A Week in My Life: Friday

Friday

My "weekend" continues today, although I will teach one class in the evening. Normally I keep my Thursdays and Fridays free (everyone needs some time off, after all!), but I've agreed to teach one student on Monday and Friday this week and next in preparation for her upcoming final exams.

I walked to my local 7-Eleven (there's one on every corner in Bangkok), but today instead of getting a can of my Nescafe Black Ice coffee which I usually like, I decided to start my day by ordering a drink from All Cafe.

All Cafe at my local 7-Eleven

All Cafe is 7-Eleven's coffee chain here in Thailand. A few months ago they did some construction work at the local shop to add the cafe in behind the counter. I don't order from All Cafe too often, but when I have a little extra time I like to get a real coffee drink rather than a canned one. This morning I felt like a mocha. It was good, but a little too sweet for me.

I think I'll cook for dinner today. I got a slow cooker about a year ago, and I love it so much. It makes my life so easy! I can throw all of the ingredients together in the morning, set it on low, and have a delicious hot meal ready for me at dinnertime. My favorite dishes to make in my slow cooker are chicken stew, Japanese curry, and various pot roasts.

I decided to take a walk (about one mile) to the nearby MRT (subway) station. They recently opened a branch of the Gourmet Market supermarket inside the station. It's small and a bit more expensive than other supermarkets, but I always like Gourmet for their excellent produce and good selection of imported foods.

MRT subway station - the supermarket is located underground inside the station 

Today I think I'll make a pot roast. 

In Thailand, the street food is so cheap (and so tasty) that it's actually more expensive to cook for yourself. Still, I enjoy cooking, and I try to cook several times each week.

I was really excited when a Gourmet Market supermarket opened inside my local subway station! 

I picked up some Boston butt, a sachet of roasted tomato and garlic pork rub, purple onions, potatoes, celery, and garlic. Unfortunately I forgot to get carrots! I cooked all of the ingredients on low along with a little bit of red wine vinegar and soy sauce which will form the base of a gravy after the roast is finished.

Gourmet Market - one of Thailand's great supermarket chains

I've got a mission today! A Japanese friend of ours wants a figure of the Hindu god Ganesha (the elephant-headed god of learning, wealth, and success), so after she got of of work, my girlfriend and I headed out to JJ Mall at Chatuchak Park to hunt down the sacred MacGuffin.

Before shopping for the Ganesha, we needed to have some lunch. We stopped at the food court inside JJ Mall, where I ordered one of my very favorite Thai dishes. It's called hoy tot, a dish made of eggs and oysters fried together and topped with bean sprouts and sweet chili sauce. So good!

lunch!

Then it was time to search for the statue. We had definitely come to the right place! JJ Mall is the indoor (air-conditioned!) extension of the adjacent Chatuchak Market. It's full of cheap stuff that tourists love, including silk scarves and Thai religious objects.

A shop selling religious figures, incense, beads, prayer cards, and more.

It wasn't hard to find shops selling what we were looking for. The only hard part was trying to decide what sort of Ganesha figure our friend wanted. Eventually we settled on one that looked simple and elegant, carved from a rich, dark wood. It was a beautiful statue, and not too expensive, either!

In the late afternoon I headed out once again to Amarin Plaza. I've been there nearly every day this week. Usually I teach online, but the in-person tutoring offers I've had this week have been too good to pass up!

Back downtown! Here's the view out the window as I was teaching today.

Dinner was excellent! I was very proud of my pot roast. 

A Week in My Life: Thursday

Thursday

I woke up early this morning and took a walk down the road to the local shop (7-Eleven) for some morning coffee.

On the way, I passed one of my favorite local street food vendors, the "Fried Pork Guy" (as I like to call him). He sets up a big wok on the corner early in the morning, and deep fries crispy bits of pork which he sells along with a small square packet of sticky rice for just 25 baht per.

the "fried pork guy" on the corner of my street early in the morning

Fried pork and sticky rice sounds good, but today I'll have something even better! I have a breakfast date with my girlfriend who's just getting off of her night shift at the hospital where she works.

