Travels in Bangkok
I had a nice long weekend in Bangkok for the first time since 2010, to celebrate surviving another year, and to contribute to the Thai economy. I stayed with a good friend (and discovered the joys of their thin, fast-drying Japanese towels from Imabari), lunched with another, had two Thai massages, shopped a lot (the Jim Thompson Factory Outlet blesses my name), ate some rather nice meals, and best of all went to see the exhibition of King Chulalongkorn's batik collection at the Queen Sirikit Museum of Textiles. The weather was unusually cool and lovely for the season, and strawberries from Chiangmai are THE BEST. Equal in every way to the Japanese and Korean ones and significantly cheaper.
My friend lives in the middle of the Japanese quarter of Bangkok, conveniently near the Skytrain, so my first day was more a less a side-trip to Tokyo, down to the really good strawberry daifuku with local strawberries, and the trip to the local branch of Kinokuniya. Even the Thai massage place that I went to was run by Japanese (hygiene and good order guaranteed). We also went to a very nice little zakka shop called Parden, which I highly recommend for small, cute things (something that both Thai and Japanese are very good at), and its superb seasonal parfaits. That was where I learned about Chiangmai strawberries, which are now in season. I meant to go back for the chestnut parfait the next day, but the five floors of the Jim Thompson Factory Outlet distracted me. I had originally gone just to get some furnishing fabric to re-upholster the chair that came to Scaredy-Cat's attention, but well...there were cushion covers. And T-shirts. And dress fabric at really good discounts. Etc etc and so forth. I would also recommend Pik-Lik for nice cotton and silk nightwear and Green Cotton (both are conveniently in Amarin Plaza off the Chit Lom BTS station skywalk) for unbleached cotton casual clothes. SACICT, the Support Arts and Craft Centre of Thailand founded by Queen Sirikit, has a nice outlet in Central Embassy (a shopping-centre also connected to Chit Lom station skywalk), that sells beautiful jewellery, textiles, furniture and household goods.
The Queen Sirikit Museum of Textiles is inside the Grand Palace compound, but luckily is the first building that you come in when you go in (there is now a queue with security, so there is no longer a scrum at the entrance) and you can buy a ticket for just the museum if you don't want to go round the whole compound. There are rotating exhibitions. This time it was the batik, and an exhibition of some of the clothes that Queen Sirikit wore on her travels around Thailand with the King. Those were nice, especially after she started working with Pierre Balmain to design clothes that could make use of Thai silk. The batik collection is amazing. King Chulalongkorn made several visits to Java at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, and collected and documented his purchases in a very systematic way, so the collection has a vast range from common or garden ordinary-people batiks, to a full royal outfit given to him by the Sultan of Jogjakarta. It also includes some very high quality batiks from an important workshop that was hitherto completely unknown, so it has already made a significant contribution to Indonesian textile history. There is a very good catalogue in the very good museum shop (at which I shopped some more, naturally). What would be really nice would be if some of the patterns could be revived in Indonesia for the current generation. The next time that I am in Java I will take the catalogue to a batik workshop I know in Imogiri and see if they're interested.
Thai massage has evolved a bit. Better-class establishments are now more systematic about getting you to tell them which bits of the body to pay more attention to or, conversely, ignore, so you can now get them to avoid the more potentially lethal movements. Please remember that all practitioners must be licensed; it's not just a back-rub, and can be very dangerous if performed by an untrained person. There are more male practitioners than there used to be, but most of them are still nice ladies able to tear phone books (remember those?) in half with their bare hands. Thai massage is for tuning up rather than relaxation, so if you fall asleep you are either not getting an actual traditional Thai massage or you are Bear Ghrylls. They will offer a choice of Firm, Normal or Soft. If it's new to you, let them know, and choose Soft, and don't hesitate to yell if it really hurts.
My friend lives in the middle of the Japanese quarter of Bangkok, conveniently near the Skytrain, so my first day was more a less a side-trip to Tokyo, down to the really good strawberry daifuku with local strawberries, and the trip to the local branch of Kinokuniya. Even the Thai massage place that I went to was run by Japanese (hygiene and good order guaranteed). We also went to a very nice little zakka shop called Parden, which I highly recommend for small, cute things (something that both Thai and Japanese are very good at), and its superb seasonal parfaits. That was where I learned about Chiangmai strawberries, which are now in season. I meant to go back for the chestnut parfait the next day, but the five floors of the Jim Thompson Factory Outlet distracted me. I had originally gone just to get some furnishing fabric to re-upholster the chair that came to Scaredy-Cat's attention, but well...there were cushion covers. And T-shirts. And dress fabric at really good discounts. Etc etc and so forth. I would also recommend Pik-Lik for nice cotton and silk nightwear and Green Cotton (both are conveniently in Amarin Plaza off the Chit Lom BTS station skywalk) for unbleached cotton casual clothes. SACICT, the Support Arts and Craft Centre of Thailand founded by Queen Sirikit, has a nice outlet in Central Embassy (a shopping-centre also connected to Chit Lom station skywalk), that sells beautiful jewellery, textiles, furniture and household goods.
The Queen Sirikit Museum of Textiles is inside the Grand Palace compound, but luckily is the first building that you come in when you go in (there is now a queue with security, so there is no longer a scrum at the entrance) and you can buy a ticket for just the museum if you don't want to go round the whole compound. There are rotating exhibitions. This time it was the batik, and an exhibition of some of the clothes that Queen Sirikit wore on her travels around Thailand with the King. Those were nice, especially after she started working with Pierre Balmain to design clothes that could make use of Thai silk. The batik collection is amazing. King Chulalongkorn made several visits to Java at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, and collected and documented his purchases in a very systematic way, so the collection has a vast range from common or garden ordinary-people batiks, to a full royal outfit given to him by the Sultan of Jogjakarta. It also includes some very high quality batiks from an important workshop that was hitherto completely unknown, so it has already made a significant contribution to Indonesian textile history. There is a very good catalogue in the very good museum shop (at which I shopped some more, naturally). What would be really nice would be if some of the patterns could be revived in Indonesia for the current generation. The next time that I am in Java I will take the catalogue to a batik workshop I know in Imogiri and see if they're interested.
Thai massage has evolved a bit. Better-class establishments are now more systematic about getting you to tell them which bits of the body to pay more attention to or, conversely, ignore, so you can now get them to avoid the more potentially lethal movements. Please remember that all practitioners must be licensed; it's not just a back-rub, and can be very dangerous if performed by an untrained person. There are more male practitioners than there used to be, but most of them are still nice ladies able to tear phone books (remember those?) in half with their bare hands. Thai massage is for tuning up rather than relaxation, so if you fall asleep you are either not getting an actual traditional Thai massage or you are Bear Ghrylls. They will offer a choice of Firm, Normal or Soft. If it's new to you, let them know, and choose Soft, and don't hesitate to yell if it really hurts.