spot, Shoshanna.

Shoshanna is a Mediterranean place just off of the main backpacker strip. It’s a small place without much in the way of decor, but it has air conditioning, the prices are better than reasonable, and the food is incredible. Our hummus was creamy, our babaganoush was salty and acidic, and our falafel balls were crispy and perfect. Aaron and I bided our time here for a couple of hours, and no one bothered us. I’d really been missing Mediterranean food, too, so I was happy to find it in the middle of Bangkok.

The reason we were biding our time is that we were waiting for Mitramit Teahouse to open. It’s a very classic-looking teahouse, decorated with dark wood, marble, and jade. We were the only ones in there for afternoon tea. The owner was absolutely lovely, and did everything she could to make us feel welcome. She talked us through our tea choices; Aaron went with a chocolatey black, while I tried milk oolong (it’s non-dairy, but has a milky taste). Then, she brought us an assortment of bites to pair with our tea: a couple of cookies with purposefully charred tips, some fresh and dried fruit, sweet sticky rice cooked with pandan, a coconut and pandan gelatin, and a palm-sugar-and-coconut-milk biscuit. Aaron and I read and sipped and nibbled away at our trays. It was a delightfully quiet afternoon.

After our usual afternoon rest, we met for dinner at Mango. The food was way too sweet (a common issue we keep finding with the curries here), and I couldn’t actually eat most of it. One of my biggest pet peeves is when food that should be salty or savory is sweet. They did have a cool cat who came and sat next to me while I pushed the food around on my plate, though. We ended up grabbing a sushi roll after, because we were both still hungry. Aaron, too, dislikes sweet curries.

The next day we had some errands to run. I needed more doxycycline (for malaria prevention), we needed to buy tickets for our upcoming bus-and-catamaran trip to Koh Tao, and I needed contacts because my glasses broke. So, of course, we went to the mall. Yes, for the fifth time in a week, we went to the mall.

Errands were run, and we even managed to squeeze in a showing of Portrait of a Lady on Fire (three-and-a-half out of five stars, but the song written for the movie gets six out of five). Then we walked to a nearby artisan coffee shop and got fancy coffees. We spent our downtime at F.A.C.T. cafe this time, rather than the hostel.

Once the sun set, we headed to Lumphini Park. It’s sort of Bangkok’s version of Central Park, and it’s a great place for people watching. We took a short stroll past it’s large ponds and statues, eyeing the joggers, gigantic dance aerobics class, and other tourists like us. We briefly stopped to look at a couple of Buddhist shrines on the outside of the park before we headed out to find dinner.

Burgers are what’s on the menu at Arno’s Wireless. I have no idea why it is named this. There was nothing about it that appeared to be internet or cell-phone related. But it did have good burgers and seasoned curly fries served in a chic, all-glass building. Aaron and I shared a cheeseburger and a Caesar salad (that I loved because of its authentic, whole anchovies and Aaron hated for the exact same reason) while we took turns asking each other questions from one of those “how well do you know your partner” quizzes. Turns out, we know each other pretty dang well.

Bangkok: Day 6

We rode the canal boat again. But I was a little older and a little wiser this time. I did my research. Now, I knew how to ride the cheap boat that locals take, which is thirty cents, as opposed to ten dollars. I had been suckered by a tourist trap the first time, just like I’d suspected. Not this time. I also knew how to put up the plastic sheeting on the side of the boat to keep the canal spray out. When we got to our destination, I barely had any raw sewage on me at all. Movin’ on up in the world.

Our destination was Jim Thompson House. James Harrison Wilson Thompson was an American silk industry magnate who helped to revitalize Thailand’s silk trade, and preserve traditional Thai prints and techniques. He was a WWII spy who fell in love with Thailand on assignment here. After the war, he started a silk company, which gained fame when its fabrics were used to create the costumes for The King and I. With his wealth, he amassed an impressive collection of East Asian art (many pieces of which served as inspiration for his patterned silks), and built his “house on the Khlong” of Bangkok to store them in. When Thompson was 61, he mysteriously disappeared from the Cameron Highlands of Malaysia. To this day, we have no idea what happened to him, and theories range from intentional disappearance, to abduction, to retribution for actions during WWII. Whatever happened to (or because of?) him, he left behind his house and its world-class collection of antiques and art pieces. The house was pieced together from six historical houses which he managed to bring to Bangkok by river from Ayutthaya. It’s an architectural marvel, combining traditional Thai structures with Western touches for convenience, and decor from all over Asia. It is also, now, one of the best museums in Thailand.

