[Above photo: A contrast in styles. If only we could address human relationships with as much energy, detail, and persistence as we do our amazingly engineered products. ]
18 April 2021
Travelling in Thailand at this time allows one to just drop in without reservations. Nowhere is full and everyone is happy to have your business. I’m in Chiang Rai in the north, where I’ve wanted to come since hearing about the area when we were in Laos in 2004. I want to take the slow 2 day public ferry down the Mekong from Huay Xai to Luang Prabang but I don’t think I’ll risk Laos right now. Even if I can get in easily, I‘d probably have to quarantine in Thailand on re-entry. My plane to the US leaves from Bangkok.
It is lush green here, with many hills in the distance. I am going to a very simple hilltop resort (no wifi, no swimming pool) called Bamboo Nest tomorrow for at least 3 nights. There are hammocks on each bungalow porch overlooking the lush valley below, hikes into the National Park nearby, and bike tours if desired. Plus 2 meals a day, which suits me fine—I am losing my belly fat as I eat 2x/day now.
From there I’ll move on to a series of towns on the Mekong before flying south to one of the island destinations to read overlooking the sea, to snorkel, and perhaps to scuba.
Bangkok was much more manageable this time than when we were there 17 years ago. I was not hassled by girls (I look old now.) or touts. I mastered the BTS (Skytrain), the MRT (Subway), and the Orange flag river ferry so between them and my feet I got around nicely.
I very much enjoyed the Jim Thompson House and Museum. He was an American with the OSS during WWII who fell in love with Thailand and stayed. He revived and developed the Thai silk industry internationally. He also assembled a number of traditional teak Thai houses into a lovely compound on one of the canals in Bangkok and filled it with a large collection of ceramics, paintings, sculpture, and furniture. He only was able to enjoy it for 11 years or so. At 61 yo while visiting a friend in the Cameron Highlands of Malaysia he took an afternoon walk and disappeared. He was never seen again. Perhaps he was lunch for a tiger; worryingly, he’d been publicly critical of the CIA so that shadow remains. The restaurant at the compound is beautiful, built underneath one of the stilt houses, adjacent to a long carp pond. My prawn and pomelo salad was delicious. It is a calm island in the middle of busy Bangkok.
I took a bike tour which was fun, albeit hot as hades toward the end. My antihypertensives really kick in if I get a little fluid-depleted in the heat, leaving me faint. It happened on our first trip up Mt. Mulanje, in Malawi. I hydrated and my guide bought me a very chilled wet cloth which I used to refresh my face and then draped around my neck. We finished the ride across the river from the Grand Palace, biking along a maze of footpaths in the old Portuguese section. There is a wonderful small museum set in a traditional house there, which explores the Portuguese influence in Bangkok. Instead of their usual bullying colonial approach, in Thailand the Portuguese military leaders were impressed with the strength of the Thai army and decided it was in their best interest to work with the king, rather than to battle him.
I also did a bit of shopping at MBK, buying a long pair of Thai fisherman’s pants—I think they are now preferred by women but originally were used by men—which I find very comfortable. I also bought a knock-off watch. I don’t know why I wanted to get the latter; it feels like a joke of sorts. I bought a Longines for $27 in Hanoi in 2004 and when I had the battery changed 3 years later the Oakland watchmaker declared it was the genuine article, not a fake. It listed for $1100 in Duty-Free! It must have been stolen. This time I stepped up and bought an Audemars Piguet “Royal Oak” (I had no idea but liked the name and looked it up.). It retails for $34,950. I got it for $110 and the seller probably got a good deal although it was less than half of what he initially requested. The many fakes he has are made in Taiwan and have genuine automatic movements. Pretty funny. It looks good, although I rarely wear a watch. I’ll save it for those high-powered interviews when I have on a suit and tie and am really wanting to impress or close a deal! The seller has Rolex, Tag Heuer, Omega, and more. A $22 Casio quartz will undoubtedly tell time more accurately than any of them and if you drop it, who cares!
As happened quickly in Myanmar, I am Wat’ed out. I’ve seen many and have no need to see more. There are interesting symbolic and structural differences, I hear, although they appear very similar to me. For instance, the Chinese-influenced Wats have ceramic paneling outside. All have lots of gilt. In Myanmar and, probably here as well, you can salve your guilt for crimes committed by donating a lot of money to build or refurbish a pagoda, stupa, or wat. You also increase your likelihood of being reincarnated higher on the food chain, returning as a monkey not a mosquito, for example. And, of course, the head monks, as with leaders in the Catholic Church (and other Christian denominations), are grateful guardians of significant wealth.
My 55th reunion at Columbia P&S will be in two days. I sent in an 11 minute Zoom life-update, compressing 55 years into that time. Now I’m eager to be in touch with some of my former classmates; I’m sure many have interesting tales.
Kitchen Confidential did not hold my interest as I had hoped. Like many breathless tales it left me wanting some air. Bourdain let us into his bad behaviors but didn’t really let us much into the unhappiness underlying them. Like many of us, perhaps it was difficult for him to recognize it. Striking for me was how, after his death at 61yo, his mother said she had “No idea” he was suicidal. It perhaps explains a bit of why he was; he makes it clear how he alternated between feeling king of the mountain and helplessly self-destructive, abusing himself and others to the extreme. Armchair psychiatry has its limits but I sense that he suffered a pretty early failure of empathic bonding.
I’ve started A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. So far it is a gripping tale of the struggle of Untouchables (Dalit) in a small village in India. The economic roots of the caste system are swiftly exposed as the book develops. The Hindu/Muslim mobs attacking and killing each other during Partition echo the words, actions, and facial expressions of those in the January 6 Capitol assault as captured on Frontline’s “American Insurrection”. I find it chilling, mostly that many politicians stoke those flames with known lies, thinking the mob’s hatred and destructive energy advance their political interests. It’s not as easy to galvanize a mob with love and kindness, it is true.
I think the aloneness of solitary travel, the lack of novelty for me in this setting, and, having started the process, my increasing desire to return home are sapping some of my enthusiasm for this trip. I still think it was a good idea, allowing it to warm up in Maine and let covid settle a bit in CA before I return. But I am having to remind myself to live in the moment, to enjoy each day. It’s isn’t how I generally feel about travel so I’m hoping that immersion in the natural beauty of the countryside will perk me up. It also is depressing to see and hear of so much economic suffering because of covid. Tourism contributes between 10 and 20% to GDP here and there are virtually no tourists. I mistakenly booked online the current hotel I’m in; 330 rooms and only 12 taken. On New Year’s weekend, the major holiday week in Thailand.
And, of course, the ongoing news from Myanmar is dreadful. 82 killed in Bago 9 days ago, with the death total of protesters and opponents of the coup over 750 and the arrest total over 3000.
A Psychiatrist in Myanmar 