Random happenings in Bangkok during the new year

I just wanted to share some happenings during the start of 2010. First there was a big concert to help Haiti here. I caught the start of it while I was waiting for my bus to go home. This guy on screen was performing and had a simple yet highly unoriginal song to convince people to donate....the song went something like this...well actually, it went exactly like this.....Help Haiti...help Haiti....heeeeeeelp Haiti....heeeeeeelp haaaaaiiiitiiii.....help haiti help haiti.....well I guess he got the point across, but no points for your lyric writing ability buddy....but 10 points for giving your time to help out:)




Also visited a place I have been trying to go for a while....the souffle house at Saphan Taksin....
I was realyl glad I went for 2 reasons...first, the couple who own this place are really really kind, and it's obviously a family run business and they work hard and are so nice to people. AND, they spoke to me in Thai, which I have been finding is incredibly rare in Thailand....yes, I am serious Thai people dont seem to want to speak anything but English to foriegners and it is annoying me no end because HOOOOW am I meant to practice Thai when NO ONE will speak to me in Thai??? Even if I speak to them in Thai first so that they know I can speak some Thai....I still get English.....hmmmmph, it is really frsutrating and I am sick of it:( But some nice people like this man and his wife do speak Thai to me and I love them for it:D

The second reason I am glad I came is the cake is amazing as are the drinks....the owner backs them all himself and so they taste like they are meant to and not just like sweet....this is the tiramisu cake and it was really nice. I also had an apple smoothie which had real apple in it...I am coming back and willing to take anyone who wants to try it out!!!



And then....Karl came to Bangkok and I haven't seen him since I left Japan in 2007! So it was great to catch up, be it very quickly. We went to Greyhound which si this very cool cafe chain in BKK.



I ordered the complicated noodle....




And it was indeed complicated as neither Karl nor I could figure out how to eat it....luckily the Thai friend of Karl's knew how....maybe he eats here often and favours the complicated noodle as the dish of choice??? Lucky he was there otherwise it would have been a right mess and two farang would have ended up wearing a lot of meat, gravy and lettuce....





The other big happening was Yu's birthday and we ordered home-delivered pizza AND home-delivered KFC!!! WOW, in BKK you can get KFC and Maccas home-delivered!! Could you imagine that in Australia....KFC and Maccas regulars who dont even get the benefit from walking from the car to the restaurant....or even the walk from their front door to the car to go to drive-through......hmmmmm we probably would have overtaken USA years ago as fattest nation on earth I think!! Anyway, home-delivered KFC is just the same, and Thai KFC is just the same....fatty and bad for you....this is what home-delivered KFC looks like!

Oh and the funniest thing today....we got Thai writing books to practice our Thai writing skills in class...and look...one of the exercises was practicing how to write the number 1-10!! Hahaha, yup it was good to get back to kindergarten....

Im concentrating very hard on getting this 1-10 writing business correct hahaha! Sucess!!!

Chinese New Year this Sunday coming up, so full report coming soon!!! Expect dim sum and other Chinese delicious things from Yaowarat!!!! Am I ever excited about this!!!

Japan for Tommy and Junko's wedding

I went to Japan for a week to attend Tommy and Junko's wedding in Nagoya, and then quickly visit friends in Tokyo before flying home to Bangkok. I had a nice flight on Cathay Pacific which included a 40 minute transit in HK....this means it was not so much a transit rather it was a made rush off the plane, run down to security, pass security eventually after a million slow old people hold EVERYONE up, run up the stairs to departures, run down to gate 63 and sit down only seconds before bording starts....and to think we arrived 15 minutes early....imagine if we had arrived ontime!!! Cathay Pacific I really love you, but please make a minumum of 1 hour transits....because I had no time to shop for HK mooncakes at my favourite shop in the airport on either flight this time and it was the dissapointment of my year.....other than that, your inflight catering is amazing, and your selection of movies this time was amazing....thumbs up all round! So it was COLD when we arrived....4 degrees....um no thank you Im staying on the plane and going back to HK.....it was so nice to be back in Japan....where I can speak the language and chilli is not added to everything, and salt is not added to orange juice....although it is added to watermelon but this is another story.....

Here is a picture of Nagoya streets at night



And here is my dinner on the first night....miso ramen...mmmm and this is actually oishii ramen, as opposed to the oishii ramen in Bangkok which is actually oishikunai ramen but is just deceptively called oishii ramen...it is indeed the worst ramen in the history of the world....but this ramen was GOOD!!! mmmmm it's nice to be home!!! Although that said, I was travelling with my Thai friend James who insisted that this was not that much better than Bangkok ramen.....hmmmmm I think the excessive amount of chilli has ruined his ramen taste buds.....oh yeah, so James really wanted to go to Japan, so considering how much he has helped me out in Bangkok, I figured showing him around for a week in Japan is the least I can do to repay him, and it was good to have someone to travel with as well.






