Sunday, July 26, 2009

Pattaya.

Not impressed with this location. Have been looking forward to getting out of Bangkok for a few weeks, mainly to find some fresh air. I'm beginning to think it's a resource Thailand runs short on.

Anyways... yeah...Pattaya... what can one say about it... a dreamy location where the old, tired and ugly whores retire to accommodate and service an aging population of sexpats. And when I mean aging, I mean... Geriatrics with dentures and zimmer frames... and possibly nappies, but thats just an educated guess. Although, we did visit in the day time, so I think perhaps the younger working girls might creep out at night. Got to give the old working horses a gander I guess.

Like every other globalised country in this world, you have your Holiday Inn, your Ibis, Amari, Nova, Mercure etc... all beach side. Next to them, You have shopping malls with Nike, Mango, Guess, Esprit, FCUK, Crocs, Burger King, Macdonalds, Donut King, Starbucks, etc etc. Same same but, well, same.

The beach itself – Shite. I got so excited about going to the beach I actually wore swimmers (rare for me), when I got there, I took one look at it, and decided I wouldn't even bother getting my feet sandy let alone wet.

The water looked like tepid swill, filled with sewerage, oil and floating plastic. I'm thinking if you had any open abrasions and went in for a dip, infection would ensue.

There was actually no beach smell. None, whatsoever. It was totally masked by the smell of the storm drains, which I assume ran directly into the ocean.

We got their before 11am, and were watching sexpats guzzle white wine with ice cubes, before mid day. Probably nursing their hangovers. Every white dude seemed red eyed and hung over, or just down right 'special'.







Best thing about Pattaya, the flower market and buying 4 turtles - Which I obviously have to name Leonardo, Donatello, Michael Angelo and Raphael.

I wouldn't be able to own turtles in Australia with out some license of some kind, which I would never bother to get. Officious twats. Here in Asia, they eat them. So I don't think they much care that my TMNT now live in a salad bowl as a centre piece on the dining table.



Comic Bangkok

Thursday, July 23, 2009

A few months in Bangkok.

Here is a somewhat short and definitely crappy visual tour of the last few months in Bangers. When people come to visit, they expect a little something that we like to call the 'cultural tour'...















Gazebo, a Turkish styled bar, in open air on Khoa San Rd. It is possibly one of the nicer bars I have been into in Bangkok. You can roast up some apple (or strawberry, or pineapple, or whatever fruity taste you want) flavoured tobacco in a big Hookah pipe and puff away to your hearts content.



















Entertainment provided is the standard fare of the Philippino cover band (every band in Bangers is a Philippino band as they are known for their fantastic mimicry), and a small, enclosed, boxy nightclub space where the Thai style of DJ-aying is butchering top 40 songs into 30 seconds of chorus, proceeded by bad mixing.

One of the great aspects of this bar is the many couches which you can get horizontal on. The only thing that didn't seem right was the smoking of apple tobacco through the Hookah. I was sure it was meant for something else.

I had probably the first conversation with a white chick, Penny was her name, in about... well since I left Australia really. It was refreshing to not talk about sexpat shit for a night, where the men just 'feel so sexy'. After months of rehashing the same topics, in virtually the same manner, by rote every time, even though the face changes, it does get old.

Got introduced to the bar by some california pseudo hippy... or maybe he just had long hair. David – the professional house minder. Maybe less hippy than sensitive new age guy. You would have to come from a pretty good family to get paid for minding million dollar houses around the world. Personally, I couldn't understand it myself. I guess he was non assuming enough.















The last is probably one of my favourites, momentarily inspired by the polish guy who took photos of binge drinkers in Cardiff, Wales, over the period of 4 years, I couldn't resist. Have a look at his shots, they are awesome, here

Of course mine is taken with no decent lighting on an iPhone, near 5am in the morning, so looks grainy as shit, but I still thought it was a good representation of Khoa San Rd.



Moving on...






















A film shoot for an ad I was on. The film studios were initially purpose built for a little film you may know called The Beach. Bangkok film crews, I have been told, are generally Hong Kong trained, so extremely efficient and fast.




























What amused me was the laxity behind the scenes, they have little notion of the Australian fascist regime dictate "Occupational Health and Safety", and the director, along with many crew members, chain smoked through out the shoot – I liked their ashtray, it was a little, steel kidney shaped, surgical tray, filled thrice over. Alcohol is provided, and after an 18 hour shoot, the white guys are pissed. Nobody got hurt - amazing isn't... (hardly).