Tours are obligatory, but also very informative (for a change). Our guide provided historical details and interesting tidbits that really brought the place alive for me. I could imagine Jim Thompson and his famous American guests smoking in the parlor or dining at his Chinese table, looking out at his flourishing, jungly gardens. I also got a bit fascinated with his disappearance while we toured. I snuck glances at the Wikipedia article about it, whenever our guide wasn’t talking. I think there’s a novel to be written there. Who doesn’t love a good mystery?

After exploring the gardens on our own for a short bit after the tour, we headed to lunch at B-Story. It’s in the same shopping complex as Caturday, and also has a fun theme. In this case, it’s “Provençal rose conservatory” instead of “cats.” The whole restaurant looks like a Victorian greenhouse. It was a bit too fussy and feminine for my decor sensibilities, but it was a fun idea. Our macaroni and cheese was creamy without sacrificing tang or pungency, too. Plus, did I mention it was in the same complex as Caturday: The Cat Cafe?

Obviously, we had to check in on our friends, both feline and human, while we were in the neighborhood. The cafe workers were different this time, but still as helpful as the last bunch. The cats were the same, though we did get to spend a bit more time with some of the shyer ones. Aaron got petite, white-chinned, grey-furred, Phoebe to warm up to him, while I got to spend some quality time with Rocket, who has tufted ears and a long, lithe frame. We also got some great playtime in with Hip-Hop, the stumpy-legged, munchkin cat that seems to have his tongue stuck in the always out position. He looks like what we in the scientific community call a “doofus.”

After Caturday, we went back to Chern Hostel to rest, and after our rest, we walked to dinner at Chili Chill. Chili Chill is an Indian restaurant at the end of Bangkok’s backpacker row. It doesn’t look like more than a hole in the wall, but it served up some mighty fine vegetable pakora, butter masala paneer, and tandoori chicken. I was scraping the bowl. It was also a total bargain. Aaron and I are finding that you can eat cheap just as well as, if not better than, pricey in Bangkok.

We finished the night with a cocktail at Ku Bar. We took a few wrong turns, and ended up at a few wrong spots, before we finally noticed it’s entirely inconspicuous sign. I think this is intentional–it’s going for a speakeasy kind of vibe. It’s located at the top of some stairs, tucked in the corner of what appears to be an abandoned industrial building. Inside, the lights are low and the music is cool jazz. The bar is your basic high-end mixology kind of place–meaning it looks like a cross between an apothecary and a euro-lounge. Cocktails are expensive, but the price is fair for the craftsmanship and originality. Aaron and I only stayed for one, though, because we are on a budget.

Bangkok: Days 4 & 5

We got a late start. Sleeping in has become the norm. Usually, this would be fine for a vacation, but those cooler hours in the morning have become the only time to see any non-air-conditioned sights, which is the majority of sights here. So, when we sleep in, the day is pretty much shot in terms of sightseeing. We can still eat, though.

For lunch, we decided on dim sum at Hong Bao. It’s in the mall. Yep, we went back to the mall. Hong Bao has an upscale chain-y feel, like P.F. Chang’s. My go-to drink has become soda water with a bit of lime squeezed in. It’s thirst-quenching and refreshing, and I cannot recommend it enough in hot weather. So, I ordered one of those, and Aaron and I split some steamed shrimp dumplings, BBQ pork buns, and pork soup dumplings. Everything came in odd numbers, but it worked out that Aaron liked the BBQ pork buns significantly more than the other two, so we traded. My favorite was the soup dumplings, which were juicy and garlicky. For dessert, we ordered some salted egg custard steamed buns, which for some reason are usually served as a non-dessert item here, despite the fact that their filling tastes like the inside of a Cadbury Cream Egg, only saltier.

After lunch, we went to our favorite bookstore, which we have visited more times than any other place here in Bangkok. And every time we leave with more books–so much for packing light. Aaron has gotten particularly into reading on this trip, and spends all our downtime devouring books. I’ve gotten particularly into Fire Emblem: Three Houses, which I’m sure is just as enriching as literature.

It was a lazy day after that. I think the day before had been so busy that Aaron and I were both craving quite a bit of downtime. We ordered in for dinner from Il Bolognese, the same place we ordered from a few nights ago. They have these fried eggplant balls in this salty, acidic tomato sauce that you dip in burrata cream, and then die, because it’s the best thing you’ve ever eaten. The pizza is fantastic, too. We chowed down and watched Fullmetal Alchemist and promised to wake up earlier the next day.

Alas, it was not to be. To tell the truth, the day before it was Aaron’s fault we didn’t get a start on the day until late, but this next morning was entirely my fault. I did that thing where I slept so long that I was too groggy to wake. I didn’t need the sleep; my body had just decided it was going into hibernation mode. Aaron was smart enough to not wait for me, and went off to check out a temple on his own.

