Since it was the middle of the week, and there was a lot going on out in the burbs, we opted not to stay downtown for the night. Instead, I met Jeff after work and we took the BTS down to Saladaeng to go exploring. We hadn't walked around that part of Bangkok before, and we had enough time to wander a bit. There were a lot of restaurants and massage parlors. My favorite was the statue outside a Mexican restaurant, part Thai and part Mexican.
The restaurant was one block up, so we had a bit of an adventure finding an alley that went all the way through. There was no sidewalk, and there were motorcycles zooming around, but we figured if we followed the motorcycles, we would be on the right track. Sure enough, we soon popped out on the right street.
Unfortunately, the sidewalk was mostly under construction. There were parts that looked like they'd been recently completed, but I can't say whether or not it was an improvement on what was there before. It was obvious that they hadn't been careful about drying the cement.
By that point we were quite hot, so we found a place that was offering happy hour drinks, a little cafe outside the De Arni hotel. I like to try coconutty drinks, and the menu had one that looked promising.
Of course the actual drink looked nothing like it, and was 75% ice cubes, but it was tasty and cold.
After drinks, we were ready for some BBQ. The Smokin' Pug is quite small. There's a bar and a some tables for two. There's a room upstairs that can seat more people, but there was a party there that night. Everyone had warned us to make reservations, and I was glad we had, because it got full fast.
Jeff and I decided to go full on BBQ, so he got the brisket platter and I got ribs. The plates were jaw droppingly full of goodness. We tried to capture them in the dim lighting.
It was delicious, but we definitely needed a walk after dinner. The Patpong night market is right over in that area. We knew it could get a little sketchy later in the evening, but we figured it was still fairly early, so we would probably be fine. We did get offered some sex shows, but nothing too aggressive. We also found t-shirts we had been looking for. It was interesting bargaining for them, because I'm sure the woman thought we were tourists. She started with 1,500 baht, which is about $50, but quickly bumped it to 750 when she saw the expression on my face. She had a calculator she was typing the prices into, so I typed 300, which is a fair price for two t-shirts. She typed 600. I typed 300 again, and she offered 400. I figured, fine, and we went with that. I'm not good at bargaining, but I draw the line at being completely ripped off. As we were walking back to the BTS we saw several tables being set up with bongs and dildos for sale, so we decided we were leaving at the right time.
Even though we left a little later, there was still a ton of traffic getting home. Luckily, we are both geeks, so we put on some podcasts of NPRs Science Friday, and had a great time listening to the show and talking for the drive home. It was nice to sleep in our own bed after our adventuring, so we might put a hold on staycations for a little while.
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