A Thai Chinese wedding we attended.


The unassuming 3D guy at work got married, we were kind of surprised, as we didn't even know he had a girlfriend. The wedding and reception are held at odd times like 9.19 and 11.29, from what I could ascertain they seem to be fortuitous numbers. The wedding present is an envelope with money in it and most people who get married usually keep a ledger of who gave what amount, and reciprocate it when the time comes for another envelope gift giving affair.

I spent ages waiting for the cake - the only food I could recognise, only to learn the one they cut was fake, and the cake they gave out was only for special people, like senior family members and bosses. The bride and groom are supposed to drink with senior guests at every table, and by the end are too pissed to enjoy their wedding night. So I have heard.

Luckily we only got invited to the reception.



Ahhh Soi Cowboy... Now this is where the cultural tour really starts...



























This is a small street which at night time fills with neon lights and women. Where every man is handsome, whether he be old, fat to the point of morbid obesity, bald, ugly, obnoxious, misogynistic, detestable or impaired... every man is 'very handsome'.

I occasionally go when there is clients in town. Essentially, Bangkok is a boys town. I can enjoy it for a while, come the fourth bar I get bored. The music is loud and crap and the girls can't dance.

A good majority of the girls are poor Issan (has variable spelling) girls, supporting their children and parents. From the very old hags to the very young nubile. Usually I don't mind seeing western girls dancing in strip bars, where it's kind of a mutual exploitation, and is better paid, having better hours than a crappy hospitality job. But these girls do it much more out of necessity. Poor, uneducated, with a family of mouths to feed. It gets a bit wearing when you take it into consideration. Regardless, the boys seem to like it.

And Occasionally I find it enjoyable too... When I see some forethought and creative license has gone into performances, instead of the usual slothery around a pole.























Umm... yeah, you're looking at cooked bugs. This is one of the local Issan delicacies. I haven't been brave enough to try this... I'm more likely to say something wholly inappropriate like 'you're going to put that shit in your mouth?'. A micro-politically incorrect phrase I have learnt they take great offense to here. Now I try and say, 'No thanks, I just ate'.

























I kind of like Soi Cowboy for its colourfulness and character. I like leaving the boys inside, and strolling around taking pictures of weird shit and talking to the girls – who can usually only say a few things, repeatedly, 'happy yes, happy yes, what your name, where you come from?'.

Of course at the beginning of the night, the boys are generally a little shy, and somewhat wide eyed at the sexual proclivities and free license of it all. Maybe even a little bashful, but as time rolls on and the liquor is imbued, well... they become less embarrassed and more, how would one describe it: lascivious and gluttonous would be the best adjectives, I think.

And please don't tell me your husband wouldn't... They all do.


Our house...



























We have been told we live like kings. And I think it's somewhat true. For $250 US dollars a week, we have a 5 story house in what is known as the 'Beverly Hills of Bangkok'. There is, let me think, 3 bedrooms, a maids room and an edit suite, also bathrooms for each room. One floor for the lounge room, one for the kitchen and dining room. And a lot of flights of stairs.


For an extra $280 dollars a month (fixed price we can't raise because she is cousin of the maid at work – whose job is quite a bit more demanding), we have a live in maid – Noi. Primarily she was hired to take care of the dogs, so we can go out and not worry about the average number of eyes dropping. But she cleans, does washing and occasionally cooks. All by about 10am. She can't speak much English, or read Thai, and I can't speak Burmese and only minimal Thai, so communicating gets tiring. By the end of the day it's mostly a game of charades. And me slapping my forehead thinking the word for this object in thai will somehow magically appear. Needless to say it doesn't.

Anyways, we have lots of room if you want to come and stay... and I like you. Fuckwits need not apply.


How could bangkok be complete without a trip into bureaucracy, so last but not least a looksie at immigration...






























Immigration, a funny kind of place. People have lovely gold jewelry and fabulously expensive shoes. The paperwork is stacked up to the rafters, the plumbing room with the pumps dealing with sewerage is perfectly fine place for the staff to eat, you have to buy toilet paper out of vending machines, if you can, as they are most likely on the blink, and immigration comes complete with a soi dog. I don't think you would find anything quite like it in officious Australia.

The immigration lawyer foisted on us by work... how can I say this delicately, I fucking hated her. She is an extortionist, blackmailing, bribing fat sack of shit who speaks perfectly good english but pretends not to understand a thing you're saying. She takes months to do anything, while your bill creeps up, and then expects to be paid immediately. There, delicate enough I suppose.