On Thursday we went to Inuyama to see my host brother Hide and his wife momo and 2 daughters. We had a great time going to the shrine and the castle and then lunch! It kinda started snowing just a bit which was cool too!!




For dinner we went to an AWESOME miso katsu place. Miso katsu is famous in the Naoya area, and this one was really good. I had a set, and the dish on the top left is the miso katsu....mmmmm sooooo good.




And here it is up close in all its glory.....



The next day I went to the wedding and it was a Japanese wedding ceremony...which meant it took 20 minutes!!! The 2 ji kai was also cool- we went to an italian restaurant and there was a lucky prize which I won.....a WII!!!! I dont use a WII but perhaps I will have to start!!!

The next day we got up early to shinkansen to Tokyo. We got a perfect view of Mt Fuji which was cool, and lucky considering I had a tourist to entertain too....although Thai tourists are perhaps the easiest people to entertain whilst travelling...eat and shop, shop and eat....eat and eat, shop and shop....and so on and so forth.....simple!

In Tokyo in between the shopping and eating, I caught up with B&G friends and we ate....it was so good to see them all!




And caught up with more B&G friends and Hitotsubashi friends and we ate.....this time okonomiyaki at a place that was on tv for its food....here's me trying to sneek a photo of the restaurant without anyone seeing....



The food was really good...salad with goma dressing

Negi okonomiyaki....serious negi happening there....

And hiroshima style okonomiyaki....Im glad this shop opt to serve the superior Hiroshima style and not the inferior Osaka style.....

And this thing was this chilli dish which caused a lot of discussion and to everyone dissapointment turned out to be just this....

And then dessert.....icecream and mochi....mmmmmm

On the last day we went to Hibiki at Marunouchi which was really really nice. I caught up with my zemi for a nice meal before leaving Tokyo the next day. It was great to see them all! Also caught up with Iyotani sensei which was good....although I did get the hard line as to when I was going to start working....and don't you even dare become and English teacher or he will "not be happy"....hmmmm ok sensei......understood......sorry

Leaving from Narita I decided to picture the JAL check-in because there is a good chance it will be no more soon....sad...kinda....but actually I like ANA more....

Flying home and another mad rush through HKIA to make my connection to BKK.....my flight to BKK had the MOST amazing airline food I have ever had....you see, when they were preparing I could smell sweet and sour, and sweet and sour pork is my dream airline meal.....but unfortunately the 2 options were fish and chicken....so I was left with the task of guessing which would be the sweet and sour....I took the fish......fail.......but the fish was this pasta which was absolutely amazing!!! It was so good I wanted to ask for a second....well actually the ladies sitting opposite me were both in the process of being air sick and didnt take a meal, so I wanted to ask for their's please....but I thought better of that and decided against it! Wow....Catahy inflight catering I HEART YOU VERY VERY VERY MUCH:D

So that was Japan in a nutshell....nice to have some cooler weather and be back home again!

Happy New Year with Maki and Katie in Bangkok!

Hisashiburi mak mak maaaaaaaaak.....this is my first post in a looooong time and I have to say it is due to a mixture of being busy with various things, and being just a little bit slack with the blog. BUT, seeing as I am having a Friday night in, I have decided to sit down and catch up a little. So, let's start where we left off.....Maki and Katie came for their sotsugyou ryokou to Bangkok for about a week, so I had my eating partner back (Maki and I have been known to eat the food supply of Japan and Vietnam) and between the three of us we ate our way around Bangkok! So, we hada good time being all touristy, and went to Wat Po where Maki got in for free by virtue of looking incredibly Thai.....so unfair! Also climbed to as far up as you can go at Wat Arun....brave brave creatures we are!!!

We also did JJ Market on the weekend where we found the MOST amazing cha nom ever...the guy could pour 3 jugs together all whilst spinning around and not watching, AND posing for photos.....incredible! And, all this posing and spinning really does make the tea taste better....this was the best cha nom I've had since arriving. Cha nom is like teh tarik, or a kind of indian spiced tea which comes out really orange here in Thailand compared to other places....highly recommended

We also attacked the food in China town like no other. First we had to take the train to Lumphini to buy tickets to the Thasi boxing....here is the MRT subwayticket.....a black disk yay big.....how many tiems have I almost lost this stupid thing.....

