-Decided to get my haircut, after a slow, social morning, set out walking around my neighborhood looking for a place that could shave patterns like the thai kids have.
-Not three blocks away from my guest house, walking on the sidewalk when two thai police pull up their motorbike right next to me on the sidewalk and ask to search me. i ask "what for?" "drugs and weapons" is the response, I say yes, because i have no drugs or weapons, and i don't think i have the option of saying no.
-The cops search my pockets and bag, opening everything multiple times, smelling my cigarrettes, even going so far as to page through my journal. obviously, they don't find anything, finally they tell me they searched me because I "looked like an artist."
-parted ways with the cops and shortly thereafter found a men's hair salon, that had won the bangkok championship for free style hair. got a haircut for about $10, more expensive then anywhere else but they did a great job.
-Went to the record store, hung out for a while, listened to some Isan 7s as well as original Studio One cuts, and original Mulatu Astake from Ethiopia.
-Took the Skytrain to the victory monument, a massive roundabout surrounded by food stalls and other stalls selling everything you could imagine. Incredible amounts of people moving every-which way. Had a dinner of delicious duck soup, after wandering around trying to find water (the city was sold out due to threats of flooding). bought six bottles of water, saw a brutal car walk on the way back to the skytrain. chilled out and read on the roof of the guest house for the rest of the night.
10/22/2011
-Slept in and had a prolonged tea.
-Spent the morning researching the weekend market scene, in bangkok there are an assortment of markets which only spring up on the weekends.
-since most of the markets were really active at night, decided to go to chinatown because i had read that there was vinyl there. Chinatown is a massive sprawl of alleys crowded with vendors selling an array of wares, mainly food products and chinese imports.
-didn't know at the time that there is one street in Chinatown that used to be the center of the Thai record industry, the only place to find records in Chinatown is from the Chinese families selling the backstock. Now i have it marked on my map, so when i return to Bangkok...
-didn't buy much besides some snacks at the chinese market, but enjoyed walking around.
-accidentally got on the boat going the wrong direction and wound up at Khao San road, which is the bangkok backpacker district. I was immediately uncomfortable there, and left after walking around for an hour (i wanted to at least see the place), despite plans to eat lunch there.
-Took the boat and skytrain back to the hostel, visited the record store, hung out for a bit.
-Met a friend at the guest house and went to this strange hipster market in a parking on the outskirts of BKK. arrived after an interesting experience with a cabby who had picked us up despite not understanding at all where we intended to go, but took half off the final meter.
-Interesting collection of stuff. Lots of vintage clothing, old Vespa parts (old Vespas are huge in BKK), American movie posters, and action figures. Bought a watch from a guy who makes new bands out of leather for old watch faces.
-Read on the roof a bit before bed.
10/23/2011
-Woke up fairly early and headed to Chatuchak Market.
-Spent a while outside recording a Phin player and his son. Wandered around the market for a long time, Awesome array of vintage goods, pets, new clothing, military surplus, home goods, anything you could think of they'd probably have, asked a couple of people with antiques about records to no avail, with the exception of two small collections of american classic rock. Picked up an awesome pair of sunglasses from the 60s, some gifts for friends in Nong Khai, including an awesome vintage shirt from the states for the "charlie manson fan club." Two crazy psychedelic shirts from japan for myself.
-visited the record store on my way back, listened to some old Morlam records, Nat gave me two for free.
-had an early dinner of roast duck and rice, read on the roof before bed.
10/24/2011
-Had a leisurely tea, travelled with a friend who'd been stranded in the guest house for 7 months, to go visit the Bangkok forensics museum. Which happens to be in the same hospital where the King of Thailand is currently undergoing care. The forensics hospital is apparently one of the largest collections of medical oddities in jars outside of Vienna.
-unfortunately, the regular boat shuttles weren't running, due to flooding, so we had to hire a longtail boat, because the hospital is across the river. 100 baht and a noisy wet boat ride later we arrived at the hospital.
-spent a while wandering through the labyrinthine hospital complex, til we found the museum, only to be told it was closed due to the national holiday for Rama IV.
-disappointed we wandered the backstreets, til we stumbled on a temple along the water, and vendors selling assorted food for birds and the river catfish.
-bought some food, and fed the prehistoric looking catfish, while fighting to keep the pigeons from swarming our bag of food.
-attempted to get a boat back to the skytrain. The only available boat was a ferry that just went to the other side and back. so we hopped to the other side figuring it'd be easier to catch a boat from there.
-walked away after being quoted 600 baht for the return trip. walked through a massive park and through an ancient temple, stumbled on some junk vendors, lots of tapes but no vinyl.
-while we were on a broad avenue, the police made everyone on the street stand still for a caravan, of top of the line Mercedes with a police escort driving BMWs. traffic on the road was cleared and no pedestrians were allowed to move til well after the caravan had passed. I assume it was royal family members from the stickers on the sides of the Mercs.
-caught a bus back to the guest house, took about 45 minutes, but only cost 30 cents.
-was lucky enough to catch a friend of a friend who works for the Bangkok Post for dinner. Great to meet him, had interesting conversation about Taos NM and the expat life in BKK.
-roof reading pre bed.
10/24/2011
-woke up early and went to the train station to make sure trains were still running, purchased my ticket.
-chilled at the guest house for a while, my train didn't leave til 8PM, played some cards and did internet stuff.
-went to the record store, gifted my tiger t-shirt to Nat, helped move records upstairs in case of flooding, chilled out in the back room listened to some great records.
-headed to the train station around 7, forgot about rush hour, got to the train with about five minutes to spare, but luckly the train was an hour late in leaving.
-I was sharing a bunk with a very interesting Japanese business man who had worked all over the world and hated Bangkok, fun talking to him though.
-While i was outside the train with the japanese dude smoking cigarettes, the train started to pull away and me and the japanese man both had to jump onboard as it rolled out of the station.
-talked with the Japanese man, a Canadian girl and some Frenchies who were bunked nearby til it was time for bed.
-I took the top bunk because it was cheaper, which was a mistake, i was right by the ceiling light, so it was bright as day all night, also the top bunk is windowless.