She also has all our details and is probably on first name basis with immigration agents, so it's in our best interest to not report her. Just try our hardest to never use her again. After over charging for our visas, she then tried to milk 30,000 baht out of us to get our maid a working visa. We then got our maid a working visa for 5,000 baht. So, you get the drift.


But through all of it, I find we are incredibly lucky. Bangkok is a great town. It's a heady thriving metropolis, modern and ... kinda smelly. It has charm, intrigue, mystery and it's kind of fucked up, with no other place like it on earth. I mean, you have to love a country where David Carradine dies from auto erotic asphyxiation and the next day his tied up body is on the front page of the local rag. Well maybe not you, but I do.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Jebus.

What the fuck is the world coming to? Bitter, tormented, twisted people spreading the love. If you want to be party to the downfall (I'm sick and can't help myself)


I went to the celebrities page, and in a nutshell: actresses get Herpes (I assume from sitting on the casting couch), Musicians get Hep C (didn't apply the 2 Xs water, 2 Xs Bleach, 2 Xs water rule), and Porn Stars - HIV (hazard of the trade). Makes sense. There are a few Journo's chucked in for good measure (maybe a trip to the local sauna while the wife was visiting her parents).

Here is the article commenting on the effects of outing people in public.


All I can say is: what a fucking retard.

And I hope none of you have Bitter Ex's who plan on presenting a dish best served cold.


Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Dear Family Guests.

Dear loving family,

Living in the sticks, I realise you must be somewhat deprived of stimulus. But in enjoying our hospitality, please endeavour to not steal the books (plural) I offer you to read. I guess I would not have minded so much, HAD I EVEN READ THEM.

As at this time, I'm sure you can appreciate that, with fuck all money, no computer*, slow internet meaning no downloads, no television in english, and only one shitty game on my iphone to amuse me, books provide pretty much my singular form of entertainment. As you know, from experience I imagine, in being momentarily poor and needing an escapist reality, the genre of pulp fiction offers the solution of hours of relatively cheap fun.

What bothers me more is, that if I had to stay at your house, I would be specifically told to 'not steal the books'. An interloping act, if performed, one would never hear the end of... And more to the point, now I know why.

NB to self: must hang sign in guest bedrooms "Don't Steal My Fucking Books"

*computer situation rectified (obviously) by this point in time.

Dear Americans.



Dear Americans (god bless your souls),

Please refrain from using your shitty colloquial speech, in the attempt to make yourselves seem at least somewhat intelligent. Coined slang terms such as 'Off the Hook' belong in bad 90s sitcoms such as Fresh Prince, Moesha, or Saved by the Bell, and are not appreciated by the rest of the world.

Your insistence on using such terms, makes you look like some perpetual bong head, at some never ending keg party, who refused to mature.

In reality, the style conjured up is some middle aged man, sporting hair plugs, aping surfy greetings and advertising Ed Hardy for Christian Audigier.

Grow the fuck up.

A new beginning. Again.

Ok, google sites isn't really working for me. I'm going to try this for a bit. Pithy Shit... I wanted to call it 'her heart of darkness' or 'the black truth', but thought it was a tad bleak since I started off the last attempt at blogging as some sort of optimistic brave in a new world. I don't think the terms 'optimistic', 'brave' or 'new world' really applies to any of my life. A misnomer I guess. I think I was sedated at the time.

Hopefully this will be easier to navigate and update, upload pictures, and just generally more fucking useful than google sites. I kind of hinge between wanting people to share in some of my experiences, and not wanting anyone to know. I want freedom to tell the truth, but don't want to hurt anyones feelings. I vacillate, continuously.

After perusing through peoples lives on the interweb, in whatever form they choose to share it, I get... I don't know, it's not bitter, nor resentful, but kind of disbelief I guess, at how everyone can be having such a good time. I know I have always been cynical, pessimistic, to the point of misanthropic, but really... you can't expect me to believe the minutiae of the pedestrian public's day to day life is all that wonderful. I'm sorry, I just can't. It's too hard to stomach. And if it really is that good, I tend to think... well ignorance is bliss.

Vitriolic Vomitous posts are written in the spirit and effort of 'you have to let it go', and other general feelings of sarcastic mirth. What I think I mean is, if I spew it out on a page to the point where I laugh about it, then maybe it wont effect my headspace.*

*Not really intended for anyone to take any of it onboard, probably caused by an ongoing case of being premenstrual... the entirety of the month that is.

Ok, lets give this bitch a whirl, shall we?