For breakfast we met up at the skytrain station and walked to a nearby jok shop. Jok is a type of rice porridge that's popular for breakfast in Thailand. It's hot, filling, and super delicious! You can pretty much order whatever ingredients you want in it. Today, I ordered a big bowl of jok with steamed mushrooms, prawns, green onion, slivers of ginger, and an onsen egg (very soft boiled). I like to add a tiny splash of soy sauce and a little sprinkle of chili on top.

jok - rice porridge for breakfast

I've got sort of a slow and leisurely day today. Since my girlfriend works on weekends and many of my international students like to study with me online on Saturday and Sunday, I've begun taking my "weekend" on Thursday and Friday. I don't have any in-person tutoring today, nor do I have any online classes to teach. I'll take the day to read for my grad class (this week I have to read Candide, ou l'Optimisme by Voltaire. Ah, truly this is the best of all possible worlds... ).

One of my girlfriend's colleagues is under the weather today, so she's going to have to take over her shift. That means that she's going to have to work three night shifts at the hospital back-to-back in a row. It's going to be a hard week for her, so after breakfast she went back home to sleep while I worked on my reading and my continuing mission to watch every piece of the Star Trek canon. I've already finished Deep Space Nine and Enterprise, and I'm all caught up on Discovery and Picard. Now, I'm working my way through The Next Generation. After that, I'll continue to Voyager and The Original Series, followed by The Animated Series. Lastly, I'll watch all of the films that I haven't seen yet. Nerdy, I know, but it's been a fun journey so far.

A Week in My Life: Wednesday

Wednesday

Good morning once again from Bangkok, Thailand!

I had a very rare blessed chance to sleep in this morning. Many days, my classes start at 5 or 6 am, so I'm up as early as 4:30 some days. Nowadays, sleeping in means waking up around 7 or 8, and today it was so nice to wake up naturally.

I had a bowl of Thai noodles in a sweet Chinese five-spice broth with a stewed chicken drumstick and lots of bean sprouts and green veggies. It's a pretty tasty way to start the morning! There's a noodle shop just down the street, and you can get the noodles and soup to go, served in small plastic bags and wound up tightly with rubber bands.

I had my tutoring lesson again today, so in the afternoon I headed out to Amarin Plaza. I was feeling a little sleepy in the afternoon, so I got a coffee at the local chain, Cafe Amazon. This one was called "coffee marble", and was a layered coffee and milk drink with cubes of Thai black jelly which sat in the coffee kind of like a bubble tea.

coffee marble from Cafe Amazon

On the short walk from the mall to the train station, a small crowd gathering at the Indra Shrine caught my eye.

Learn more about the Indra Shrine and the other 7 Hindu shrines near Ratchaprasong Intersection: https://michaeldesrosiers.blogspot.com/2018/02/8-shrines.html

prayers at the Indra Shrine

A group of young women dressed in traditional Thai outfits like those used in the sacred dances performed at the nearby Erawan Shrine were kneeling before the statue of Indra, Hindu god of thunder, in a synchronized prayer. I've never seen this before, though sacred dance is quite popular at the Erawan Shrine.

Erawan Shrine: https://michaeldesrosiers.blogspot.com/2017/08/erawan.html

Indra Shrine

It's the little things that make life in Bangkok so interesting. Even when I thought that these "Week in my Life" posts might get a little boring, I am glad that I've been writing them. My daily life tends to fall into a fairly regular routine, and after seven years, I start to overlook the exotic aspects of my home. On a regular week, I might just have walked past this event. Since I'm sharing my week, I realize that this might be interesting to my readers back home.

It gave me the chance to stop and pause for a moment and take in the quiet moment of peaceful worship in the midst of Bangkok's busy shopping district.

It really was a beautiful moment.

I had a few online classes to teach in the evening. Today my student and I finished reading the fifth Harry Potter book! She's especially excited to start the next book, since her favorite character (Severus Snape) plays a really important role.

For dinner my girlfriend's mother made me some delicious homemade fried rice. It was nice to have a home-cooked meal this evening! 

