Haze

Okay, I'll admit, Bangkok is smoggy and hazy. BUT, the smog ratings are often equivalent to Cambridge, ON. Not kidding.

Hood from Adam's Balcony

Shot of the mosque: I wake up to the muezzin doing the call to prayer. Love it.

New Years Eve 2008

For New Year's, Laura and I were supposed to be in Ko Lanta, but we decided to fly back to Bangkok early for work etc. So we ended up on Kao San Road, an international mash atrocity, filled primarily with Europeans. But on new years some boys from the country had obviously come to the city to party, dancing mor lam style to Euro-trance in the street. Hilarious! Frightening!

so these boys wanted to take pictures with us....their shirts are of old school punk bands, but they don't know their music. Bangkok has a huge indy t-shirt printing scene, many original, many rip-offs of old North American shirt designs. You'll see little old ladies wearing Exploited shirts..pretty funny. These boys are about as non-mainstream as you get in Bangkok. Not much of a alternative scene here, I think cuz people are more concerned with getting out of poverty than looking cool. The kids that are into Western music are largely spoiled brats that have access to that type of thing (through internet mostly). The dude's acid wash jean jacket made my night.

Krabi / Ko Lanta

Went to Krabi and Ko Lanta for the Christmas holidays. So fun. So spoiled.

the Restourant

The Restourant: a karaoke/gambling joint/ restaurant down my street. View from patio outside.



A tuk tuk.....a mini-truck....my main form of transport

Laos x 2

See the mounds of sticky rice? I think sticky rice (cow niao in Thai) is one of the best things in the world. Here we are eating by the great Mekong river. Sticky rice was see as a nationalizing force, an unifying aspect of culture, and was banned in Cambodia.

Buddha park....the brain child of a recluse Laotian....
Laos is still a communist state, but is more appropriately known as post-communist. They are "liberalising" their economy, following the lead of Vietnam, ie. opening it up to the international market. Any dissenting voices against the government, however, are still strictly repressed.

Kings Birthday # 2

Gathering and procession by the King's Palace.

After the ceremony, a huge Luk Thung / Mor Lam performance.

This is what we call getting "dirt pitted"...cuz it's just a giant open field and all the boys want to be your boyfriend...but they are so passive that they won't do more than grab your hand or tell you they love you.
After the show we watched a dude get a traditional Thai Buddhist tattoo. Painful.

Hood Morning

Here's my street. We live at the end of a road, beside a transport canal. Our apartment is on the left.
Here's the ice factory. Ice boys are hot, because they lug giant bags of ice around the city.

This is the migrant workers housing. It is a big complex housing about 500 people in a tiny little space. The majority are from Burma, working both legally and illegally in the country, usually in construction, an extremely dangerous and unregulated industry; even the legal ones have hardly any rights, but it is better than living in the conflict zones in Burma, where the military attacks ethnic minority areas, raping and pillaging, forcing the people to be slave labourers.
Usually, I buy bananas for breakfast. The ladies at this stall are particularly unpleasant.

Laura buys bbq chicken, from one of about five different sellers. We call this dude Happy, cuz he's always smiling ('cept here).
This wall encloses what we call the vortex....There's something weird going on it there...I almost got hit by a sliding motorcycle on that corner...

Corner of street to work, other side of vortex. Except now we moved offices and are in a real business district... :( I guess DeeJay Domination is the best DJ in Asia.....