We’ve been in Bangkok now for several weeks, taking a break in our travels and taking root as quasi-permanent “ex-pats” in our new abode. Accordingly, this is about Bangkok and our life here.

The building where we have rented an apartment is called “Natural Ville” and is operated by Accor, the same people who run Sofitel and a few other French hospitalities. It is endowed with a distinct Gallic character; elegant, modern, fluffy and enhanced in the lobby by “Café Le Nôtre”, a Paris/Champs Elysée based institution, which just happens to serve Michelin star quality victuals and irresistible pastries. But Asia too has its presence in the building; on the eighth floor of our “home”, Joyce found, and immediately bonded with, “Nibhana” - one of Bangkok’s most famous spas. The only part of the building’s amenities that have been neglected to date is the gym and the swimming pool…what a surprise!

The apartment proper is fully equipped and serviced like a luxury hotel. It’s not too shabby either. It gives us, from the corner of the 23rd floor, a spectacular view of Bangkok (see photo show), enabling us to get our bearings on what is really a pretty complex city as well as on the weather, which is always expressed by fascinating cloud formations.

The immediate neighborhood is peppered with embassies, other “serviced” apartment buildings and corporate offices, clearly not a child rearing environment, but one that spells business affluence and ex-pat habitat. The Skytrain is one block away, a good sized, well stocked mini-market is within half a block, a huge (over 1 million square foot) full service high quality department store is located one long but walkable block from our building, we’re literally surrounded by every first class hotel in the industry including Four Seasons, Plaza Athenea, Hyatt, Dusit Thani, JW Marriott, Conrad, etc. On our very own street, there is every kind of restaurant imaginable - thus far, we’ve tried two excellent Italian places that were first class, one Japanese place which was terrible and, of course, our own Café Le Nôtre which has served us, on various occasions, phenomenal duck confit, duck maigret, incredibly light quiche Lorraine, delicious bouillabaisses, real foie gras (not the Hudson Valley variety) and one evening a filet mignon accompanied by oh…miracle of all miracles, Pommes Dauphines! - a delicacy Peter had almost forgotten still existed.  There’s also a Piano Bar - decorated in pure Victorian and 50’s photos of American singers, the Thai version of Ray Charles at the piano playing great jazz and blues non-stop … and serving wonderful Thai food.
As we ventured further a field from our immediate neighborhood, the immensity of Bangkok started to sink in. There are lots of opinions as to the city’s physical size. Its population is placed at between 10 and 15 million…it might be more actually. In the early ‘90s, in anticipation of Hong Kong being turned back to China, Bangkok witnessed a gargantuan building boom which produced a lot of see-through buildings ten or so years ago as the anticipated exodus never materialized on the scale that was predicted. Over time, however, space seems to have been absorbed, and vacancies have now been substituted with traffic jams. The perception of a buyer’s market and bargains have had the corollary effect of enriching Bangkok to a point where it is now realizing its full potential and emerging as one of the great cosmopolitan gateway cities of the world, easily taking its place alongside of Paris, New York, London, etc. It is to South East Asia as Miami is to Latin America, or Shanghai is to China. Every international corporate enterprise, every retail trademark, every hotel company, etc. must have a presence here.

All this energy is reflected in spectacular amounts of retail concentrations and mixed use activity centers which compete with one another for architectural prominence, depth and variety of services to shoppers and creative marketing environments.

For example, we visited what we think must be the most amazing shopping center anywhere. Try to imagine a shopping complex 9 stories high, each floor about the length of Dadeland. The 2 basement levels house the largest indoor aquarium in Asia; the ground floor is filled with over 25 restaurants of all kinds and a huge full service supermarket; the mezzanine has all the big name designers - Gucci, Chanel, Ferragamo, etc.; the “1st floor” is filled with “regular priced” stores … that is, if you don’t count the dozen or so jewelry stores that – I’m not making this up - had diamonds, as Jimmy Buffett would say, “as big as the Ritz” in the window - to the point where Joyce was so sure they were fakes, she had to go in and pretend to be a real shopper and, guess what, THEY WERE ALL REAL - smallest solitaire was 5 ct. We were telling the restaurant manager here about it and he said that when they had the 60th anniversary of the King’s coronation a few months ago, all the Arabs who came for the celebration went to the Mall and spent 400 million baht in ONE DAY - about $12 million US! And it goes on - one floor has an exotic car and motorcycle showroom - Porsche, Ferrari, Jaguar, Lamborghini; the next floor containes what looked like two acres of gym and fitness related equipment and services; above that, acres of books and electronics. The top floor is all movies - we saw Superman on an IMAX screen - in 3D no less … and a 38 lane bowling alley. And above it all, the complex houses a convention hall and an opera house1

Yet this monster complex adjoins two other shopping venues that are not much smaller, though we simply did not have the energy to find out what they have - yet. All three of these agoras, which might well aggregate over 10 million square feet of retail space, are inter-linked above the street level with the Skytrain interchange that provides comfortable and easy access to much of central Bangkok. Thus, for us to reach all of this involved a short one block walk, climbing some stairs to a train platform, waiting three minutes for a train and, five minutes later, we were there. Even a stalwart Porsche owner like Joyce, who has spent a lifetime eschewing the degrading nature and inconvenience of public transportation, had to admit that WHEN IT WORKS, IT’S REALLY GOOD!