When I woke, we agreed to meet at a coffeehouse, and I took my first “GrabBike,” which is a motorcycle Uber. It was a bit awkward, because usually I would put my arms around the driver to keep from falling off the bike, but the driver was a stranger. This time, I just held on to the seat. The driver was great! He wove through traffic a bit, but was so deft that I never felt unsafe. I’ve taken several tuk-tuks that were much more terrifying than this motorcycle ride. Aaron had beat me to the coffeehouse, also via GrabBike. From there, we made lunch plans.

Nahm has a Michelin star. It’s not the most expensive restaurant in Bangkok, but it’s certainly not the cheapest either. When I want to eat fancy, I try to pick a place that’s open for lunch. Lunch set menus at upper-crust restaurants tend to be priced around what a nice dinner would cost at a mid-range restaurant–it’s at night that the bill becomes exorbitant. Our guidebook had a few recommendations before Nahm, but Nahm was the only one open for lunch, so Nahm it was. We had a difficult time finding it, tucked as it was in the corner of a large hotel, between some other large hotels. The decor was white-tablecloth modern, as was the food. I need to start taking pictures of the menus at these places, because I can never remember what I ordered. It’s never just “Chicken Massaman Curry.” Instead, it will be “Browned Cornish Hen with Yukon Gold Potatoes and Vidalia Onions in a Coconut & Palm-Sugar Broth, Spiced with Galangal, Cardamom, Cloves and Cinnamon on a Bed of Fluffed Jasmine Rice,” ya know? Our lunch set included an amuse bouche that I think had some dried shredded fish? And a couple of canapes, one of which was served on a betel leaf? And then our entrees, one of which had fish dumplings (mine) and the other of which included starfruit and fried shrimp (Aaron’s). It was all fine. Innovative, fun, yummy, sure, but also a bit overpriced. It wasn’t innovative or yummy enough to justify the price. I wish there were more restaurants that forwent all the floral arrangements and table linens and just concentrated on making artful food at reasonable prices. Nahm was a lot of pomp for a middling pay-off.

You’ll never believe this, but following our afternoon downtime, we went to a mall. I told you a lot of what there is to do in Bangkok involves being at a mall. For some insane reason, Aaron and I had a promise to keep, a promise we’d made many weeks ago, when we were missing western food, a promise to get a bloomin’ onion at Outback Steakhouse in Bangkok. So now, we were at the mall again, because of course Outback Steakhouse is in a mall here. And you know what? That bloomin’ onion was off the chain. I liked this stupid bloomin’ onion and its spicy horseradish dip more than any dish in my entire fancy meal at Nahm. There’s no accounting for taste, I guess.

Tomorrow, we really would get up early.

Author’s note: Usually, below this last sentence, you would find a slideshow of photos, but since we didn’t do anything particularly photogenic these two days, all you get are those dumplings at the top of the post.

Bangkok: Day 3

Enough with all these malls. It was time to get serious and visit some of Bangkok’s famous temples. Not too far from our hostel, upon a steep artificial hill, lies Wat Saket. First built during Thailand’s Ayutthaya period (1350-1767), it was later renovated and renamed by King Rama I when Bangkok became Thailand’s capital. Wat Saket is often called “The Temple of the Golden Mount,” because of its steep, man-made hill and the giant, golden chedi at the apex. We began our visit circling the base of the hill, which is surrounded by grotto-like shrines. From there, it’s not too far of a climb to the top, but we decided to stop at the coffee shop just before the peak. We hadn’t had our caffeine yet. Aaron and I whiled away a good chunk of time here, just chatting about some self-improvement projects we’d like to take on in the new year, one of which was meditating more. There’s no time like the present, so after a respectful circling of the chedi, we settled onto a bench and began a meditation session.