A Week in My Life: Tuesday

Tuesday

***

I don't have any morning classes today, and already my "average week" is starting our a bit unusual. I've got to head to the US embassy this morning to take care of some paperwork. The US Embassy in Bangkok is located in the "Embassy District" along Wireless Road (named so as it historically ran past Siam's first radio transmission station). It sits on a beautiful piece of garden land not too far from Lumpini Park.

downtown Bangkok along Wireless Road

a spirit house on Wireless Road

Wireless road itself is one of the prettiest and ritziest roads in the city. It's a wide road lined with leafy green trees and home to plenty of gorgeous hotels and expensive condo towers in addition to several embassies belonging to some of Thailand's most prominent allies (including those of the UK, UK, Netherlands, and Vietnam).

at the gates of the US Embassy

My appointment was for 9:00, but I got there a little early. As usual, the line for visa applications stretches down the street. Also as usual, the line for Citizen Services in nonexistent, though I had to get an appointment more than a week in advance. I submit my appointment to the security officer on duty, hand over my phone, and am issued a visitors badge. It's a bit boring inside the Citizen Service office, if I'm being honest. Faded US National Parks posters line the walls, and there are a few magazines and copies of the New York Times and Bangkok Post to read, but the waiting area is small and fairly bland. There are never enough seats. There is a TV, but it's not working correctly. The picture is horribly distorted and grainy and there's no sound. It's fine, though, because the only thing on is WWE women's wrestling. It's the "Royal Rumble". I don't care for it.

another shrine at one of the fancy hotels near the embassy

It's funny, but somehow it feels odd to be surrounded by Americans and standing on (technically) American soil. The staff is quick, efficient, and polite. I've always been fond of the State Department, even if their entertainment choices are seriously lacking.

Central Embassy shopping mall

the bookstore inside Central Embssy

After finishing up with my embassy appointment, I head down the road to Central Embassy, one of the newer luxury malls that opened a few years ago on land purchased from the old British embassy. I have a coffee at Starbucks, browse around a bookstore in the mall, and after a while settle down for lunch.

Starbucks Reserve in the mall

it's just the same as back home

With the pollution and the virus going around, it's a good idea to wear a mask!

Today's lunch is a sizzling hot plate from Pepper Lunch. They heat up a cast-iron pan then serve the rice, veggies, and meat right in front of you. You cook it yourself on the iron plate. It's like having fajitas, but making them yourself at the table.

lunchtime!

After lunch I head back to Amarin Plaza to meet my student again. We have our two-hour lesson, and I really think she's improving, especially with the speaking portion of the IELTS exam!

Central Department Store in downtown Bangkok

After that, I hop in a taxi to head to another student's home. Well, two students, to be precise! They are twins! I used to teach them in middle school and high school, but even after leaving the school, they asked me to stay on as their private tutor, and I really love teaching them once a week. This week, we started reading and discussing Bram Stoker's Dracula.

By 7 pm, it's dark and I'm tired. I've had a long day out, and it's time to head home. I take a taxi to the subway station, then head three stations back to my neighborhood. The evening will be spent reading for my grad school course, and I might turn in early. It's been a long but productive day.

A Week in My Life: Monday

Monday

Over the past few years, I've been dedicating my blog to the exciting and interesting things that I've done. I write about my travels, delicious food I've had, and other unique aspects about life in Bangkok. I don't often write about all the little things in my day-to-day life, however. This week, I'd like to bring you along with me as I go about my "business as usual". From today until next Sunday, I'll be writing a post every day in which I share with you all of the little things that I do on a typical week. I hope it will be enlightening to see what expat life (for me, at least) in Bangkok is really like. Hopefully it will be interesting. Maybe it will be boring. Who knows?! Let's find out!

***

Good morning!

It's 7 o'clock, and I'm already wide awake and out and about. The morning started with a walk to the subway station where I dropped my girlfriend off on her way to work. The weather this morning feels great! It's only 26 C (78 F) today, though I expect it will warm up as the day goes on. On the way back home, I stopped in at the local convenience store to buy a can of morning coffee. When I'm feeling lazy, I like to buy a can of Nescafe Black Ice at the shop. It's only 15 baht for a can, and I like it more than any other canned coffee I've tried in Thailand. Most are way too sweet, but this particular one has only a tiny bit of sugar to sweeten it.

Nexcafe Black Ice - my favorite canned iced coffee in Thailand

I spent the rest of the morning back at home hanging out with my cat, writing for my various blogging projects, and studying for the first week of my new semester of graduate school. This semester I'm taking a sort of great texts course, so there will be a lot of reading to do over the coming weeks!