Indeed, we’ve found the Skytrain to be a real blessing. It costs next to nothing, (maybe $.50 a ride) the trains come every two to three minutes, it is simple to understand and the stops are manageably located in relation to activity centers. The cars are quiet, well air-conditioned and not too crowded; the ride is fast and smooth.

But the overwhelming reason for our new-found affection for the Skytrain is the fact that there is really no alternative! Taxis are cheap enough, on the average less than $2.00 per ride, but the traffic has them immobilized for all practical purposes. It took us an hour one night to reach a restaurant which turned out to be no more than half a mile away. Traffic lights last forever, sometimes five minutes, and gridlock is a permanent condition.

However, the quip used in New York “do we walk or do you have time for a cab” does not cut any ice here, as walking is even worse. The narrow sidewalks, if we can call them that, are full of treacherous obstacles, broken up pavement, electric power lines hanging so low they brush your scalp, transformer vaults protruding above the surface, stanchions attached shoulder high on poles … and the rest of what’s left of the sidewalk is then taken up with street vendors, satay chefs and the occasional beggars. It is impossible to make real progress walking the streets. The hapless pedestrian simply does not stand a chance. Tuk tuks, motorcycles and trucks all have priority - and they don’t stop, they rev up! The walks are further interrupted by driveways and 9” high curbs which turn a stroll into an athletic event! The contrast between the bedlam on the streets, often beneath the Skytrain structure, and the super slick edifices that line those streets is all the more remarkable as it is extreme. Bangkok seems to have an excellent public infrastructure, but the management of its pedestrian environment is abominable.

The architecture of the new structures is impressive. It goes beyond merely endowing each high rise with iconic and dramatic roof designs. The buildings in their entirety show a tremendous amount of design sophistication in the selection and use of materials, the basic configuration of their elements, the detailing of their fenestration and the treatments of the decorative elements. These all clearly spell class “A” construction with little spared in the quality of the end product, inside and out. The weakness invariably is how all these beautiful and expensive buildings meet the ground - hardly any set-backs or the kind of plazas or fountains that usually pay homage to the structure or its function. Again, the deplorable management of the streetscape cheapens the whole thing!

In the final analysis, the street is one thing; the overall public infrastructure is another. In that respect, Bangkok is quite advanced - clearly first world. We had dinner at a rooftop restaurant located at one of the city’s busiest intersection. Looking down, it suddenly became clear that like the metropolises of science fiction, the city managed its various means of getting around on five vertical levels. There is a fixed rail subway at the lowest level; above that is the cruddy street level, where everything intermingles; the next level (3) is devoted exclusively to grade-separated vehicular traffic spaghetti, with a network of bridges; level 4 is where the poor pedestrians are given a chance to cross the traffic maelstrom in relative safety, and finally, over and above all that, on level 5, the Skytrain slinks its way around with regal insouciance.

Beyond the brick and mortar, there is so much more to tell about Bangkok.

There is of course food.

As Peter is just now over a bout with the Thai version of King Tut’s revenge, he has had to keep very close to the bathroom for several days and has missed some culinary opportunities. We think he got it from a real touristy “river dinner cruise” he just had to go on – Joyce thought the food was disgusting, so she didn’t eat it; Peter liked it, since everything tasted like “chicken”…she was right! Good news - Peter lost 10 lbs., which Joyce has been trying unsuccessfully to get him to do for 10 years! Now, if he can just keep it off with the endless list of fabulous restaurants here!

In this connection we’ve become very spoiled. There isn’t enough time to make an encyclopedic list of Bangkok restaurants, just as one would not attempt to do that for New York City. Suffice it to say that we have had a number of memorable meals here to date – and plan to continue sampling.

Early on we had to have a genuine classic Thai meal. We did that at a famous place called “The Blue Elephant” (not a chain, but also found in other gateway cities, and boasting the Thai version of Cordon Bleu, the world famous cooking school). The food was aromatic, with intoxicating spices, served with a wide variety dishes that gave us a good grounding for the national fare. The service was exotic, Peter though the waitresses were adorable and he kept humming the theme from “The King and I”. Joyce was mortified! The most impressive part of the meal was the fact that the restaurant was located in a large, old, beautifully restored mansion which endowed the meal and the ambient music with a sense of formality and legitimacy. As far as Thai cuisine is concerned, there is no question - we had experienced the real thing. It also seemed clear however, that any restaurant serving Thai food, except for the environment, would not be materially different…it’s mostly about lemon grass!

