Tips for Thailand’s touri

Where You Stay?

03 Friday Apr 2015

Tags

Hotels and Restaurants, Stupid Tourist Tricks

Sometimes it’s about where you stay, others about who you stay with.

In case you missed it, there’s a young(ish) Canadian sexpat offering his master bedroom to travelers visiting Khon Kaen. Snagging a booking may be a bit difficult as he has a perfect record of setting up rendezvous with fellow travelers and then failing to show. But the room comes with amenities, including overflowing ashtrays, dog hair, and an incredible assortment of creepy-crawlies. And there is no joiner fee as he has a strict policy against joiners. On the plus side, for a limited time only visitors can help him learn how to use Grindr, ‘cuz his career writing computer code hasn’t prepared him to master the simple task of working a phone app on his own.

While travelers visiting Khon Kaen may have few places of accommodations to choose from, Bangkok and Pattaya offer a smorgasbord of hotels, motels, love rooms, and hostels for every budget and every taste. But some visitors want more. They want to not only book a room, but book a friend for life too. And there is no better way of doing that than staying in some stranger’s house. ‘Cuz if you can land a boyfriend in Thailand by opening your wallet, just think of the friends you can make by paying them to host your visit to their country.

Thanks to Mister BNB you too can now pass on those antiseptic lodgings offered by greedy corporations like Marriott, Hyatt, and Starwood, and instead book your room with a friendly gay Donald Trump wannabe. Sure, their website is a bit difficult to navigate and appears to be developed by a computer-coding Canadian sexpat who can’t figure out how to use Grindr, but that’s just part of the experience. So while it may take you a few dozen clicks to sort through the mess, once you do you’ll not only find photos of the places people want to rent in their homes in Thailand, but profile photos of who you’ll be staying with too. So who needs Grindr?

Here are a few of the wonderful gay hosts just waiting to book you in Bangkok and Pattaya:

Where Sleeping Dogs Lie
Why make that long trek to Khon Kaen when you can lie down with the dogs in Bangkok? Brian, who from his profile photo looks like he’s found more than one way to make a few spare bucks, has a simple room in a row house just a 15 minute walk through a Thai/Chinese neighborhood to the closest BTS station for a mere $50 per night. And you’ll probably want to spend those 15 minutes walking the house’s dog to avoid any unpleasantness when walking through your accommodations barefoot.

A Night With Angry Lesbians
Nam is a 43-year-old single English speaking Bangkokian who offers room in his 2 Bedroom apartment for just $82 per night. He doesn’t offer much in the way of details about his rental, but does provide lots of photos, all of which highlight his choice of angry lesbian decor. If you’ve ever wondered about those travelers who claim where you stay isn’t that important ‘cuz you spend so little time there anyway, a night at Nam’s should clarify that sentiment. Or just scare the bejesus out of you.

When Dead Animals Make you Blue
Mickael too has opted to go with the Horror Tourism route, offering his aptly named ‘Blue Room’ on Sukhumvit Soi 26 at a terrifying rate of $190 per night. The room comes with its own bathroom, and a private balcony which you may find a new use for after spending a night trying to not walk on the dead animal pelts used as carpeting. Mickael too has a bit of a sinister look about him, which becomes even a bit more worrisome when he describes that balcony’s location as “a single throw from transport.” But if you haven’t worked up the balls for a visit to Bar Bar, Bangkok’s #1 SM club, I get the felling Mickael will only be too happy to show you the sights.

Boot Camp For Your Booty
Angkrit is a 35-year-old Thai world traveler who has decorated his abode with buys he made at flea markets in Europe and the UK, which must feature lots of military surplus. Located in the Silom area, within walking distance to the night market and Silom Soi 2 and 4, he, an expat, and a pink traveler offer comfy bunk beds for $11 per night in his “homely gay friendly house.” He says he “enjoys hosting people, enjoys food and making them, bakery and baking them, people and meeting them.” So he may be a friend of Mickael’s. But at $11 a night, who cares?

Nothing Says Home Or Harem Like Mosquito Netting
“A true Budweiser, an original Bohemian and a confirmed Bunburyist!” who “loves Stephen Fry, adores Edina & Patsy, and no one makes me laugh like Miranda does!” Farouk is a 36-year-old “Czech Egyption Expat” who has a private and spacious master bedroom for rent at $33 per night in a duplex that belongs to his business partner. Located in the heart of Bangkok´s Central Business District, the room comes with its own bathroom, a 60″ TV, DVD, WiFi, Air-con, Storage space, Maid service, a balcony, 24 hours security service, and fire and heat sensors in all rooms and common areas. Plus mosquito netting. More importantly, Farouk wants you to know hes has a “body thankful and active” which must work well with being an “easygoing creature with a passion for discovery.” Swipe left.

Decorative Soaps All In A Row
Mister BNB lists rooms in both gay and gay-friendly houses, but when one of the room photos features decorative soaps all in a row, ya know the place belongs to a friendly gay. And that’d be John,a 29-year-old who offers a cozy room in his nice apartment for a nightly fee of $36. John doesn’t offer much way in the way of descriptions of his rental, but ain’t no slouch in the marketing department as he’s listed his place twice, each with a different profile pic. And at that price John looks like a keeper.

The Blue Man Group Sex
Noppadol, who is a 49-year-old gay couple, know what visitors to Pattaya really want. Wink, wink. And while a room rate of $39 a night might be more than Pattaya aficionados like to pay, The Noppadol defuses that nasty bit of detail by letting you know Nude OK! right off the bat. It/They also want you to know “we do not simply offer “only” guest rooms, (wink, wink) but does offer “always nice other guests (wink, wink). And in case you missed it, at The Noppadol’s “everything you are looking for you can find here” (wink, wink).

It’s All Greek To Me
Stettcos (whether that’s a person or a thing is up for debate) on the other hand doesn’t seem to quite grasp the allure of Pattaya. Or its fans’ spending habits. The former he/it calls “the Beverly Hills on the eastern seaboard” and for the latter his/its rates run $325 per night. But it’s a villa, not just a room, which unfortunately is “too difficult to describe.” But then the “extra-ordinary and tastefully decorated” abode’s photos speak for themselves.

Thanks, I Will Name It
Paween is a 27-year-old with a 1 Bedroom apartment for two in Silom at $60 per night. He ensures a “home-like experience” and after listing a smattering of amenities finishes his description off with “you name it”. Cool. ‘Cuz I don’t need to see the room, I’m just naming it Paween. And I can’t wait to check in.

Related Posts You Might Enjoy:
Bangkok’s Best Hotels For The Gay Guy: Keeping The Red Light On (Part 1 The Majors)	Thailand’s Gay Friendly Hotels	Bangkok Gay Gogo Bar Dos And Don’ts For The Newbie: The Hotel Room Edition

You Can’t Beat Their Meat

29 Thursday Jan 2015

Posted by Bangkokbois in Tips

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Hotels and Restaurants

One of Bangkok’s best treats is all the fresh meat you can find on its streets.

There is a lot to love about Thailand, and a lot for visitors to be wary of too. Many get the two confused. Despite, for example, the fame of The Grand Palace Is Closed scam, a perennial favorite in Bangkok, visitors flock to the shoddy gem emporiums and cut-rate, guaranteed to last until the first dry-cleaning tailor shops that are the important part of your 25 baht, 3 Temple Tour that some kind local clued you into since your day at the palace came up trumps. Those same touri wouldn’t be caught dead eating food from a street cart, usually out of fear that doing so will wind up with them being dead.

Granted, the streets of Bangkok are not exactly what you would call hygienic. And even the more popular food carts often look even less so. Add in that the gods only know what in the hell that stuff they are cooking is, and a lot of visitors decide to give dining in the streets a pass. To their great loss. For me, when you say Thailand, one of the first pictures that enters my mind is that of aromatic meats sizzling on a grill, lovingly watched over by some local vendor in the dark of the night. And then my stomach starts growling, my mouth begins to water. And I haven’t even thought of the guys in the gogo bars yet.