It's 1:00 in the afternoon now, and I'm heading out to work. This week, I've been contracted by my former colleague and sometimes boss, Cherry, to teach two students for private English tutoring. The first is a girl who wants to study the IELTS (international English proficiency examination), and the other is a primary student who wants to practice basic English conversation skills.

Amarin Plaza

I'll teach for a few hours at the food court at Amarin Plaza, one of downtown Bangkok's classic malls. It's an older mall, not as flashy or fancy as Icon Siam, but it's a convenient place to meet, and a comfortable place to teach.

the shopping mall where I'll teach today

I taught the first student from 2-4 pm and the second student from 4-5:30. 

inside the shopping mall... I'll teach my students at the food court

After teaching, I had to rush home. My next student lives in China, and I teach her online. We've been reading the Harry Potter books together, and we are just two chapters away from finishing the fifth book in the series! This class is just half an hour, but we have been meeting nearly every day while she's off of school for the Spring Festival.

By 7:00 pm I'm done with work. Now, it's time to relax!

I have some leftover chicken stew in the fridge, so I had that for dinner. Afterwards, I sat down to watch TV with my cat. It's been a busy day of studying and teaching, so it's nice to take some time off in the evening to relax.

***

These may not be the most interesting posts I'll ever write on this blog, but I promise to be honest about  how exciting (or not) my day-to-day life really is. A lot of people tend to think that expat life is thrilling, and sometimes it is! When I first arrived in Bangkok, everything felt exciting and exotic. Now, it just feels like a city where I live. Sure, it's still exciting to live here, but my life is pretty normal! I'll keep writing these posts for the next few days. Hope you enjoy!

Quiet Canals and Abandoned Temples

Thonburi is Bangkok's twin city. Sitting just across the Chaophraya River, it is, for all intents and purposes, part of Bangkok. Nowadays, the BTS Skytrain and the MRT system both reach into Thonburi. Historically, Thonburi was even capital of Siam for a while (one reign, to be exact) after the fall of Ayutthaya in the 18th century. The two cities, however, couldn't feel more different. Now, Thonburi is quiet. It has a reputation for being calm, laid-back, and incredibly peaceful. Crossing into Thonburi is like going back in time to before Bangkok became the big crowded city that it is today.

crossing the river from busy Bangkok to quiet Thonburi 

On Saturday, I joined in another walk with my walking tour group. This time the trip took us deep into Thonburi's quiet neighborhoods to discover some of the city's old temples. One orange-flag public boat ride and a short ferry crossing later, and Noi was leading our small group of ten adventurers through the back alleys and quiet canal-side sois of Thonburi. After a few minutes of walking, the narrow alleys opened up to a beautiful old temple, Wat Kharueha Bodi.

a golden Buddha from Lanna (northern Thailand) 

The royal-grade temple dates back to 1824 during the reign of King Rama III and the small Buddha image enshrined inside the temple hall is a holy relic from the Lanna Kingdom (Kingdom of Chiang Mai), and is made of solid gold.

beautiful patterns adorn the doors (left) and walls (right) at the temple

To honor the temple's connection to the northern kingdom (originally an independent kingdom until 1802 and a vassal state to Siam until 1939), the temple is guarded by an elegant statue of an ancient Lanna queen.

a statue of the historic queen of the Lanna Kingdom 

Inside a second prayer hall, a large golden Buddha sat beneath a multi-tiered umbrella. To the side of him was displayed a collection of khon masks from the traditional Thai masked opera.