This time, instead of metta or mindfulness of breath, I did what I call “inside/outside” meditation. It’s a form of mindfulness that I like to use in areas that are distractingly noisy. If you wish, you may try it as follows: first, find a comfortable position and set a timer for your desired amount of time (if this is your absolute first time, I’d recommend 2-5 minutes). Close your eyes. Take a deep breath in and exhale, then allow yourself to become aware of your body’s position. Relax your shoulders. Straighten your spine; I once had a meditation teacher tell me “your spine should be a balanced stack of golden coins”–I’m still not entirely sure what this meant, but I think of it often when I’m straightening my spine. Next, become aware of your contacts with the chair and/or ground. Feel where your feet meet the ground, where your thighs touch the seat. Now, slowly, open your awareness to the outside world. Feel the air on your skin. Hear the birds or traffic or A/C or whatever your current soundscape is. Since your eyes are closed, I would mostly stick with sound. Once you have more practice, you may try open eye meditation and do this same exercise with visual input–it works particularly well outside on a rainy or windy day, or when looking at a river or waterfall. But for now, let’s use sound. Even in very quiet places, there are constant, subtle changes in sound. Your job now is to tune into those. However, resist the urge to label them. Your first response will be “oh, that’s a wind chime, and oh, that’s a car honking far away, and oh, that’s a mourning dove.” It is ok that this is what your mind does. This is what minds do. But, do your best to spend less time labelling and more time being curious. Yes, it might be a windchime, but what does it sound like? Can you hear each individual chime tinkling? Where is it located? Can you hear how the sound changes from second to second, moment to moment? Try your best to listen openly, curiously, calmly, without labelling or judging or having a conversation in your mind. Answer these questions not with words, but with experience. Experience the sounds. And as you experience them, try to notice how your experience isn’t actually parsed. What does it mean, ultimately, to say that your experience is of a windchime to your right? “Windchime” and “to the right” are ideas, not experiences. Your soundscape is whole. Even the parsing of sounds from other senses is an illusion. Sound is just one aspect of a singular conscious experience. Notice that the feeling of the air on your skin is as much part of your conscious experience as the windchimes are. Ok, it’s about to get a bit weirder. Notice that your internal experience is also part of this singular consciousness. That the way the air feels on your skin is part of the same consciousness that’s feeling bored with this meditation, that’s having worded thoughts about how you’ve got other shit to do. Your thoughts, your feelings, what you think of as you is not different, experientially, from what you think of as windchimes. Words are just our clumsy way of butchering experience. They are also the aspect of our experience we tend to identify with the most. But the words in our heads are no more “us” than the sound of the windchimes. Does that make sense? No? Well, that’s because you have to actually experience what I’m saying to believe it. It’s not intuitive. You’re not going to reason your way there. If you spent a lot of time reading about neuroscience, you’d get close, but this way is a lot faster and a lot more real, in my opinion. Even if you don’t feel like going all the way down this path because it sounds like a crazy acid trip, getting to a point where you can be mindful of sound is also a form of meditation.

I did inside/outside meditation on The Golden Mount, with windchimes behind me, traffic below, birds nearby, and the occasional low chatter of visitors walking past. Also, every now and then, one of these visitors would bang an enormous gong a few feet from my head. That sound was a little hard not to label as “terrifying” and “extremely annoying” and I can’t say I succeeded in not doing so. But overall, it was a very fulfilling meditation, and I was happy to be back at my practice.

After our descent, in which we briefly stopped to learn about how this temple used to have so many piles of bodies taken by cholera that a colony of vultures took up residence there, we walked to lunch at Krua Apsorn. It’s not a beautiful restaurant, it’s also not a particularly cheap restaurant, but it was both authentic and delicious. We shared a crab omelette and some crab in yellow curry, both of which had big, sweet chunks of jumbo-lump cooked perfectly. Apparently, this place is even popular with Thai royalty, despite its fluorescent lighting and linoleum flooring, and it’s known for the two crab dishes we ordered.

We hid from the heat of the afternoon in our hostel, and then, briefly, in a coffeehouse. For dinner, we had what’s considered the definitive and original pad Thai at Thipsamai, which is only a couple of blocks from our hostel. It was good. Shrug. Pad Thai is good.

After dinner, we made our way to Wat Suthat Thepwararam. It’s open later than most of the other temples, so we decided to visit at night to see it all lit up (and also because it wouldn’t feel like it was 105 degrees while we checked it out). Outside the temple sits the Giant Swing. The monumentally tall, red archway was originally built as part of a Brahmin ceremony, but is now an iconic landmark of Bangkok. We walked through Wat Suthat’s gates, and realized we were entering the complex mid-service. I’m not sure if the chanting was in Pali or Thai, but it was rhythmic and beautiful. We approached cautiously, trying not to disturb the service. Inside, I could make out a large group of seated figures, surrounding a large, golden Buddha statue. The walls were elaborately muraled with scenes from the Buddha’s life. We walked around the outside of the temple, then sat on the steps in the back to meditate on the chanting. Listening to this crowd, devoting themselves in unison to Buddhist principles, communing together over this shared belief, I started crying. I became aware of the impermanence of it all. First, because I would probably never be in Thailand again, listening to this chanting at this gorgeous temple, but also, because this service would end. And these people would go home and live their lives and they too, would eventually end. This temple would eventually crumble. The sun would eventually die. No note of this chant would last. No part of this brief communion was forever. I was deeply sad, yes, but also deeply grateful to be there, in that brief moment, with these people, in this place. Everything was as it was, everything was as it had to be, and all was right. I don’t know how long I sat there with tears streaming down my face, but, eventually, a man approached us. He warmly told us “you can go inside,” as he entered the temple. I don’t know if he noticed I was crying, or was just being friendly. I think Aaron and I both appreciated that small act of welcoming. We weren’t sure if we could go inside, or if it was ok to enter during the service, but now we had been invited in. Aaron settled in and meditated, and I did for a bit, as well, but soon I got up. I wanted to explore the temple grounds with the sound of the chanting around me. I had them all to myself (well, except for the ten temple cats I kept running into). I walked them mindfully, aware of the feel of my feet on the stones of the garden. Through a door, I found the ubosot, or ordination hall. It was empty, save for a temple worker changing the arrangement on the shrine. I stood and watched him for a bit, before realizing the chanting had ended.