Personally, I’m of the eat first ask what it is later school of street food cart dining. After your mouth is filled with wondrous tastes, that you just chowed down on pig neck doesn’t sound as bad as it should. And in some cases, it’s better to just not ask at all. Exactly what was stuffed inside that sausage casing is not something you really need to know. Even back home you’d never let your lips touch a hot dog if you really thought about what it was made of. What is safe to assume, however, is that if it looks like meat and is being barbequed over an open flame on the streets of Bangkok, it’s either pork or chicken. Thais have an obsession with pig and chicken. And yes, that does mean you’ll occasionally run across treats like grilled chicken feet, but that doesn’t mean that everything else that vendor sells too is parts of a pig or chicken that you’d discard instead of thinking about cooking back home. Even if you are from the south. Well, actually it probably does. But if you try it first, before you know what it is, you’ll probably agree that crispy grilled chicken anus is actually damn tasty. If a bit chewy.

There are a lot of exotic treats to dine on in Thailand, but much of what is available on the streets will be familiar to you too.

Most street food carts specialize in a single dish. And there are some pretty extraordinary culinary treats served up on Bangkok’s street daily. For newbies, however, I generally prefer starting them off with barbeque; it at least looks like something they are familiar with. And at 10 – 20 baht per serving if they don’t like it, it’s no big loss. Spitting out what they just put in their mouth doesn’t happen often though. When it does, it usually means they picked the wrong cart or the wrong piece of meat. So here’s two tips: First, eat where the locals do. It’s not like anywhere you find a cart serving grilled meats that you won’t see another one just a few steps away. Some, especially in tourist areas, are geared to sell to the unsuspecting and use the cheapest meats they can buy. Locals can tell from just looking if a pork ball is heavy on pork or heavy on filling. So get in line behind those who know. Second, there is nothing wrong with you deciding which skewer of meat you want. In fact locals seldom allow the vendor to make that selection for them. And if the skewer you want looks like it has been off the grill for a while, just pick it up and place it back on the barbeque to reheat. No one will bat an eye.

Barbeque is also a good first timer’s choice for those worried about how sanitary the cooking facilities may be. There are no plates or cutlery to worry about being cleaned, and fire pretty well kills off harmful bacteria. And after an evening of eating grilled meats, their stomach won’t allow them to be quite as picky over hygienic standards when you move them up to full plates of food later. Generally the meat cooked at street food carts is fresh. At least it was that morning. Most vendors hit their neighborhood fresh market in the morning and only buy the amount of ingredients that they anticipate using in a given day. Street vendors don’t like to carry a lot of over-head; most cannot afford to so. Most carts work the morning, lunch, dinner, or late-night crowds too; few set up shop for the entire day. So usually whatever is being cooked was still fresh just before it hit the grill. As in killed that morning. Which you can’t say about the meat at your local Piggly Wiggly back home.

I’m a jump in with both feet, total immersion kinda guy and think the best intro to street cart dining is to find the most disgusting looking dish possible and start chowing down. ‘Cuz it’s all up hill from then on in. But you may find that idea a bit hard to swallow. Literally. So for now, let’s start with what clucks or oinks. Or did earlier that day until an axe rudely interrupted their conversation. We’ll wait for those things that stare back at you for your advanced street cart dining lessons.

Soi Twilight’s gogo bars are not the only place in town you’ll find a tasty line of balls on display.

Little chunks of chicken on bamboo skewers are an ubiquitous offering at Bangkok street food carts. It’s a good choice to start with ‘cuz its almost identifiable. And you’ll think it tastes like chicken. Thanks to its lovely, smoky duskiness from the charcoal, and the slightly sweet garlicky barbeque sauce, I think it tastes like a little slice of heaven in your mouth.

Possibly even more popular are pork balls, although there are two different versions offered on Bangkok’s streets. Both are delicious, and if you are traveling with urban lesbians who know little about balls and less about meat they’ll believe you when you tell them those are pig testicles. That just means more for you. Usually, if the vendor sells chicken skewers they’ll have pork balls on a skewer too. This version is called nam and it’s made from pork, garlic, chilies, salt, and sticky rice, all fermented and encased in pig skin. Slightly sour, nam is popular and widely available throughout the country, although there are many different types of nam and it is cooked in a number of different ways. For now, stick with the grilled skewered ball version, and try it at several different spots ‘cuz the secret often is in the vendor’s homemade barbeque sauce.

When those sumptuous little balls are hanging in pretty rows instead of pierced by bamboo skewers, you’re in for a real treat. Not to mention a salute to Joni Ernst’s farm days. Filled with a mixture of ground pork, spices, and glass noodles, these freshly made sausage balls are mouth-watering delicious. They’re made by pushing the filling into a sausage casing as deep as the first joint of the thumb and then tightly wrapped with a white string around the outside, which turns them into one-inch, bite-sized balls, formed together in a long line.

The entire strand of sausage balls is grilled over hot charcoal. For each individual order, the vendor cuts a length of sausage balls from the strand and then snips the balls apart. Which is where Joni Ernst’s favorite pastime comes into play. Yours is walking away with a bag full of sausages bites drizzled with a mildly spicy sweet chili sauce and a bamboo skewer to spear each delectable piece into your mouth as quickly as possible. Then repeat as necessary.

Thai fried chicken vendors will give the Colonel a well deserved bitch slap every time.

Street food cart dining can be an educamational experience too. A good lesson in how Thais perceive the world is the choice many make between a nice piece of freshly slaughtered and plucked chicken grilled over an open flame – that creates a lovely flavorful glaze over the meat, coating it in sweet saltiness – and a piece of two-month-old frozen chicken coated in a disgusting batter of odd, mysterious spices that even the manufacturer won’t cop to, that has been sitting under a heat lamp for an hour and costs ten times what that fresh piece of chicken does.

In my opinion, KFC is what the south inflicted on the rest of the country in revenge for losing the Civil War. To Thais, KFC is all about status. They’ll walk right past a freshly grilled chicken stand to line up for the pleasure of dropping their entire week’s food allowance to sup on The Colonel’s revenge. This is one time you should not follow that when in Rome do as the Romans do advice. ‘Cuz when a Thai is hungry and not just out to impress, he’ll go for the freshly barbequed chicken every time too.

If your pallet is a bit more refined, you can also find chicken skewers filled with perfectly roasted livers (tab gai), and chicken gizzards (guen) which are a bit more chewy but lots more flavorful. There’s nang gai (chicken skin) too which is zero meat and all skin, just in case your system is missing all that fat you are used to eating back home. Local street chefs will also take it a step further and serve you that which the chicken used to step up to the chopping block, but ordering chicken feet might still be a bit beyond your personal Ewwww level. And then the next thing ya know those bowls of crunchy grasshoppers might start looking good.

Forget about spotting a pair of golden arches, in Bangkok the real treat is found under a cloud of aromatic barbeque smoke.

Ditto for kor moo yang, which is grilled pork neck. But this is one of those treats that you’ll love if you don’t know what it is you’re putting in your mouth. Often displayed as a piece of steak, usually the vendor will slice yours into tiny, thin pieces that can be dipped into the accompanying barbeque sauce. But it too can be extremely fatty. So feel free to dig through the pile and pick out those pieces that have the most meat on them.

Grilled pork (moo ping) is also a popular breakfast treat on Bangkok’s streets, and beats the hell out of a bowl of oatmeal. It’s worth getting out of bed early for. These bite-sized cuts of pork are marinated in a sauce of coconut milk, dark soy sauce, garlic, palm sugar, and oyster sauce, then grilled over fiery charcoals until the meat begins to caramelize. I don’t know why it is that you can only find this treat during the early morning hours, but stumble out of bed and look for the closest cloud of barbeque smoke . . . you’ll be glad you did.

Almost as tricky to find is what Thais have done to the Malaysian/Indonesian dish known as satay. In Thailand it goes moo, not because it’s beef instead of the traditional chicken, but because locally it’s known as moo satay. And it’s pork. Whatevers. It’s onolishess, and that’s all that matters.