During our initial stop in Bangkok, we tried unsuccessfully to get reservations at Sirrocco, the spectacular restaurant located on the 63rd floor of the so-called State Tower Building identified by its resplendent golden dome which can be seen for miles around the city. We had to settle for what we thought was splendid enough, namely, a high style meal in the Italian restaurant called Mezzaluna, located stratospherically in a very elegant circular dining area on the 65th floor. Now that we were settled in, we did the necessary advanced planning to secure a reservation at Sirrocco’s. We were not disappointed. While the meal was just “OK”, bordering on forgettable, the setting was not. It was really special! Dining is alfresco, you sit high on this wooden terrace, underneath the circle of spectacularly lit Greek pillars that support the brilliantly lit golden dome of the State Tower, with a twinkly panorama of the entire city laid out beneath your seat. All the landmarks are there, the famous hotel towers, the omnipresent Skytrain and, of course, the Chao Phraya River with all its illuminated bridges and the myriad of festive party and tour boats decked out in multi colored beads of light parading there in an endless dance on the reflective waters. At the base of the pillars there is a stage with live music where an Ella Fitzgerald clone performed most of the night, endowing the place with the aura of a jazz club in heaven! The food did not really matter; it was magic and it transported Joyce into a paroxysm of enthusiasm: “I want to do this again!!!”

Then we had two unforgettable, unabashedly French gourmet dinners. One had a French/Saigon Chef owner who had earned two Michelin stars in his prior career in Paris. Joyce, who is usually disdainful of such mundane stuff as anything tuna, ordered just that as atonement for her over indulgences…but she wound up lapping everything up with unrestrained greed and has been raving about it ever since. Peter only had the best duck maigret he’s ever eaten, with one of the finest reductions he’s ever tasted. If Bangkok Thai cooking is all about lemon grass, Bangkok French food is clearly about cêpes and white truffles!

The other French meal, however, turned out to be an authentic culinary treat and a most remarkable evening. The restaurant, D’Sens, located near the top of Bangkok’s famous Dusit Thani Hotel, is an outpost of the even more famous “Jardin des Sens” in Montpellier, France, which we had always wanted to visit during our trips to France, but always missed because it was not “on the path”. That night, the chef from the original restaurant was the guest chef and had prepared an incredible tasting menu. Of course, the chef had earned Michelin stars…but by now we’ve become quite blasé about that; of course, the food was outstanding…Joyce had an Oxtail ragout - something she couldn’t have conceived even in her wildest dreams! She not only inhaled it in seconds, but her mouth still waters every time she thinks about it; Peter was consoled with a delicious Turbot imported from the North Sea - oh yes, and an outrageous bottle of wine which, Joyce continues to remind him, cost more than the food!
Perhaps the best part was the opportunity to make a new friend - Jean Yves, the charming manager of D’Sens, who has now become a vicarious participant in our adventures through this site. No doubt we will be seeing him again very soon!!
Beyond these gastronomical adventures, we also had the opportunity to eat Foie Gras rolls and Kobe Beef sushi - a most unusual and delicious combination of Japanese culinary creations, at a highly innovative restaurant called Wasabi, whose host turned out to be French from Lyon. This engendered a heated discussion, over lots of excellent Saki…sipped cold per forceful injunction from the owner …about the questionable merits of Paul Bocuse.

On the lunch front, as a special reward for Peter’s angelic patience while Joyce spent hours and hours browsing, shopping, pricing, haggling, testing, trying on … shoes, jewelry, beads, sarongs, etc…etc…she took pity on him and steered his tired feet for lunch at Lord Jim’s at the Oriental. We normally eschew Buffets, but Lord Jim’s is something else! We have never experienced anything quite this opulent. Buffets do not normally have cold and hot foie gras, lobsters, craw fish, not to mention sushi, smoked salmon, an endless assortment of meats, fish and exotic dishes cooked to order. The display of desserts, of course, defies description. We made pigs of ourselves while sitting in a cushy little private space with our own couch as well as table and chairs. We sat there, eating and relaxing, while sipping the Oriental’s signature drink - the most delicious Mai Tai made in this universe.

There are many things we have not done yet, and there is so much that we probably will never do it all. So count on a follow-up to this quick account of our life here thus far. Let us leave you with our overwhelming affection for the city:
• Despite its size, complexity and depth, it filled with an incredibly polite kind and warm hearted population, as friendly to visitors as we have seen anywhere;
• Except for the streets, everything is done with good taste and cosmopolitan elegance. Sometimes the opulence of things here border on the gaudy…like the top of the State Tower for example, but the Oriental influence somehow makes it fit and it works;
• The general mood of the city is playful and almost festive; it almost seems designed for kids - or for adults who don’t want to grow up;
• It is not expensive by Western standards, but there are no unusual bargains. It is a shopper’s paradise but mostly as it relates to the extent and variety of the shops and merchandise. The prices are fair, but the really good deals require a lot of shopping and negotiations with merchants who tend to be quite knowledgeable.