Sometimes I feel like we don’t emphasize enough how astonishing an establishment the Chatrium is. Here you can see the care they put into Valentine’s Day.
(The upside-down lady is not a Valentine’s decoration, she is always there, constantly inspiring us to be, each in our own way, more athletic.)
Some people have been wondering about what the political situation is like in Bangkok. There were elections last week, but they didn’t seem to achieve anything; official results have not been released, and anyway everyone knows what there will be. There are still a lot of protesters in the city; they’re camped out in a handful of sites. Here, for example, is the National Stadium last week:
The people camping out in all of the tents are probably from the south of the country; people from the south are upset about the ongoing war in that region. This morning, the number of tents seemed to have thinned out a bit:
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(This is from a slightly different angle; both are from the Skytrain station. It’s nice that it’s the Sport Science Bureau that’s the site of the occupation.) But: the protests continue, and there’s no obvious stopping point. It’s a minor annoyance if you want to go to things near the sites, and the traffic in the city has been even worse than usual, but our lives really haven’t been impacted that much.
Inspired, perhaps, by the example of poor Starbung (see previously), the Chatrium has taken it upon itself to offer its own Subway sandwiches for the month of February.
Today is the day that the protesters have planned to shut down Bangkok. The view from our balcony this morning seems pretty normal; but there’s clearly less traffic going down Charoen Krung and there are fewer cars dropping off students at Shrewsbury.
It’s New Year’s Eve in Bangkok & the city is gearing up for end-of-the-year celebrations and more protests. People are making last-minute merit by leaving offerings at shrines everywhere. This was on the curb outside the Chatrium: I don’t think I’ve ever seen a whole chicken left for the spirits. The chicken did not last very long – the local dogs are infidels.
We’re off to Cambodia bright and early tomorrow morning – we’re visiting Angkor Wat. Happy New Year everyone!
Three dollars buys you a lot of balloons in Thailand:
Well, it is infested with one bat, or more precisely it was infested with one bat. Kim surprised a bat in Harriet’s room, which we trapped in the shower. A man from the Chatrium showed up and threw a towel over him as if he’d done the job many times before. And now our apartment is once again bat-free!
Probably you didn’t know that November is Hot Dog Month, according to the monthly room service addendum:
We are going to Cambodia for a week, so you might not see anything here for a while.
We may have neglected to mention here that we live in a place called the Chatrium which is, as the name suggests, an atrium for chatting with hotels and apartments attached. It is run with an iron hand by someone with the unwieldy name of Chatrium Condominium Juristic Person, as you may see from this correspondence that we were sent. Thankfully we do not have a bicycle so these troubles are not yet ours.