Maybe it’s the exhaust fumes, but nothing tastes as delicious as freshly barbequed meat served piping hot off the streets of Bangkok.

What makes pork satay even more special than other types of Thai barbequed meats is its curry marinade. It infuses an herbal aroma into the meat, as well as turning the pork the color of turmeric. Most satay sellers in Bangkok never put big chunks of meat on a skewer, but just tiny curls of the grilled pork instead. Which is perfect for dunking the pork in its rich peanut sauce before slipping the entire conglomeration into your mouth. And if that doesn’t put a big smile on your face, you probably should have headed for Burger King instead. Preferably one back home.

To Wai Or Not To Wai

21 Wednesday Jan 2015

Posted by Bangkokbois in Tips

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

Stupid Tourist Tricks

To wai or not to wai? That’s an easy question. Not.

Lets all put our hands together – and upside the head of the stupid farang who cruise the streets of Bangkok giving a wai to every Thai they meet. Kids, sex workers, touts, street vendors, service personnel, it doesn’t matter. They are in Thailand. And in Thailand you wai.

No. You don’t.

You idiot.

I cringe each time I see a farang wai in Thailand. And usually roll my eyes and shake my head. Unless I’m in a really good mood. Then I point and laugh. I suppose I should be more generous and just chalk it up to an ignorant touri attempting to echo Thai etiquette. But while the locals will pretty much ignore the effort, it’s a lot like a non-native trying to speak French in France: you’ll do it poorly, the locals really won’t appreciate it, and you’ll come off looking like a fool.

It’s easy to understand the first time visitor to the Kingdom picking up this nasty habit. On Day #1 they’ll be waied to a good hundred times. And the gesture is infectious. Especially when it is accompanied by one of those glorious Thai smiles. How can you not wai back? If they bothered to find out just an ounce of Thai culture before making their trip, however, they’d realize the result of their wai attempt is more like a bitch slap than the gracious gesture they intended it to be. Yes, your mama was right. It never hurts to be polite. But if that is your excuse for improperly using the wai in the kingdom, the polite thing would have been to spend five minutes out of your busy day to learn just a smidgen of local culture before landing in Thailand.

Farang who wai improperly look like the clowns that they are.

Thai’s are big on saving face and being non-confrontational. So when a touri wais, they will not correct him, scold him, or ridicule him. Besides, that’s what I am here for. Their opinion of said touri, however, will drop quicker than Lindsay Lohan’s panties at a lesbian coke party. And seriously, there is nothing more ridiculous than the fat, dread-headed backpacker bobbing down Khaosan Road giving a wai to every tout, tuk tuk driver, street vendor, bell hop, and whore he passes.

But OK, ignorance amongst the uninitiated can be excused with a laugh. The repeat visitor who has tried to go native, and should know better, is a different story. My problem with these guys is their air of superiority, their desperate desire to demonstrate they are ‘in the know’ when the exact opposite is true. And yeah, I’m talking about the fat old sex tourist who gives a wai to every bar boi he meets. The only time you should ever wai to a bar boi is when his cock is between your palms and you are about to deep throat him.

If you are not Thai it is doubtful you will ever master the intricacies of the wai. What looks like the same gesture to the Western eye, is in reality countless variations on the theme. The level the hands are at, the rigidity of the fingers, the degree of accompanying bow, it all has significance to a Thai. And honestly, you will never get it right.

Beggars often wai in supplication because of their need. As needy as they too may be, sex tourists should not follow suit.

The only time a touri should ever attempt a wai is to a senior monk (both in status and age), a member of the royal family (like you’d ever meet one), a high level member of parliament (see royal family), an elderly person of at least your social status (and since you know nothing about how Thais view social status, mark this one off your list too), possibly your Thai friend’s parents if they are older than you (which is doubtful in the first place, but ask him first anyway and get instructions, too), and to one of those wai giving Ronald McDonald statues (‘cuz it will crack up your Thai friends).

If your mama raised you to be polite, a smile and a nod of the head is an appropriate response when a Thai wais to you. The wrong wai back negates their polite gesture and is akin to a sweet smile while saying, “fuck you”. Because Thais use the wai to pass on that little message too. Just watch the next time a cheap-skate, obnoxious bore staggers out of a gogo bar. Half the staff will wai him. That’s not about Thai graciousness. While their entire hands may be part of that gesture, it’s only their middle fingers that count.

Which you should keep in mind in the event you are confronted with the singular time most visitors ever experience when a wai is not only proper but mandatory. Because while the locals may excuse your other child-like attempts at giving a wai, when The Buddha is the recipient, you better get it right. And 99% of the time your best rule of thumb is the same as it is in giving a wai anywhere else in Thailand: don’t. So let’s cover that first.

All wais are not created equally; knowing what a specific wai means could mean the difference between a happy ending and a not-so happy event.

Showing proper reverence when visiting a temple in Thailand is a must. That doesn’t mean you have to drop to your knees the minute you enter a wat. It does mean that you show the same amount of respect and decorum you would in a house of worship back home (unless your brand of faith involves handling snakes and such). Be quiet, be respectful, don’t interfere with those whose visit is for religious purposes, and don’t be rude. Walking up to the main Buddha statue, having a quick gander, and then turning your back on him and walking away, by the way, is considered rude. Just like striking a crucified pose in front of the altar at a Christian church for a quick selfie would be.

As a visitor, you are welcome to enter pretty much every wat in the country. Unless you are a Buddhist, your role is that of an observer, not a participant. There is no reason for you to kneel. Because you shouldn’t be standing in the middle of a group of locals praying to begin with. There is no reason for you to pray. Because The Buddha is not your god. And if you are one of those who claim to be more spiritual than religious and you feel the need to ‘honor’ the ideal of The Buddha, find a quiet corner away from the locals and give it your best. That will help keep them from interrupting their prayers to ask The Buddha what in the hell that silly farang is up to.

You may however have the good luck and grand misfortune to be visiting a wat with a Thai who actually thinks well of you. And then you really do owe The Buddha a thanks. Said local may very well care about your spiritual well-being and he may also want you to reap the benefits of offering a blessing to Buddha. Or he may just want to reap the benefits of your wallet paying for both of your accruements associated with offering a blessing. Either way, you’ll soon find yourself holding a candle, some incense sticks, and a flower – usually but not always a lotus blossom, or three. If you are truly blessed you’ll also have a piece or two of gold leaf in your hands. Just to help confuse you further.

Guess who is not Thai.

As nice as it would be for said local to explain what you are supposed to do with all that stuff, he won’t. Anymore than he would tell you how to breathe. You’re supposed to know this crap. And knowing that you know nothing is the first step toward enlightenment. Unlike learning how to wai by watching the gogo bar’s staff’s treatment of obnoxious customers, watching your friend make his offering first is a good rule of thumb. ‘Cuz the intro is seldom the same.

There are a lot of Buddha statues in Thailand, but they are not created equal. Some are more significant than others. Some are in shrines, others in wats. Some wats rank higher in religious significance, as do then their main Buddha statue. And at some temples it’s not only the Buddha that needs proper respect paid. So how you approach will differ from one spot to the next. At most, walking up to the image will suffice. At many, dropping to your knees in front of the image is expected. At some you should be on your knees before making you way toward the image. Which is a bit tricky if you haven’t been born to it. Especially when all the alcohol you consumed the night before has not yet dissipated from your system.

Fortunately the knee-crawl approach requirement is few and far between. When it is, since you are farang, you can walk up, then kneel, and then make one move forward. That still counts. And any demerits you get are probably minor compared to what you did to your karma the night before. In most cases you won’t have to knee-crawl at all. And in many you’ll never have to drop to your knees either. What you will have to do is figure out what to do with all that crap nestled in your hands. And that – thank the Buddha – is almost always the same.

First comes the candle. If it isn’t already lit, use the flame from one already left as an offering to do so. There will be a vessel with lots of burning candles in it already at the altar, and yours goes in the same place. If there is only a candelabra or candle holders and it/they are already filled, just gently knock one out of its spot to make room for yours. ‘Cuz farang candles always rank higher.

