Catching Up on Bangkok

Sorry about the light posting. My schedule Bangkok was a little hectic. The first night, I met up with my roommate Dan and we went to the Saxophone Pub (near the Victory monument). Much is written about the Bangkok nightlife, but the music scene is often neglected. That's too bad, because Bangkok is probably the live music capital of Asia. I've seen a dozen or so bands in Bangkok, and they have all been good. Our night at the Saxophone was no exception. If you go to tourist bars, the music will generally be cover songs. Unless you see a hip hop band, which will be original. But if you go to the bars the locals hang out at, you will see original music that is very good. But the lyrics will be in Thai. The Saxophone is a tourist bar, and they mostly have blues and jazz. We saw one blues band and one funk band, and they were both excellent. The funk band had a foreign singer (Australian), who I think I had seen before. It was a good night.

The next day, I manged to wake up early enough to catch the second half of the Patriots game at an American bar (The Tavern- Sukhumvit Soi 4). I then stayed a while to see who would show up. You tend to meet some pretty interesting ex-pats at places like that. I met three guys who were there for medical treatment- one American, one Brit, and one Canadian. The Canadian got a three level lumbar fusion and two levels of cervical artificial disks. He saved about $200,000 off the quotes he had from America. Not bad. In fact, even if he were an American with health insurance, he still would have paid more in co-pays in America. That's scary.

Dan wasn't feeling well when I got back, so I went to bed early. That was good for me because I could then wake up early enough to catch the Giants game at the same bar. They had stayed open all night to show the playoff games (it took some bribes for them to do so). The Giants game started at 4:30AM, and I just barely made it. But it was a good game. I was impressed with the Giants, but not enough to believe they will beat the Packers in the next game. After the game, I stayed for a few more drinks, and then packed and left for the airport.

So, now I am in Menlo Park, CA at my sister's house. I leave for home tomorrow.