Buddha shrine inside the temple hall 

Khon is the national performance art of Thailand. Khon masks, which represent gods and heroes from the Ramayana (the Hindu epic which is also the national epic of Thailand), are seen as sacred, almost as if they are imbued with the spirit of the performers and masters who have worn the masks previously. As such, they are treated with extreme reverence. The masks stored at this temple were displayed next to and slightly below the statue of Buddha himself.

khon masks on display inside the temple

As we wound our way deeper into Thonburi, Noi told us about Thailand's unique relationship with Buddhist temples. Thailand is a deeply religious country, with about 95% of the population adhering to Buddhism. As such, there are some 40,000 Buddhist temples throughout the kingdom! Approximately 33,000 are still in active use today.

beautiful street art of a naga 

What happens to a temple when it becomes abandoned? That was one of the big questions that this particular tour was designed to explore. Over the course of our walk, Noi took us past a few old Buddhist temples which are no longer in use, at least as they were originally intended to be.

an abandoned temple in Thonburi

An abandoned temple doesn't mean that it's truly a ruin, although a few that we visited were visibly crumbing. Being abandoned just means that the temple no longer houses monks. One small temple, which dated back to the Ayutthaya period in the 18th century, though no religious ceremonies or services were held there anymore.

We respectfully removed our shoes, leaving them in a row outside the exposed brick wall of the tiny neighborhood temple. We stepped inside the dark interior, and Noi fumbled in the gloom for a breaker box, flipping on a few dim lights to reveal a simple, but still cared for shrine inside.

inside the old temple 

Instead, it's cared for by the local community. Occasionally, monks will be invited to the temple for blessings or services, though it is not regularly used. Incense still burned from a brazier in front of the shrine, and portraits of the ninth and tenth kings were displayed against the yellow stone wall.

there are no monks, but it's still maintained by caretakers 

Some communities don't have an official temple, but still want to have a place to pray and worship. Further on, we came to a sala, a traditional Thai-style wooden pavilion which was constructed as a sort of shrine hall for the local community.

a community shrine hall 

As it's not a temple, the sala did not have any monks attached to it, although it was full of statues, icons, candles, and incense. Even though it has no monks of its own, it still hosts monks for local religious ceremonies. In fact, as we visited, an elderly caretaker was setting up a place for several monks to sit during chanting. I think a group of visiting monks would be stopping by later in the day.

inside the shrine hall

Presently, we made our way back out of the alleyways towards the river, and found ourselves underneath the magnificent cables of the Rama VIII Bridge, one of several similarly grand suspension bridges that span the Chaophraya River.

one of Bangkok's beautiful bridges 

The Rama VIII Bridge is a beautiful piece of engineering. It may be less grand than the soaring Bhumibol Bridge, but it's no less incredible to stand beneath. Looking up at the bridge really gives you the sense that Bangkok is a city on the edge of the future.

looking up at the Rama VIII Bridge 

In stark contrast, the narrow canal which we walked along on our way to visit the next stop on our tour threw us back into the past fifty or more years to a time before Bangkok was a city of shopping malls, cinemas, and international business.

a quiet canal deep in a Thonburi neighborhood 

This side of Thonburi is a peaceful and quiet place, a neighborhood full of memories where wooden stilt houses and tin-roof shacks are built up against the canal and where banana trees grow in abundance.

another abandoned temple in Thonburi

Another abandoned temple stood in all of its quiet lonely glory, looking almost as if it was starting to sink into the ground. Like the other temples that we visited, it no longer is home to monks, though it seemed to be kept up relatively well by the local community. A small library housing the Buddhist scriptures sat on stilts above a small turtle pond. Someone had left out some leafy green veggies for the turtles, and the temple grounds were clean and well-maintained. It's obvious that even the abandoned temples are still loved.

golden standing Buddha at the temple 

This temple was locked up, and we weren't able to get inside to look around. We took a quick break to visit the ubiquitous nearby 7-Eleven where we picked up a few bottles of water and cans of coffee, then sat down in the shade outside the temple to rest from the heat.

abandoned, but still beautiful

This temple had a beautiful golden standing Buddha statue built into the back wall. The statue was standing with one hand held out, a symbolic iconographic representation of the Buddha's teachings to stop fighting. The standing Buddha with one hand out is also the "Monday Buddha" - my lucky Buddha according to Thai belief!

trekking through the neighborhoods

This week was a nice laid-back walk through a quiet part of Thonburi. It's been a busy few weeks, so I needed something like this. It's amazing how just crossing the river can feel like being upcountry! I also got to see a few of my friends whom I've met in the past few months through this tour group.

a quiet neighborhood in Thonburi 

I plan to keep exploring Bangkok and the surrounding provinces throughout the year. Stay tuned for more walking adventures in the coming weeks!

at one of the beautiful Thonburi temples