Next, it’s flower time. There is often a bucket of water next to the statue to place your flowers in. Sometime not. Regardless, this is not the time to show off your skills as a florist. Place you flowers where everyone else has. Occasionally, usually at a shrine instead of a wat, your only offering will be flowers. If so, move immediately to step #3. If instead you still have the incense and possibly gold leaf to deal with, um, also move immediately to step #3.

Use the flames from the candles you didn’t knock over to light your incense. Hold them between your palms in the wai gesture. Don’t worry about the height you are holding them at – the locals will already be amazed you got this far without screwing it up. Now it is time to pray. Just like right before you blow out the candles on your birthday cake. You can ask for good health. Or world peace. Or to never have to make an offering to The Buddha again. Or if you want to emulate the Thais praying next to you, you can ask for the winning numbers for the next lottery. Like a Catholic priest during confession, The Buddha has heard it all before. And unlike dealing with a Catholic priest, you’ll probably escape without being molested. Which is probably similar to what your boy du jour who accompanied you on your visit to the wat has been praying for.

After praying, while still holding your incense sticks reverently aloft, wai three times. You do so with a slight bow. Then stick your incense in the bucket where everyone else has planted theirs. You can wai/bow one more time after doing so. It’s up to you. If you moved to this step because you only had a flower offering to give, you normally place your flowers and then do the three wai thingy. In either case, now back away from the altar, taking at least one step (two or three is better) before turning your back on the Buddha. And say a quick prayer of thanks for having not screwed up making your offering to Buddha.

But wait! There’s more!

You may still have some gold leaf in your hands if it came with your Buddha offering kit and if you managed to not drop it while trying to accomplish steps #1 through #3. If so, the statue it goes on it will be evident. It’s not Buddhist graffiti, so this is not the time to blaze new trails. Generally, if you have more than one piece of gold leaf, that means there is more than one statue on which you are supposed to affix some. And yes, it really is gold. And no, do not attempt to scrape off a handful to cash in later. The Buddha will not be amused.

My How Time Thais

16 Tuesday Dec 2014

Posted by Bangkokbois in Tips

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Gay Thailand

Time and Thai waits for no man.

There are many little habits common among Thai that drive farang crazy. Not social customs so much as peculiarities that many seem to share. One of the least popular is what is commonly referred to as Thai time. That’s when you agree to meet someone at say 7 o’clock and they show up somewhere around nine. It’s such a wide-spread habit that it makes you wonder why knock-off watches are such a popular item at night markets in Thailand. But then again no self-respecting local would be caught dead wearing knock-off bling. Any more than they would looking at their watch to make sure they were on time.

Personally, I have a bigger problem with their love of karaoke than I do with their time avoidance issues. Part of that is from having lived in Hawaii for so many years where Thai time is called Hawaiian time. Both use the same clock. Numbers not being my strong suit, it doesn’t hurt that I tend to avoid clocks and watches myself. I don’t get why there’s such a big thing made of time pieces being instruments of great precision when the traditional clock is anything but. When seven forty and twenty to eight mean the same thing you’re just asking for trouble. At least if you’re asking me what time it is. My biological family still likes to make jokes about my time telling capabilities. Like if we’re meeting somewhere at eight, they’ll go: So that’s when the big hand is on the 12 and the little hand is on . . . . They’ve been beating that one dead for so many years you’d think they were Thai.

So 7-ish makes perfect sense to me. That mean your arrival time for any social engagement is when there’s a seven anywhere on the face of your clock. Unless yours is digital. Then you don’t even have to show up at all. But that drives many visitors crazy. Which, since most are on holiday, doesn’t make a lot of sense. The only time you should be concerned with is whether you are booking a bar boy for a short-time or long-time off. Or how much longer you have to pick a guy before the bars close.

When the big hand is on . . .

Nonetheless, and while I doubt it will help any of you chill, I’d thought I give you my thoughts on why Thais seem so unconcerned about the time. And that’s often because they are instead concerned with face. Uh, not the one on your watch. Thais go to great lengths to avoid setting up themselves, or you, to lose face. And setting a time to meet does just that. Believe it or not, they know arriving late is rude. But even if they leave home with plenty of time to arrive when they should, there’s no telling what will come up in between. They may run across a friend. Or two. Or there’s more traffic than they planned for. Or the local 7/11 was having a sale. Ya never know.

So everyone concerned is better off if you just agree to meet at an indefinite time. Like later. Or tonight. Then they won’t lose face for arriving late. And you won’t lose face for being upset that they are. Which is even worse. Because if you were Thai and understood the concept of face you’d know by getting mad you are not doing your part to protect them from the loss of face for being late. You just can’t beat Thai logic. At any time it appears.

There’s the issue of confrontation at work too. Thais avoid confrontations almost as much as they do face loss situations. And when it comes to time, there’s two confrontational paradigms at work. The first, obviously, is that there is a good chance they will arrive late and being a farang and not knowing better you’ll get mad and a confrontation will ensue. In which you will lose face. But even before that disastrous event, your insistence on setting a time to meet alone is confrontational. ‘Cuz the trifecta in the time conundrum is that Thais hate to say no. So when you say let’s meet at 7, they’re stuck. They can not say no. Even though they know there’s no way they can be there until 8. So it’s your fault. ‘Cuz if you were Thai, you’d know better.

Looks like 3 o’clock to me.

Of course that’s assuming they even want to meet you. A Thai will also agree to meet you at 7 even when he has no intention of ever meting you. At any time. Because telling you that would be rude. And you’d lose face. Again. It’s the same principle at work when you ask a Thai for directions to somewhere he has no clue about getting to. He’ll still give you directions. Because that will make you happy. Later, when you are completely lost, he’s out of the picture so it’s no longer a problem for him. Ditto for when he never shows up for your date. He made you happy by agreeing to meet you at 7. That was the extent of his duty to you. What happens afterwards when he fails to show is up to you. And you’ll have plenty of time to deal with it.

Farang just spend too much time allowing a clock to dictate their life. Thais know whatever the time is, it doesn’t really matter. Farang rush to get out of bed in the morning to not miss out on their hotel’s free buffet breakfast. Thais know that if the buffet closes at 10 and they show up at 10:30, one of their countrymen will open the restaurant’s door for them. The important thing about their job as a bar boy is not that work starts at 8, but that they show up sometime before the show begins. ‘Cuz that’s when the manager really needs them. And it really doesn’t matter what time your plane is scheduled to arrive and that they convinced you to allow them to meet you. Because airlines tend to work on Thai time too. And even if they are an hour late getting to the airport, they know you’ll still be there waiting for them. Because despite the aggravation of their lack of a sense of time, it’s the time you spend together that you really treasure. And that’s what is really important.

Penis Power In Thailand: The Legends Of Phra Nang Cave

05 Friday Dec 2014

Posted by Bangkokbois in Tips

≈ Comments Off on Penis Power In Thailand: The Legends Of Phra Nang Cave

Tags

Attractions, Gay Thailand

Towering mounds of hard limestone thrusting into the sky ain’t the only reason visitors to Phra Nang Beach have penis on their minds.

While these days Thailand’s southern beach areas are best known for dead tourists, not-so-dead wood too awaits the more adventurous travelers. And since there are only so many illegal Burmese immigrants around to blame your local troubles on, the authorities on Krabi recently devoted a day’s efforts to cleaning up the island’s most troublesome hot spot. ‘Cuz rumor had it that some of those damn farang – who are almost as good as Burmese for finger-pointing – had been filling the local phallic shrine with dildos.

Thanks to Thailand being as sybaritic as it is religious, Phra Nang Cave – aka the Princess Cave – should be on every budding queen’s must-see list when holidaying on Krabi. Located on the far end of Phra Nang Beach, the cave is a shrine to an Indian princess who was killed in a shipwreck. Or she was the wife of a local fisherman who was lost at sea. I’m not sure how the legend of a dead princess and one about a dead fisherman’s wife who lived out the rest of her lonely days in the cave pining for her husband’s return managed to become intertwined and confused, but then since the result is hundreds of dicks who really cares?