So the food we ate at China town included the world's best....well maybe not best but really realyl good at least shu mai, some random pork marinated with garlic and pepper then grilled which loooked really cool on this kind of jey chain thing....here's Maki the fatty eating it all!!!

So the boxing was at Lumphini Stadium, which is perhaps the most famous place to see Muay Thai in Bangkok. We went really quickly coz we had to cram a trip to the Central World winter beer gardens in before they closed, cos the 1st was the last day to go before they closed. So we bought tickets in the 3rd lcass area, which turned out to be quite close to the ring anyway. And the matches were all really good, although I had absolutely no idea what made a good fighter and who was winning....ever! One guy got knocked out cold....much to the crowds delight....poor guy! When they had a break between rounds the brought out what looked like these big oven cake baking trays and the boxers sat in these while their trainers squirted water all over them and shouted advice....haha I couldnt help but picture them as a turkey being prepared for raosting coz that's what it looked like!!....ahhhh how I amuse myself sometimes!!

We then cabbed it to Central World where we met James and went to the Chang Beer garden as this was the only place serving beer towers still, and Maki, Katie and I had never tried one so wanted to see what this things called a beer tower was! Wow, it was this huuuge tower of beer litterally! And in the middle they have a tube where they put the ice to keep the beer cold!! We also ordered some delicious bar snacks and listened to the (not too bad) live band play! Nice way to spend the 1st night of 2o1o!

Oh that reminds me....I haven;t told you about new years eve!! So, we went to Central World plaza and much to our horror, all the beer gardens in which we had intended to spend the night listening to the bands and having dinner were charging 200 a table just to enter!! Absolutely no thank you! So, we went to loft food court and got a table next to the window and had dinner there which was really nice! Here is my last meal for 2009....tamarind soup with prawns, a kiwi and apple fruit smoothie and rice.....very aroy!!!

After dessert...cake courtesy of me being caught by the buy one get a 2nd pice half price deal.....we had a look in Zen Central where Maki found her long lost twin......

And di you know....Zen has it's own dj booth....extravagent or not.....????

We then went outside for the countdown....here is the Singha garden...then only one not charging and thus the only one full....so we couldn't get in.....:(

The countdown was quite cool....I got to practice counting backwards in Thai....from 40 too, as they felt the need to commence the count at 40 as opposed to the traditional 10....HAPPYNEW YEAR....SAWATDII PHII MAY KHRAAAAAAAAP:D

And here's the 4 faced Buddha at Erawan....random picture I took as we walked past....

A highlight of Maki and Katie's trip was out visit to Longtable, which is meant to be the longest dining room table in the world!! How very cool! So, we had to go try this place out coz it was meant to have great cocktails and views, and also good food as well. So we booked to ensure ourselves a seat at the longest dining table in the world and rocked up to begin enjoying a cocktail on the balcony before the restaurant opened. The cocktails were really interesting and tasted great. I had one made from pomelo which I had never tried before...really nice! This place is MUCH MUCH MUCH better than Sirocco....but no waiter here will ever speak to you in Thai no matter how well you can speak just the same as Sirocco...in fact, they wouldnt even speak Thai to the Thai contingent in our group!

The dining room is so cool! It is just one loooong table, and everyone sits at it with small gaps to seperate you and other diners. We had a seat close to the end where there is just a huge window to look out over Bangkok.....suay mak mak! Here it is from both ends

Special mention has to go to the inventive bathrooms in the place....I know this is strange, but seriously, the sink hasa secret button to turn the water on which I could never find despite 2 trips to the bathroom, but this is ok! Because there is someone who has a specific job of walking over to push the secret button for you and then standing ready with a towel for you to dry your hands when you're done.....wow chay may??!!!

So, the important thing....dinner....it is all Thai food, and not really that much fusion in it, but a little bit. We ordered toooo much....first lesson, this is a nice restaurant which serves big plates, but actually puts decent amounts of food on these plates.....you don't need to order a pizza on the way home! We had fried tofu....incredibly good, vegetables, a duck curry, and a pork curry all with rice.

Following this we went to Le Notre for dessert and again it was amazing....I had apricot tart this time...it wasnt suga flavoured and I could actually taste apricot....it really is a great shop and I think I will eventually eat the entire menu here!!

On Maki and Katie's last night we met Sine and Nuchi and went to MK for suki. Here is all out food pild high....Maki eats a lot you see....this was her food alone....haha....no just joking! We had such a good time....AND, Sine managed to convince them to do the MK dance especially for us because they had finished for the night....WOOOT! So I finally get to see the MK dance and it is really cool!!

Finally, here is some funny english I saw....the chocolate chip cookie is "American enricked, and the fresh cream roll comes with a fresh dream filling.....mmmmm how exotic!