Appreciating Downtown

I'm WAY behind on my blogging, so I'm going to have to condense some stuff to catch up.  Way back in September, Jeff and I did a walking tour of Wireless Road through the embassy.  One of the embassy spouses is a historian, and he thought it would be interesting to research the area around the embassy and share what he found with anyone who was interested.  There was actually a good turnout, even though Jeff was the only other guy there.  It was a fascinating tour, and I took lots of notes, but I'll just hit some of the highlights here.

We started at NOB.  The guide told us about the building design and the history behind the name.  He also took us outside and explained how all buildings in the area are required to have a water feature to absorb excess rainwater and help prevent flooding.  The NOB's is lovely.

We learned that it's also a certified wildlife area, which I thought was pretty cool.

Next we walked down the street a bit to look at some of the interesting architecture

and to learn more about the different kinds of spirit houses.

The wooden one on the right is a spirit house for family spirits.  This is where you'd go for granting wishes and asking permission to do things like cut down a tree.  The more elaborate one on the left is for communication with the gods.  The single pillar is supposed to represent Mount Sumeru, the center of the universe in Buddhist cosmology.  The position of the shrines is determined by priests.  Our guide said to think of it as a cosmic satellite dish.  You get the best communication if it's pointing the right direction.  In Thailand, they practice a combination of Therevada Buddhism, Hinduism, and Animism.  For example, it is not unusual to also see a shrine like this one just down the street with a multiarmed Hindu deity.

As we walked along Wireless Road, we had to make the joke about all the wires.

These are actually telecommunication wires for things like television and internet.  The city rents the poles out to the telecommunication companies, and then those companies load the poles down with wires.  Sometimes, the load them down so much, that the whole pole falls over.  This is something that the city is trying to work on, and their long term goal is to get the wires underground.  The road is called wireless because this is where Bangkok's first radio (or wireless) station was set up.  At that point it was far outside of the main city which was along the river banks.  That was done for safety reasons, since people weren't sure exactly how radio waves would effect the general population.  Obviously, we're all doing fine, and the city has expanded far beyond Wireless Road.

In terms of the expansion, our guide also told us about how roads had been built over many of the klongs (canals), but now the city is considering reverting some of them to klongs and increasing public transportation via boat to try and cut down on some of the car congestion in the city.  The other option for avoiding the traffic is taking a Bangkok helicopter, the nickname for the motorcycle taxis that zip all around the city.  These motorcycle taxis are easily identifiable by the bright orange vests that the drivers wear.  The vests are similar to a taxi medallion and cost a lot of money.  Different groups of motorcycles have their own operational area, and the police know who works which area.  The typical shift for one of these motorcycle taxi drivers is 12 hours, during which time they can earn about 400 baht, a little over $10.

We walked around Lumphini Park, which we learned was named after the Nepalese birthplace of Buddha.  It's a huge park in the middle of downtown Bangkok.  Our guide likes to go there regularly, and he noticed that Thais who go there generally wear the color of the day.  In Thai culture, each day has a color.  For example, Tuesday, the day of our tour, is a pink day, so our guide was wearing a light pink button down shirt.  He said if you look around Lumphini Park and blur your eyes a little, you'll easily be able to tell what the color of the day is.

It started pouring rain at about that point.

Our guide pointed out little boxes where traffic police sit to change the lights, since Bangkok, in its infinite wisdom, has decided to periodically turn off the automated traffic light system, and instead let a person in a box decide when the light should be red or green.  This is supposed to address the traffic problems, but, not surprisingly, seems to have caused even more congestion than usual.

We made our way back down the street to EOB, where we learned that the U.S.'s diplomatic relationship with Thailand is the longest standing one we have.  This is partially due to the Thai ambassador to the U.S.'s refusal to present a declaration of war to the U.S. during World War II.  Our guide also pointed out the shrine on EOB's grounds that was built by U.S. mission volunteers.

We learned lots of other interesting facts, but I didn't take many more pictures, because I didn't want my phone to get wet.  It was definitely an interesting tour, and I would recommend it to residents and visitors alike.

I found myself downtown again that weekend to hang out with our friends and enjoy another yummy meal at Scarlett.

I was back downtown the following Monday to help chaperone Vivian's class field trip to the Snake Farm.  Since we've gone before, I didn't really want to go, but there was a need for chaperones, and Vivian guilted me into it.  I'm glad I went though, because I got to witness her single handedly holding a python.

I'm so proud of my brave girl.  I'm proud of the other kid too.  She's been doing a good job of playing quietly in her big girl bed for the quiet time that replaced nap time.  Although, I tricked her into a nap the other day.

Life is good :-)