Today we got our Vietnam visas -- at no small expense. While we were waiting for the ornery folks at the embassy to process our visa applications we strolled around Siam Square, an area of town near the embassies littered with modern malls, high rises, and western kitsch and glitz. Out of morbid curiousity we walked into a high-end mall where plasma tvs, cameras, cell-phones, Gucci purses, and calvin klein dresses were on display, whetting the appetites of the neophyte Thai consumers, a giant christmas tree decorated with gold bulbs and strung with twinkling lights lifted its fake bluish-green needles to the sunlight spilling through the glass ceiling panels of the circular atrium, and christmas music played softly over the strategically located speakers in the main corridors. I felt overwhelmed with Christmas spirit -- I was glowing red and green.
The streets are lined with food vendors of every sort. Most of them sell sizzling meats, many resembling the common hot-dog. I, as a general rule, do not eat street meat but today I was tempted. The glistening of the meat, and its tubular shapes, was very hard to resist.
We decided not to go to a Thai island tonight. Instead we are headed north, by red-eye bus, to Chiang Mai, then into Laos, then into Vietnam. We'll check in from Chiang Mai. Hope all is well.
No comments:
Post a Comment