Come to think about it, I’m not too sure how either legend ends up being about safety on the seas or getting knocked up either. But along with those two stories comes those two beliefs. Or you can combine them, kinda, sorta, and claim the shrine is where local fishermen go to pray for success with their day’s catch. Which doesn’t explain how having good luck with fish translates to dick either. Other than that some claim Phra Nang Cave resembles a vagina. But since the one thing everyone can agree on is that the only use for a vagina is sticking a dick or two in it . . .

According to local legend, this is what a vagina look like. Now aren’t you glad you avoid those things?

Which, at least, helps explain yet another local legend that claims if anyone carves a wooden dick and releases it at high tide anywhere along the Krabi coast, it will eventually end up in Phra Nang Cave. There’s a penis tie-in to yet another legend surrounding the cave too, which says that if a person enters the cave with a good heart, food will drop down from the cave roof to feed them. But if they enter with a bad heart, a great wind will usher from the cave and blow them tumbling to the other end of the beach. Not that Phra Nang Cave is the only place in Thailand you can get a blow job. Even, occasionally, a legendary one. In any case, that’s a lot of legends. And a lot of dick. Both of which the locals are generally in favor of. Farang dick, not so much. Which is why officers with the Noppharat Thara National Park and beach guards recently spent a sweaty day diligently searching the cave for foreign dick. But before we get to the meat of that story, let’s look at another not so legendary one.

Phra Nang Beach, with its beautiful white sand contrasting with the emerald expanse of the Andaman Sea has been called the second most beautiful beach in the world. Thanks to the massive limestone cliffs which block any possibility of making a road to the spot, the only way to get to the spectacular little bit of paradise is by boat. So back in the mid 1990s, The Dusit Group, Thailand’s premier resort chain, decided the only way you could improve on the pristine beauty of heaven was by building a 5-star, exclusive, $1,000 per night, 100 pavilion hotel. So, once again, we’re talking about dicks.

Ignoring every legend they’d heard of, not to mention a few hundred wooden penises, construction of the resort plodded along smoothly until the night before the grand opening when some of the construction workers decided to have a little Mekong whisky party in the Phra Nang Cave. Reportedly, the workers were from Isaan in the northeast part of Thailand, which is almost as good as illegal Burmese immigrants when you need someone to blame for a catastrophe. Which is usually the outcome of any Mekong whisky party. And in this case, the outcome was a fire that torched the penis shrine (that the diminutive workers burned the gigantic penises in a fit of jealousy is more of a rumor than legend).

Because nothing says tropical paradise like a 5-star resort, welcome to the Rayavadee.

Forget what you’ve heard about the dangers of a woman scorned, because that ain’t nothing compared to the ire of a few hundred penises scorched. While the Issan workers will still trying to decide which of their crew looked most like a Burmese, thanks to their whiskey-infused bonfire a local woman on the other side of the peninsula became possessed by a spirit and began babbling in tongues. Locals claimed Phra Nang’s spirit had take over the woman’s body, pissed about her shrine being destroyed. One of the tongues she babbled in must have been Thai ‘cuz the word went out that Phra Nang – undoubtedly because she couldn’t pronounce Myanmar – said, “The people who do this have the big house, but soon everything come down.”

Quicker than you can say Palad Khik (which is what Thais call wood dildos used as an offering at phallic shrines) word spread of the return of Phra Nang and the dastardly deeds of the Dusit Group. Hundreds of Thais gathered in protest in front of the Dusit Thani Hotel in Bangkok demanding the government stop the Dusit Rayavadee from “trespassing on Krabi’s national park.” Which probably would have been more effective at ground-breaking than grand-opening, but then that woulda meant the loss of lots of local jobs. The Dusit Group responded, showing how much the Thai peoples’ will meant to them, by rolling out a red carpet down Phra Nang Beach to the waterline amidst the sound of champagne bottle corks popping to welcome the hotel’s first guests arriving by hydrofoil jet ferry from Phuket. Phra Nang was not amused.

Pop, pop, pop went the bubbly on the beach. And then bam, pow, kaboom went the hotel’s generator, exploding and shooting flames into the sky in what appeared to be a volcanic eruption. That’s what happens when you mess with a goddess’ penises. And with no backup system to power the resort’s air-conditioners or to recharge foreign-made dildos packed away in guests’ suitcases, the hotel’s inaugural batch of the rich and famous were escorted back to the boat for a hasty retreat back to Phuket.

The last thing you want, as the Dusit Group learned, is an angry local spirit having a hard-on for you.

The Dusit Group’s PR department immediately went to work to prove their not-so-grand opening was merely a badly timed glitch rather than a curse and after bringing in a new generator ordered a large cement spirit house to be ceremoniously built in the cave with the sacrificial offering of a goat to not appease Phra Nang’s spirit, wink, wink. But the goddess didn’t want goat, she wanted penis. And that night, a Thai woman who worked at one of the bungalows was possessed by a spirit. Once again. ‘Cuz Thais will beat a curse to death just like they do a good joke.

Whether you believe in local superstitions or not, the locals do. Management of the Rayavadee awoke the next morning to find many of its employees ready to call it quits. Which kinda puts a dampener on holding a grand opening even when you’ve already held a trial one that didn’t go quite as planned. Bowing to the inevitable, and recognizing that when your heart is set on penis nothing else will do, the Dusit Group directed their remaining staff to spend the day in Phra Nang Cave carving replacement phalluses to turn Phra Nang’s frown upside down. which should have put an end to Phra Nang’s curse on the Rayavadee, but considering since then Gwyneth Paltrow has stayed at the resort . . .

Today, local fisherman and boatmen leave offerings in Phra Nang cave to ensure safe travel on the sea. Or to find true love. Or to get their wife pregnant. Or to have a successful day fishing. Not that it really matters ‘cuz unless they make their pilgrimage at the break of dawn they can’t get near the cave thanks to all the touri who want to take a selfie among the hundreds of erect penises, many vividly painted, many sporting colorful pieces of cloth. And a few far too realistic looking and made of silicone. Which doesn’t bother Phra Nang, but did piss off local authorities after a photo of an adult sex toy sitting in the cave appeared on-line (uh, that’d be a dildo and not Gwyneth Paltrow).

Wood penis good, silicone penis bad, trade-ins not allowed.

After a long, hard, sweaty day of thrusting themselves deeply into the dark, moist cave, the officers found the culprit: a single dong-shaped offering which the local media described as “a large, pink faded sex toy”. “We believe it was left there by a tourist who doesn’t really understand local beliefs,” said Komart Paenkerd, who works for the Krabi Provincial Cultural Office, adding, “Since antiquity, it is believed by locals that putting wooden Palad khik penis carvings in the cave will evoke the spirit of Phra Nang and ensure that you find true love.” So wood penis good, silicone penis bad. And any penis equals true love. Which is a legend I can get behind.

But let’s leave the last word to Khun Paenkerd. “I would like to inform tourists that sex toys are inappropriate as an offering,” he said. “Locals worship the spirit of Phra Nang with hardwood only.”

And that is as it should be.

Related Posts You Might Enjoy:
Bangkok Tourism For The Phallically Inclined	The Top Ten Bangkok Experiences Part 4: Yes It Is All About Dick	Penis Envy In Bangkok

You Khan Toke A Boy Out Of The Bar, But Can’t Take The Thai Out Of A Bar Boy

25 Tuesday Nov 2014

Posted by Bangkokbois in Tips

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

Attractions, Chiang Mai, Hotels and Restaurants

Old doesn’t necessarily mean ancient although a night spent at one of Chiang Mai’s khan toke dinner shows will make your body feel that way.

On our first visit to Chiang Mai, (Noom’s first ever) to really enjoy the experience Noom decided he needed to go local. With a passion. Or at least what he envisioned the rural people of the north considered local. It was early in our relationship and the first time I got to see how he pursues an idea with a singular intense of purpose. We spent an entire evening at the Sunday Night Market roaming from stall to stall as he assembled his ‘northern Thailand’ wardrobe. Despite money being no object – meaning I didn’t object to the money he was spending out of my wallet – at each stall he’d haggle his little ass off, and then more often than not would walk away knowing he could get a better price somewhere just up the road. Hours later, with the market closing, on our way back through the market he ended up stopping at some of those same stalls to make his purchases. No problemo. By the end of our outing he had his outfit for our stay.