After, Aaron met me for a drink at a rooftop bar nearby, where we could still see the temple, and we debriefed about our respective religious experiences. Some days are more Buddhist than others.

Bangkok: Day 2

We got a late start on the day. In Siem Reap, we had been waking up very early every morning, and now we needed to sleep in a bit. By the time we finally woke, it was already almost lunchtime.

It took us a little while to get to Tonkin Annam, and we were walking in the heat of the day. According to the World Meteorological Organization, Bangkok is the hottest city on the planet. So, when we got to the restaurant, Aaron was pretty desperate for water. He tried playing it cool at first and just ordering, but when a minute went by and still no water had appeared, he grabbed a nearby waiter and basically begged him to get us some water immediately. That settled, we were able to enjoy our lunch. Tonkin Annam is a Vietnamese Restaurant, so we got to revisit some of our favorite flavors from a few weeks ago. We shared a chicken salad seasoned with lime and Vietnamese spices, and some chao tom (shrimp surimi grilled on a stick of sugar cane, that you then wrap in rice paper with herbs and veggies, and dip in sauce). As in Vietnam, the sauce here was amazing, but the chicken salad was even better. The limey-salty-spicy vinaigrette it was dressed in was addictive. I wanted to drink it.

After lunch, we went back to the malls. There are a surprising amount of things to do in Bangkok’s malls. Today, we had our sights set on the Major Cineplex in Siam Paragon, which has one of the shmanciest theaters in the world. There was still a bit of time to kill before the movie, though, so we decided to try one of these dessert cafes we kept seeing everywhere. Americans have a reputation for loving sweets, but I’ve never been to a mall in the US that had much more than a Great American Cookie Company and a Haagen Dazs. This mall had at least fifteen different dessert cafes, many of them restaurant-sized and full of customers. We shared a mango-sticky-rice-flavored kakigori at After You Dessert Cafe. Kakigori is flavored Japanese shaved ice. Ours was stuffed with sweet sticky rice and large chunks of fresh mango, and it was the perfect treat for Bangkok’s heat.

Finally, it was time to make our way to the movie. We were greeted by two attendants, who ushered us to a lounge, where we were plied with sliders and tacos. Apparently, if we had arrived early enough, our tickets included foot massages as well, but we found this out too late. In the theater, the seats were giant leather recliners that could go completely horizontal if we wished. Each seat came with a plush blanket, large pillow, and flavored almonds. Drinks and a muffin were stealthily brought to us during the movie. Even the bathroom was indulgent. When I excused myself mid-movie, I found a bathroom with stalls as large as regular hotel bathrooms. The toilet cover came up automatically as I approached. The seat was heated! And a panel to my right would have offered me more options for a bidet-like device than I would have known what to do with, were I not terrified to touch it.

We settled into our seats, and, after the trailers, the screen instructed us to stand for a tribute to the King of Thailand. Clips of His Majesty receiving gifts and blessings were played over a stirring and emotional soundtrack, culminating in a shot of the Royal Family waving to a crowd of tens of thousands of people. Then, the movie began. I won’t give you my review of 1917, because that’s not really the point of this blog, but I can and do recommend it. Aaron enjoyed it even more than I did, if your definition of enjoying a drama is “straight-up crying through the whole thing.”

