No words necessary

F- F- F- Saturday Photo

I love Chinatown.

Friday Photo

Yeah, yeah, it's a cheap shot to laugh at their English (when my written Thai is non existent and my spoken Thai is so shabby) but it made me smile.

Here I am (and some friends)

Awww, you are so lovely. I’ve had kind messages asking why I’m not blogging. Am I still unpacking? (Pah, no, there are still boxes everywhere.) Thank you to those that have told me (or Husband) they missed my posts. *Waves* to those in the office.

I think I underestimated the stress of moving… and I’ve been feeling down in the dumps but yesterday I woke to find my low mood has lifted and I’m feeling back to normal (whatever normal is…)

Sometimes life in Thailand is hard. You might want to locate something but you don’t know where to find it and your Thai will only stretch to ‘where’s the loo? ‘Please could I have chicken fried rice’ and ‘I want to go to soi 42.’ So, lovely readers in Thailand… more specifically, lovely readers who are Thai natives, I wonder if you can help me. I need someone to do some research for me. Mostly I eventually find things but this one’s a bit obscure.

I need to buy a child-sized mannequin.  There are several types of mannequin. A is a display mannequin – you see her in shop windows wearing and hopefully selling clothes. B is what I call a dressmaker’s dummy (I don’t mean to be rude; I’m sure s/he’s no dummy) and s/he’s usually soft so you can stick pins in her/him.

And really what I want is C (because they are pose-able) but I might have to compromise because of cost and availability. I’ve had a look in the Pratunam Centre at a place I know has shop fittings including mannequins but they didn’t have what I wanted. I suspect the general answer will be ‘Chinatown’ but that’s a big place… 

Can anyone narrow it down a bit? Feel free to email me – find the address on the profile page – if you don’t want to comment.

Thank you in advance.

Take a deep breath: following on from Saturday

I’ve heard it said that Sampeng Lane is half a mile and I’ve also heard one and a quarter mile. It doesn’t really matter how long it is because it feels like five miles and you’ll be good for nothing by the end of it.

I do absolutely love Sampeng Lane – it’s a must-go to for anyone who enjoys shopping but it’s nicest when you’re there for a browse rather than something you must find. I could have scoured other parts of Bangkok for the items for our Melbourne Cup costume and not find them. I’d waste two days looking so I figured I might as well go straight to Sampeng Lane. If Chinatown doesn’t have it, it’s probably not available.

It’s a bit of a nightmare to get to. There are various routes; the one I take (not the river) is to go by underground to Hua Lampong and take a taxi to the far end of Sampeng – the Pahurat Indian Cloth market end. Hua Lampong is a train station from which naïve backpackers and tourists emerge regularly and the taxi rank here seems to attract the less honest taxi drivers. This is not the same for most of Bangkok.

Sampeng is a long lane of shops facing each other that in some ways puts me in mind of medieval England, where people on a top floor could lean out and shake the hands of people in the opposite building. The pathway is maybe a meter or so wide because goods spill out on the walk way to entice us in. Mobile food hawkers sell their wares; motorbikes, mopeds and hand carts laden with goods weave in and out of the people.

Sadly for me, there isn’t a Starbucks half way along.

Uh Oh: what have I let myself in for?

To say ‘Melbourne Cup is a horse race’ is probably a bit like saying ‘Shakespeare was a writer.’ I don’t mean to enrage any Australian readers (*waves*) I just happen to think horses are for riding and not watching… However, that doesn’t stop me from booking a place at the Anzwg (Australian and New Zealand Women’s Group) organised Melbourne Cup each November.

I used to go to point-to-points when I lived in Kent. It’s a form of amateur horse racing over fences for hunters but I’m only a teensy bit ashamed to say that for me it was a social event: beer tents and flirting with boys (it was a long time ago.) I rarely saw a horse.

I’m sorry; I know I’m a disgrace. As I say I like horses enormously, I just prefer riding them to watching them run.

Melbourne Cup is a bit like Ascot – that’s how seriously it’s taken – except I don’t think bizarre costumes are ever worn at Ascot (unless you count some of those outfits!) For Melbourne Cup, everyone dresses up either in formal race attire or in fantastic costumes. I think this year is my fourth time. I’ve always gone with the BWG and most years a costume theme is organised but I don’t take part in costumes. I make them; I don’t wear them. (Shhh: This is because I don’t like anyone looking at me!)

However, last week I found myself sitting next to costume queen, CD, and we cooked up an idea for a team costume. And now it’s happening and because I’m helping to organize it…I’m going to have to wear it. I hadn't even had a drink when I agreed to it!

Take a deep breath: yesterday I went to Sampeng Lane in Chinatown to source materials…

Trip to Chinatown

After I got the children up this morning I wrote an article. I’d been preparing it in my head for some days. I was doing the research and my subconscious, bless it, sorted most of it out in my head while I got on with other things.

Then, I went to Sampeng Lane, Chinatown. I LOVE Sampeng Lane even though it’s migraine inducing. On the way, walking through Chinatown, are the weirdest shops: shops full of engines, shops full of metal rods; shops full of basketware; shops full of string and rope.

Sampeng Lane is a narrow ‘walking street’. No-one appears to have told the locals who insist on riding motorbikes down it and pulling carts full of bales of material and the like.

There are certain rulesI have invented to cope with Chinatown:

1. Really, really want what you’re going for.
2. If possible, go on your own. If you must go with other people, try NOT to care what you buy.
3. Start at one end. DO NOT start in the middle – which way will you go?
4. Start at the end you can walk to from Hua Lampong otherwise a taxi driver will think you’ve just got off the train from the beach and are stupid. Then he will drive you on a tour of Bangkok before taking you to Chinatown.
5. When I see a shop I want to go into I have to remember if I turn left or right going into it, otherwise I won’t remember which way to turn coming out of the shop. Sampeng Lane is designed so that shoppers are perpetually confused so they stay there all day because they can’t find a way out.

6. Buy a drink every time you see a vendor: juice, water and coke. 7. Buy dim sum in Sampeng – it tastes better there than anywhere else in the world.

I had to buy stuff for a grotto and lots of decorations for Husband’s work Christmas party which we are hosting on Friday.