I’m not sure if those who live in and around Chiang Mai would consider a white cotton pair of fisherman pants to be part of their traditional wardrobe. Or the matching white shirt with a high Chinese collar. The sandals he may have gotten right. Even if I noticed most locals just went with rubber flip-flops. But the important thing was that Noom was happy. And much like a child with a new toy couldn’t resist wearing his new outfit to bed that night. Which didn’t make me any too happy. I tried using a bit of logic instead of just whining about his lack of nudity, telling him that if he slept in his new Northern Thailand clothes they’d be wrinkled for tomorrow’s wearing. He agreed. And then told me that would make them look more authentic. I made a mental note to only buy him sexy underwear in the future.

But part of the fun of that trip was that I’d told him he could decide everything we would do.; And then got busy filling in all the hours he couldn’t come up with an activity for. I shoulda figured after the fisherman pant outfit his knowledge of the northern part of his country was limited at best. But he didn’t completely crap out. He had one idea, one which he saved as a surprise. And he spent a few days surreptitiously gathering info, then telling me how much money he needed to arrange what he would only refer to as ‘you surprise’. And when the big night arrived, surprised I was.

Have I ever mentioned before how much I don’t like surprises?

The Thai food is elevated by a khantoke, in height if not in palatability.

Finding ourselves in Chiang Mai once again, this time with my recently acquired boyfriend, Noom decided that Dave too needed to experience the authentic Northern Thailand. Having become much more familiar with Noom’s mode of operations, when he told me I knew there would be no denying his plan. Except for the surprise part. Out for the day, when Noom made one of his frequent pit stops to water a fire hydrant, I pulled Dave aside and gave him the 411.

“Tonight we’re going to a Khan Toke dinner show. It’s kinda like one of those luaus they put on for tourists back in Hawaii. Bad food, bad native dancing, and you’ll suffer through a bad back tomorrow ‘cuz you have to sit on the floor throughout your meal. But Noom has his heart set on showing off his native land to you so we have no choice.”

“You’ve been to one of these things before?

“Sad to say, yes.”

“And it really sucks?”

“Worse than what I’ve already told you.”

“And you didn’t tell him it sucked?”

“That would have hurt his feelings.”

“So now I have to suffer through it too, just because you didn’t have the balls to tell him how much you hated it your first time?”

“Yeah, but we can stop at McDonalds afterwards so we’re not starving all night. Shhhh, here he comes. You have to act surprised.”

“No what I have to act is like I have a slight case of dysentery and can’t leave the hotel tonight.”

“Um, I think the one we’re going to has elephant rides too.”

“Liar.”

On the plus side, there is no such thing as a good or bad table at a Khan Toke dinner show. ‘Cuz there are no tables.

The khan toke dinner is a tradition among Lanna people dating way back in history. To the mid 1950s. The khantoke itself – a pedestal tray used as a small dining table – is a bit older. It was used for special meals and celebrations when eating off the floor was just too common. You’ve probably seen towers of different sized khantokes in handicraft shops at stalls around Thailand and possibly thought one would make a good cake pedestal. After spending an evening at a khan toke dinner and cultural show, you’ll probably think khantokes should only be used as cake pedestals. But hey, almost anything beats having your dinner served on the floor.

Because being original has never been a Thai trait, there are several places around Chiang Mai that put on khan toke dinners for the masses. Aficionados claim the best is at the Old Chiang Mai Cultural Center, located at the edge of the city about a 5 minute ride from the center of Chiang Mai. You can book your excursion almost everywhere in Chiang Mai, and most come with a free bus ride to and from the event. Personally I suggest arriving in your own private tuk tuk. It will help prepare your body for the torture to come.

Once at the Old Chiang Mai Cultural Center your evening begins with instructions to remove your shoes before being led to your not-a-table (also known as the floor), not because of any religious reasons as with visiting a wat but because it’d be rude to be tracking in dirt on the carpeting where your fellow diners will be grazing. Once you figure out how to lower yourself to the floor without looking like you’re falling off a bar stool, there are stacked, triangular shaped ‘pillows’ to rest against. Fortunately, before your food is served you’re given the opportunity to try those pillows out. And once you realize they tend to slip across the carpeting when you put your weight on them, you’ll find a new position that allows you to remain in one spot.

The show’s eye candy is far too over-dressed. But Wait! Are those fisherman pants?

As soon as the serving staff sees that you are not slipping into some other waitperson’s section, your food will arrive. You’ll note I didn’t mention menus. That’s because it’s a fixed meal. And while some refer to it as a buffet, it ain’t. Your not-a-table gets the same food as everyone else’s. If you arrived early (so that means you were not accompanied by a Thai) you may get seconds. If you are lucky. Or not. If you are even luckier.

The food comes in small bowls and fills your group’s khantoke. There is fried chicken, Burmese pork curry, fried pork skins, fried bananas, rice, not-fried vegetables, and some chili paste so that what you choose to eat has at least a bit of flavor. The best part of the meal is that if you go traditional, you get to eat it with your fingers. And the five second rule is extended by three seconds since any food you drop takes less time to hit the floor. Now aren’t you glad they made everyone take off their shoes?

Oh. And you get a fruit platter at the end of your meal too. Plus all the booze you can drink. As long as you are willing to pay for it. As you go. Because the price of your ticket doesn’t include alcohol even though getting wasted is a tradition among tourists that dates back even further than the traditional khan toke dinner does

Now I know where that Soi Twilight candle numbers came from.

About an hour into your meal, the entertainment starts. It’s traditional Thai dancing at its finest. Thais, other than those making their living as coyote dancers at the bars in Patpong, are not known for either their rhythm or dancing skills, but their attempts does help take your mind away from the horrendous music accompanying the dancers. And like traditional Hawaiian luaus filled with Samoan fire dancers and Tahitian bump and grind, in Thailand they’ve added a good dollop of non-traditional Thai dances to the show – like Samoan fire dancers – too. And like at traditional Hawaiian luaus, at the end of the performance the dancers grab a few unsuspecting tourists, pull them on stage, and make them attempt to dance Thai-style so that everyone else can have a good laugh and forget how uncomfortable sitting on the floor can be.

But Wait! There’s more! After your meal and after watching the cultural performance you can move to a nearby barn to watch even more traditional Thai dancing. More of the local tribal version than that of the royal court, it’s a fascinating look at how hill tribe ladies learned that blocking move they exhibit at the night bazaar, the one that manages to keep them directly in your path until you buy something from them. Which a few of the dancers practice in trying to get a tip out of you before you leave.

The best part of the evening is that if you took a tuk-tuk, there’s a McDonalds a mere two minutes from the venue. And just a few minutes further into town you can experience a total different type of traditional Thai dancing at any one of a number of gogo bars.

I feel sorry for the dancers if a Samoan tourist ever decides to drop by the Old Chiang Mai Cultural Center’s Khan Toke Dinner and Cultural Show.

If you enjoy visiting Jim Thompson’s House Of Silk For Sale, a traditional khan toke dinner show is probably right for you. And there are worse ways of spending your time in Chiang Mai. Like visiting an ‘authentic’ Hill Tribe village. But there are plenty of restaurants serving much better Thai food, and you can always get some take-out and eat it sitting on the floor of your hotel room.

The Old Chiang Mai Cultural Center’s Khan Toke Dinner and Cultural Show is held nightly starting at 7pm. The dancing begins around 8 and the after show dance performance lasts about 30 minutes. Depending on where you buy your tickets, dinner, with one free non-alcoholic drink will run you 500 to 600 baht per person. But attending the dinner show and keeping your bar boy happy, as MasterCard likes to say, is priceless. As for boyfriends, promise he might get to ride an elephant the next day and you may still get lucky after your meal.