We needed some cheering up after that movie. Lucky for us, we were a stone’s throw from Caturday Cat Cafe. We sat by a window and waited impatiently for the cats to come to us. We had 0 chill, and I think the cats could sense it. But the cafe workers see it as their job to ensure everybody gets their money’s worth, so they helped us attract a few of the twenty-plus kitties to our table. We stayed there for several hours, nursing coffees and gradually getting the cats to warm up to us. There was flat-faced, orange Papoy, that liked to sleep in a giant bowl. And Simba, the gigantic, loveable bully, that the workers made wear a tiny Hawaiian shirt whenever he started a fight with one of his brethren, which he did often. There was Hip Hop, whose short legs and idiotic face reminded us, heart-breakingly, of Bob. And elegant Rocket, who spent the entire time checking me out, but only came to me once we were leaving (isn’t that always the way with men?). Boobee was Papoy’s brother (or son or father?) who could be made to lie still on his back with his front two legs in the air. Phoebe was shy and sweet. Tofu and Udon were a father-son duo who had trouble getting along with each other. Frodo was indifferent, but still spent a significant amount of time at our table. They were good cats (Brent). And we could tell the workers of the cafe really cared for all of them. They had several high places to sleep if they wanted to get away from people, and signs asked that you not disturb sleeping cats. The cats seemed happy, and healthy, and Aaron and I left feeling like we’d made friends both with the cats and the cafe workers. We would be back.

Bangkok: Day 1

We got into Bangkok late at night, so we went straight to the minimalist, hotel-like Chern Hostel, and then, to bed. After a subpar breakfast at the hostel the next morning, where I once again discovered that meat just doesn’t really do it for me here, we headed out.

Bangkok has everything. In the same way that every other gigantic city has everything, but different; a common Thai-lish phrase used by vendors of faux designer goods here is “same, same, but different.” It has big glossy malls, and ancient, open markets. It has museums and historic houses. It has every kind of restaurant imaginable, and some that aren’t imaginable (like a condom-themed restaurant.) It has bars, clubs, cafes, teahouses, venues, stadiums, movie theaters, and concert halls. It has a business district and a Chinatown. It has every kind of accommodation from the Mandarin Oriental to a four-dollar-a-night hostel. And it has the best public transit system we have yet come across on our trip. In addition to buses and a skytrain, this public transit system includes boats (same, same, but different). Bangkok is veined with a system of canals, a holdover from the past, when they were vital for the city’s transport system and economy. Many of them have been paved over and turned into roads, but the few that remain still serve as routes for public water buses.

Our destination this morning just happened to be close to one of the stops on Khlong Saen Saep, one of Bangkok’s oldest canals. We walked to the pick-up point and found a ticket agent. She told us it would be about ten dollars per person to ride the boat, but our pass would work all day and we could get on and off at any stop. This did not sound right to me. Thai people used these boats, and I highly doubted Thai people were shelling out ten dollars for them. I voiced my doubts to Aaron, and found another, significantly cheaper boat. When I asked the agent nearby about the boat route, though, she told me it did not go to our stop. Oh well. Maybe they just charged foreigners more. A lot of places we’ve been here have a “foreigners” price that’s higher. I shrugged and we paid up, then we hopped on the long, thin, canopied canal boat. Canal water sprayed up into the boat as we went, which I just found out was full of raw sewage, so um, YUCK. Yuck yuck yucky yuck yuck. Yuck. Excuse me while I go take three consecutive showers. Anyway, we made it to our stop, which was a short walk from our destination: the megamalls of Bangkok.

Bangkok has some massive malls. This one city has the fifth, sixth, fourteenth, fifteenth, twenty-sixth, and thirty-second largest malls in the entire world. For comparison, the Mall of America ranks forty-third. Our guidebooks had promised us prime people-watching in the Siam area, which contains three of Bangkok’s gigantic malls. We people-watched, we window-shopped, we shop-shopped. We had a fantastic time just taking it all in. Neither Aaron nor I are really the shopping types, and I don’t think a mall would usually be either of our ideas of a good time, but if there’s one place you can really get immersed in the culture of a different country, it’s its malls. We drank tea in a mall cafe across from a giant ad for men’s make-up. We passed probably fifteen different “dessert cafes.” We saw trends that were so different from ours, I’m not sure if they’re behind or ahead of us–or both. A mall plastic surgery clinic (apparently that’s a thing) had ads for some procedure that helps you have smaller hips. Beauty counters promised me rosy-white, glass skin. It was culture shock at its best. But all that same, same, but different made us hungry.

Across the street from the mall was a Taco Bell, and I’m not even a little bit ashamed to say that I dragged Aaron there. Taco Bell is my mecca. I hadn’t dared dream I would get to have it here; but there it was, my oasis in a taco desert. The tacos were a little same, same, but different as well, but they were still undeniably and reliably living más. Our stomachs full of delicious “suitable for human consumption” taco beef, we made for the skytrain.

Buying tickets for and navigating the skytrain ended up being significantly easier than the canal boats. It was clean, too, and I’m pretty sure I didn’t have any raw sewage sprayed on me during the ride.

Our next stop was the Amari Watergate hotel. We had spent the evening before googling about pool parties in Bangkok. This party didn’t make the top ten list we found first. Or even the other list we found after that. But it was this weekend and none of the others were, so that made it the best. Entry was free before four, and Belvedere had set up an open vodka bar for a couple of hours. Plus, the website for the event promised “hundreds of party people.” Now, I don’t want to brag and say I’m definitely a party person, but I do regularly listen to Jimmy Buffet. But when we got there 1) the music was shitty EDM, and 2) all these squares were not in the pool. I mean, the pool was freezing, but still. What did these dorks think “pool party” meant? Aaron and I spent the next couple of hours goofing off, being the oldest people there. We were the only ones who weren’t Instagram influencers that actually got in the pool. On our giant floating swan, we sipped our vodka-sodas and accidentally photobombed the models until the vodka wasn’t free anymore. You know, like ACTUAL party people. Then, we went home.

We ordered in some really bomb pizza and watched Late Night on Netflix. It was a damn good day. I think I’m going to like Bangkok.

Siem Reap: Highlights Reel

Best Experiences: Anna

Birding in Prek Toal: I felt like I’d been dropped into a nature documentary
Exploring Beng Mealea with Aaron for hours on Valentine’s Day
Playing “I Spy” with the remarkable bas-reliefs of Bayon

Best Experiences: Aaron

I’ve never seen so many birds as we saw in Prek Toal; really wish I hadn’t forgotten my Pokeballs
Watching the Phare Cambodian Circus troupe tumble, tightrope, juggle, jump, dance, dab, and flip both their genders and their bodies; it was a real party and I’m glad I was invited
Picking out bits of lore from the carved reliefs at Bayon, including an 800-year-old circus of its own, complete with a man carrying three smaller men, a tightrope walker, and a man balancing a wheel on his feet

Best Meals: Anna

Salmon en papillote and goat cheese bisquette salad at Le Malraux: one of the best meals I’ve had on the whole trip
Snow peas and asparagus bagel at Little Red Fox: so fresh and so cream, cream (cheese)
Cauliflower “wings” and “not-tuna” sandwich at Vibe: I could go vegan if all vegan food was this good

Honorable mention goes to Asana Wooden House’s Khmer Cocktail Sampler, which was disqualified for not technically being a meal

Best Meals: Aaron

Cauliflower wings at Vibe
Breakfast Bagel at Little Red Fox: tasted so nice I ate it twice
Beef Lasagna at La Pasta

Blooper Reel

The night we got tipsy and Aaron came back from the bathroom looking bewildered. He made Anna promise to go to the “bathroom with a fountain.” She found a bathroom, but it didn’t have a fountain, and she ended up in the kitchen just looking for it. She gave up and used the only bathroom she could find. When she returned, she told Aaron he was crazy and an oil diffuser was not a fountain. Aaron marched her to the correct bathroom (on the complete opposite side of the bar) where, sure enough, there was a giant fountain with a statue of a man fishing directly in front of the toilet. This was your standard restaurant one-stall kind of bathroom. A giant fountain with a man fishing did not belong in front of the toilet.
When we got pulled into the orbit of the Oriental Wrestling Association. A shirtless white man, microphone in hand, stood on a 2nd story balcony shouting to all who would listen that he had just arrived from Hollywood, California where he had been shooting a movie, but that tonight, he would be the first American to ever fight MMA on Cambodian soil. We listened to him rally for a shamefully long time.
The first time we walked the six flights of stairs to the rooftop pool, just to discover that the only bar was on the first floor OR the fact that we spent more time on the phone with Visa than we did enjoying our trip.

Siem Reap: Day 8

Heat makes me want to eat my vegetables. Usually a salad sounds boring, but after being outside in the sun all day, a salad is bliss. Guess I need water wherever I can get it. So, it was with this in mind that we chose Vibe Vegan Restaurant for dinner. It’s a very small, cafe-style eatery, and I got the impression they were mostly a lunch spot. We ordered the cauliflower “wings” and a “not-tuna” sandwich. Both tasted nothing like the non-vegan foods they were supposed to be imitating, but they were superb as dishes on their own merits. I’ve never understood why vegan restaurants try so hard to imitate meat; no one who says he “needs meat” in a meal has ever eaten a vegan imitation and deemed it a worthy replacement. Pander to the vegetable-lovers! And show the carnivores what they’re missing out on. Vibe’s food could certainly do that.

We went to bed early again, because we had one more early rise ahead of us.