Related Posts You Might Enjoy:
Thai Dining Fit For A Queen	Give Us This Day	What Thais Do To A Taco

Stalking The Elusive Elephant Experience In Chiang Mai

17 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by Bangkokbois in Tips

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Attractions, Chiang Mai

Because who doesn’t love elephants?

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve traveled to Thailand with my friend Dave, who (if you’ve been following this blog you know) has more recently had that all important ‘boy’ designation added to the almost as important ‘friend’. My fist visit to the kingdom was with Dave, as were the next several in fact. We never made it out of Bangkok back then, and seldom made it out of Patpong either. There was no reason to. We were there for the nightlife, and in those days Patpong offered all the nightlife your system could handle.

Patpong’s night market was part of the scene in those days, but not the main focus as it has become over the years. Outside of the stalls crammed cheek to jowl down the middle of the street, shopping options revolved around booze and sex. Even then Patpong wasn’t the red light district it had once been, but then neither was it the blue light special it has since become. The naughty bars were primarily upstairs venues; street side beer bars were the name of the game and we spent most nights making the rounds up Patpong 1, down Patpong 2, and back again, drinking our way along the route. We never took the time to visit a wat. Or a museum. Or any of the myriad attractions that visitors to Thailand should. Our biggest adventure outside of Patpong was a night spent on Soi Cowboy. And even that excursion waited until our third or fourth trip to The Land of Smiles.

Over the years our visits together became less frequent. By the time we hit the Big Mango together again I’d developed my obsession with checking out every wat that crossed my path, and the only time I bothered to spend in Patpong proper was in cutting through it when moving from Soi 4 to Soi Twilight. When we did finally land in Thailand together again, Dave only agreed to visiting his first wat because I lied and told him he could get a beer there. But because my horizons had broadened, his did too. Or maybe it was just that as he aged his liver demanded an occasional time-out.

Dave’s love affair with elephants in Thailand is self-explanatory.

We just visited the kingdom again, this time as a couple, and spent a few days in Chiang Mai for the Yee Peng celebrations. Dave, as I had expected him to, had a list of bars he wanted to visit. He also had a non-alcoholic excursion planned, which I hadn’t expected. We’d barely checked into our hotel before he announced, “I wanna ride an elephant.”

Huh. And he wasn’t even drunk yet.

Visiting one of the elephant camps and taking your turn on one of the beasts’ backs is something I’d assume every visitor to Chiang Mai does. It sounds like a lot of fun. It’s not. Kinda like spending the night with a ladyboy, the reality is just never gonna live up to the expectation. It would be different if it was riding an elephant as opposed to riding on an elephant (and I don’t mean a fat ladyboy although that too probably works out the same). But the reality of riding on an elephant in Chiang Mai is an uncomfortable wood bench strapped onto the back of a bored beast who slowly plods along a well-beaten path following too closely behind another bored beast with another bored farang strapped to its back. It’s good for about five minutes of the 15 minute minimum ride option, and the most memorable thing about your excursion is when the elephant in front of your takes a dump.

Noom, my bar boy friend (who, if you’ve been following this blog you know has always had that all important white space between his designation of ‘boy’ and ‘friend’) was with us in Chiang Mai and was just as quick to change the subject when Dave brought up riding an elephant as was I. He too had been there and done that. On our first visit to Chiang Mai, he too wanted to ride an elephant. And agreed afterwards that riding on a elephant wasn’t all that. He’d also been along for the ride when accompanying other friends to Chiang Mai, who also felt their lives would not be complete without taking a turn on an elephant’s back. So it took longer for me to explain my plan on dealing with Dave’s elephant desires than it did for him to agree to being a co-conspirator in making sure that dream never came true.

Looking for the elephant experience in Chiang Mai? Just follow the hard to miss signs.

Elephants are an integral part of Thailand’s history. And even if you never get near an elephant camp (which was Noom’s and my intention) elephants are an integral part of any visitor’s trip to the kingdom. They are everywhere. Even on the ‘look I went to Thailand’ t-shirt you buy as a souvenir. In fact, someone has glued an elephant on pretty much any souvenir you buy in Thailand. Even back when Dave and I never made it outside of Patpong, the elephant experience was part of your visit. Back then, before it became illegal to do so (wink, wink) some enterprising elephant owner would stroll through the area with an elephant, selling bananas for tourists to buy to feed the poor beast. We’d learned your best interaction with an elephant on the streets of Bangkok was to not to – when those suckers decide to urinate, the entire block gets drenched.

Generally, I think the Thai insistence that whenever anyone thinks of Thailand they think of elephants to be over-kill. But when you are trying to avoid the actual experience of a face-to-face encounter with one, that’s a good thing. Noom decided his contribution to that goal would be to pretend Dave’s desire to ride one meant that Dave loved elephants And the best way to do that was to point out every elephant we encountered. “Look! Elephant!” became his rallying cry every time an elephant appeared, none of which were living examples of the ubiquitous beast.

We only made it through half of the Sunday Night Market thanks to Noom having to point out every elephant painting, sculpture, carving, decal, plush toy, and tchotchke he spotted. The Yee Peng lanterns we set afloat into the sky had to be sent flying while we stood next to one of the elephant statues at the moat by Tha Pae Gate. Dave (and by Dave I mean Noom and Dave, of course) got their picture taken standing in front of an elephant float during one of the Yee Peng parades. And Noom was crushed that he couldn’t find an elephant themed Krathong to float down the Ping river. Even though Dave offered to donate the small elephant statue Noom had bought for him with my wallet to the cause.

Chiang Mai’s Elephant Parade House can be even more fun than riding on one.

Dave is a big guy, standing well over six feet. Now in his late 40s, he’s packed on a bit of weight. So it was only my stern look at Noom that prevented a disaster and kept him from singing out, “Look! Elephant!” again on our first morning in Chiang Mai when Dave came strolling out of the shower naked. No problemo. The thought alone was enough to send Noom into a fit of giggles.

My efforts took the much more non-Thai (meaning subtle) approach of using Google to find elephant experience options in Chiang Mai that didn’t include encountering a real, live elephant. And as trip-planning ideas go, it wasn’t a bad move. Instead of hitting the attractions Noom and I had relied on in showing off Chiang Mai in the past, I found several new attractions worthy of the tourist experience in Chiang Mai. Art In Paradise, which I posted about last week, was one of them (they had a 3D, interactive Elephant painting, which was the initial must do elephants draw). And Dave (and by Dave I mean Noom and Dave, of course) got their picture taken standing in front it. Which was still cheaper and vastly more entertaining than riding on one.

Dave’s no slouch in the brains department, so by our second day in town he figured out what Noom and I were up to and put his foot down. “I don’t want to see an elephant. I don’t want to buy elephant souvenirs. I don’t want to spend the rest of this trip listening to Noom yelling, ‘Look! Elephant!’ I want to be with an elephant, one-on-one. Me. The elephant. Together. Get it?”

“Look! Elephant!”

Got it. Dave wanted the interactive experience of communing with a pachyderm. And since the lucky man has the world’s best boyfriend, that’s exactly what he got. Our next stop on the Chiang Mai Elephant Tour was the Elephant Parade House, a small venue tucked away in Chiang Mai Land just south of the Night Bazaar off Chang Klan Road. Part boutique, part workshop, part learning center, it’s the permanent home cum money maker for Elephant Parade, an artistic globe-spanning non-profit dedicated to raising awareness for the cause of elephant conservation and the main benefactor for The Asian Elephant Foundation.

Even if you are not familiar with Chiang Mai’s Elephant Parade House, you probably are with Elephant Parade, which has deployed some 1,000 life-size elephant statues created by over 100 Thai and international artists around the world, including on the streets of Amsterdam, London, Singapore, Milan, and Copenhagen, among others. It’s massive art for the masses that delights the citizens of every city where one of their open-air exhibitions have been held, and each concludes with an auction of the fanciful painted statues, some of which find a permanent home in the city where they were paraded.

Located in a modern, three-story shop house, Elephant Parade House features some full-size replicas of the elephant statues that have been part of one of the parades, along with smaller replicas that you can (of course) purchase. The second floor is a learning center that does a good job of explaining why elephant conservation is important, without getting preachy. But the real draw of the place is upstairs where for a mere 600 to 1,000 baht you can paint your very own elephant statue. Dave, who was still holding out for riding one, was not impressed. Until Noom began letting his inner artist flow free. And then, being the competitive bastard that he is, got busy painting his own.

What could be better than riding on an elephant? Painting one. Or pounding back a few while painting one.

Helpful staff circulates freely among the budding artists, ready to lend a helping hand so that your work of art doesn’t end up being something only your mother could love. That’s probably a great boon to the kids who give a new meaning to the art of finger painting. For adults acting like children, not so much. Dave, working on his ode to Wolverine (seriously, don’t ask) offered a deep-throated growl in response to the first helpful hint a staff member suggested to him. Which put a quick end to any further assistance being sent his way. Noom made up for that by constantly asking for more gold for his Ganesha-inspired work of art, which may have helped explain the staff’s willingness to keep supplying us with yet another round of Chang Beer (which Noom insisted on Dave ordering instead of his usual, Singha, so Noom could point out the elephant on the label).

Two hours and 3,000 baht later (because size always matters) we had a trio of artistic, half-foot tall laughably painted pachyderms. Noom, being the great guy that he is, promptly presented the one he’d painted to Dave as a gift. Which I’m sure had nothing to do with the coveted free space in his luggage, reserved for hauling stuff he really wanted back home to Bangkok. But that still left the elephant in the room – Dave’s desire to ride one – unresolved, with a mere two days of our time in Chiang Mai left. Huh. You’ll be surprised at how many non-riding elephant experiences there are in Chiang Mai. As was Dave.

Related Posts You Might Enjoy:
The Elephant Experience In Thailand	25 Uses For A Dead Elephant	Bangkok’s Erawan Museum and the Three-Headed Elephant

A Day of Pretense That’s Not About How Much He Lubs You

10 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by Bangkokbois in Tips

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Attractions, Chiang Mai

Forget your favorite gogo bar, Art In Paradise is the best place to fulfill your fantasies in Thailand.

“I lie you”
“You hansum man”
‘”I lub you”

The standard repertoire of bar boys in Thailand has been taken as the god’s honest truth by many a punter over the years. Believing what your ears tell you is the first step down the slippery slope of falling in love with a bar boy and part of the experience that causes many visitors to return to the kingdom again and again. The illusion of love is a siren’s song hard to resist, at least until someone’s water buffalo dies and your ATM account gets tired of hearing that you need more money. But if that’s your typical experience in the Land of Smiles, and your wallet is groaning, “Not another trip to Thailand!” you may want to head up to Chiang Mai. There’s a new museum dedicated to your expert-level ability of suspending disbelief. And at only 300 baht, it’s the cheapest day filled with pretense and illusion you’ll ever have in the kingdom.

Art in Paradise is billed as the world’s largest interactive 3D experience. So at least they are consistent with their attraction’s theme.

Thailand has perfected the art of illusion. In fact, their political landscape relies upon it. Being the sanuk loving folk that they are, the Thais allow visitors to get in on the fun too. You can pretend you’re getting a real bargain by haggling over prices at a night market, fake that you’re an adventure traveler while trying to stay awake riding on an elephant’s back, and convince yourself of your bravery by squaring off with a wild tiger face to face, even if one of those faces is so pumped full of sedatives the only real danger is that it might fall asleep on top of you. And now in Chiang Mai there’s a new attraction filled with illusions. The first of which is that it calls itself a museum. It’s not. It’s more of an amusement park. Where your brain gets to go on all the rides.

Art In Paradise is a three-storey, interactive theme park filled with giant waves to surf, dinosaurs to battle, dolphins to feed, and flowing fields of lava to pick your way across. Not to mention a two times as large as a human roll of toilet paper that you’ll be glad to see if you tried a bit too much of the street food at the Walking Street market the night before. You can visit Angkor Wat, Venice, and Egypt; become one with a masterpiece by Van Gogh, or have your photo taken interacting with a elephant without having to actually spend an hour riding one. But it’s all an illusion. Just like calling the exhibits there art. Or its location paradise. Or the admission fee it charges 300 baht. ‘Cuz locals get in for only 180. No problemo. It may be the best not 180 baht you spend in Chiang Mai.

Continuing that theme, while Art in Paradise is an attraction in Thailand, it’s not Thai. It’s the brain-child of Jang Kyu Suk, a South Korean artist. And it’s filled with the work of fourteen other South Korean artists. Some 130 of them. But your boy du jour will lub the place, and even if you are not a member of the Instagram generation, you’ll snap quite a few cool selfies yourself. Provided you bring a camera. Or as they are now known in the real word, cell phones. Because that’s the genius of the place. It’s not about using 3D Art to provide a realistic version of the unreal. It’s about you having your photo taken. Again and again and again. The attraction even provides directions showing you the best place to take photos or explaining how to interact to get the optimum 3-D effect in the photos you take.

Better yet, let the art inspire you and then watch all the other tourists copy your pose of peeing in the water a giraffe is drinking from, or rimming the subject of a Renaissance painting. In fact, the place probably could up its visitor count by renaming itself 130 Silly Things You Can Do With Your Penis. But then you probably already did 128 of those things while visiting Soi Twilight in Bangkok.

The reality of Art In Paradise is the $10 it costs to enter. And that it is a waste of money if you don’t have something with you to capture a few pix. Many of the exhibits require that you remove your shoes before entering, just like at most wats in town, so wear something on your feet easily removed. And you’ll have lots more fun interacting with a friend or two than by yourself, although from personal experience I’ll tell you that going with not one but two narcissists isn’t the best idea. Although watching them try to out-pose each other can be fun. At least for the first hour. On the other hand, that’s an hour or two you won’t spend listening to someone whine about having to visit yet another wat. And you pretending you didn’t hear them.

Located in a shopping mall pretending it’s not defunct right on Changklan Road in between the Shangri La and Empress hotels, Art In Paradise is easy to find. Or if you want to get into the spirit of things early, you can book a package tour that includes a stop at the attraction while pretending you are a traveler and not just another tourist. You can also visit the attraction’s website – http://www.chiangmai-artinparadise.com – for an incredible example of the illusion of someone who speaks English. Or afterwards, stop in their cafe for the illusion of a dining experience where money is no object. But the real fun is in actually visiting the place and having your photo taken doing all the things you didn’t do while visiting Chiang Mai.

Forget stopping off at Tiger Kingdom and facing the very real threat of being mauled by a tiger, your selfie at Art In Paradise of a 3D tiger attacking you is a safer option. And while there may have been too many tourists crowding the site to get a good shot of you ringing the bells at Doi Suthep, they’ve been recreated sans the crowds at Art In Paradise. There’s a thousand baht note on one of the walls your boy du jour will spend hours trying to remove just like he does with those in your wallet, and the depths of a beautiful swimming pool to cool off in await at Art In Paradise, unlike the water feature your hotel tried to pass off as a pool.

You can do the elephant experience in Thailand thingy at Art in Paradise, do some deep-sea diving, enjoy a visit with pandas – and actually see a few unlike a visit to the panda exhibit at the Chiang Mai Zoo, and have your photo taken with a Hill-Tribe child in full costume without having to shell over a handful of baht for that pleasure. About the only Thailand experience you won’t get to interact with at Art In Paradise is ladyboys. But then they are an illusion best experienced in reality anyway.

Art in Paradise Chiang Mai is open daily from 9:00 am until 10:00pm; it is suggested you plan on spending at least two hours to see all the exhibits. As mentioned, adult farang admission is 300 baht, your boy du jour’s will only run you 180. Unless you are a fan of Sunee Plaza and are pretending he is of legal age – children get in for 120 baht.

Related Posts You Might Enjoy:
Just Another Roadside Attraction: Thailand’s Top 10 Tourist Traps	Here’s a Novel Idea	Looks Like It’s That Time Of The Month Again