Thorn, our perennial tuk-tuk driver, showed up at 6:30. We asked him to drive us to Chong Kneas, a touristy floating village just south of Siem Reap on Tonle Sap lake. But this wasn’t our final destination. We were going there because that’s where the dock is, with boats that will take you across the lake to Prek Toal Wildlife Sanctuary. When we told Thorn that this was our intention, he insisted on coming with us, to help us talk to the boat driver and navigate to the correct place. Thorn was a very good driver, and a very kind man. He rode in the boat with us, and we chatted as best we could over the sound of the motor.

Shortly after reaching the Sangker River, which feeds into Tonle Sap, we began to see signs of the less-touristed Prek Toal. In addition to being a bird sanctuary, Prek Toal is also (and was originally) the name of the floating village nearby. This village is further from Siem Reap, and thus sees less tourists than Chong Kneas. Floating shops, houses, and shophouses lined either side of the river. People went about their daily lives, waving to us and smiling as we passed. Children were paddling a rowboat to go next door. A woman was hanging her clothes to dry in her floating kitchen. A man was smoking on his floating porch. It was a fascinating scene. Humans are so adaptable.

In the middle of this town afloat, we found the bird sanctuary’s main office. From here, we hired a guide and a small, long-tail boat; our ferry would not be allowed in the refuge. Thorn helped us hire our guide, then left us to our own devices. Our guide ended up being an integrally delightful part of the whole experience. We could tell he was genuinely in child-like awe of these birds, smiling every time we spotted one. He does this almost every day, and he still loves his job. He spoke zero English, but we managed to get by using a series of gestures and a very helpful, laminated, illustrated, one-page guide to the birds of Prek Toal. And oh, were there birds.

At first, we saw nothing but terns. Aaron and I kept pointing at silhouettes in the sky, only to learn it was another whiskered tern through the binoculars we brought with us. Then, we came upon a man-made dam with an opening exactly the size of our boat. This is how they keep the ferries out. This was the threshold of Prek Toal Bird Sanctuary. On the other side, one of the most fantastical experiences I’ve ever had awaited us. But first, we had to get through this gap in the dam, which involved some finicky maneuvering on our guide/boat driver’s part, and a turbulent, if small, drop. Safe on the other side, tern sightings became more common. Then, we started seeing Indian cormorants. At first, just one or two, then whole flocks of them. Great egrets waded in the reeds. Chinese pond herons landed in a nearby tree. Oriental darters demonstrated how they got their name overhead. The largest brief of pelicans I’ve ever seen bobbed lazily in the distance. In addition to these species, we saw, in ascending order of how freakin’ cool it was to spot them: Oriental magpie-robins, blue-tailed bee-eaters, Asian open-bills, lesser adjutants, greater adjutants, grey-headed fish eagles, a stork-billed kingfisher, a greater coucal, a brahminy kite, a few purple herons, a couple of black-headed ibis, and a painted stork. I saw so many great egrets that I actually got bored with them–that’s how amazing this place was. And what’s more, we saw these birds in action. I think that was the most interesting part for me–watching them dive or root around for food, hearing their calls, admiring their graceful flights. It was truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience. And it wasn’t over.

Our guide drove into a thick patch of reeds and onto the shore. He signalled for us to disembark, and we clumsily complied. Then, we tramped forward, through a trail almost entirely grown over with thicket and reeds. I was wearing sandals; it wasn’t easy. A few hundred yards in, we reached our terminus: a three-level, bamboo treehouse that served as a lookout. Up we climbed its steep ladders until we reached the vertiginous top. A Belgian couple with another tour followed shortly thereafter. Our guides set up telescopes and aimed them at some adjutants and pelicans nesting in the distance. It was hard to get excited, because we’d gotten much closer views of the birds on the river, but the treehouse itself was worth the arduous hike. When we returned to the boat, our driver put the canopy up to shield us from the now-high sun, and we made our way back to our ferry.

After another boat-ride, in which we got to learn more about Thorn and his beautiful family, and a short drive, we were in Siem Reap. We exchanged warm thanks and well-wishes with Thorn, and he dropped us at Pou Kitchen for lunch. We were starving. We were also the only patrons of this high-ceilinged, minimalist space, because it was almost three in the afternoon. We shared vegetable cakes in a beet sauce and a smoked salmon salad with kampot pepper vinaigrette. Both were delicious–though, like many of the dishes we had in Siem Reap, the vegetable cakes were a bit sweet for my palate. We spent the afternoon introverting a bit, then ordered in and watched cartoons.

When I closed my eyes to sleep that night, I saw the dark, expansive silhouette of wings circling in an azure sky.