Holed Up in the Hotel 16.7.08

It's Wednesday night. I'm holed up in my hotel room drinking 100 Pipers scotch that I bought at Seven Eleven and working on my website (www.vicariouscollection.com), and trying to avoid the call of the ever present siren of Bangkok nightlife. Even as I write this I am receiving a call from a friend calling me to one of the events raging on at this very mintue.
Tomorrow and Friday are big Thai national holidays. Buddhist lent they call it. And apparently, you can't buy alcohol anywhere for these two days. THIS, I am really interested to see.
No alcohol for sale in Bangkok? It's like Vegas here, or maybe I should say Vegas is trying desperately to be like Bangkok, because in Thailand you can drink ANYWHERE, ANY TIME OF THE DAY. You can buy beer or mixed drinks for about 50 Bhat (about $1.50) each at one of the many makeshift cafes that sprout up on the street in Khao San road or Sukhumvit Road. These cafes consist of nothing more than a pull cart stacked with bottles of liquor, a guy taking money and making drinks, and a few orange plastic chairs he/she spreads around for patrons.
Or perhaps you would like to just drop in to a store and get something to-go. No problem, hit up one of the ubiquitous 7-11's (hugely popular in Thailand, they are everywhere) get a beer for 31 Baht (a little less than a dollar) and step out the front door into the street after they pop it open for you. Or just buy a whole bottle of liquor from them and pop it open with your buds while your at it.
Need to get in a cab and go somewhere? No problem, take your beer or booze with you and drink as you go.
So, you get my point, it's going to be interesting to see these two days unfold, because if there is one thing that Thai people are more serious about than putting on a non-stop street party, its Buddhism (something like 95% of the population considers themselves Buddhists).

On another note, since blogging last, I visited Silpakorn University's Fine Arts department again which was damn awesome and really impressive. I saw two shows at two of the three galleries they have on campus. One of the shows was by an American artist from New Orleans who was an artist in residence at the University and had one of the greatest shows I have seen in recent memory up. I absolutely loved it. I'll share pictures soon. He was totally out of his mind.
I also went and visited a gallery called Ardel, in some place way outside of town that I can't remember the name of. But the gallery was fantastic and had some work up in the cafe (that I actually enjoyed a lot more than the main exhibition, go figure) by a student that I had just met actually, and I was so impressed I bought one of her pieces right then and there. The gallery was by far the most bright shiny new contemporary spaces I had seen yet, with Astroturf for grass. HA! Anyway, just some other quick highlights, ate some durian fruit, did some more shopping for dresses for the site at Pratunam, and just enjoyed being in Thailand! I'll link some photos to this link soon I promise, until then, carpe diem my friends! You know I will! Ha!

Re-emerging from the Blur

Ok, it has been way way way too long since I updated this thing; THIS THING being what was supposed to be my world-wide travel blog, specifically, the blog to document my most recently commenced 'round-the-world trip which began flippin' over a month ago already. Alright, actually you know what that is not so bad, I guess travel time is just so much more sped up than sit-in-one-town-working-a-steady-job time. Anyway, it's about time I said something and added something to this thing.

So what has been happening since I blogged last? Well, let's see, I went from New York, to Myrtle Beach, SC, to California, to Hawaii, to Australia, and to Thailand by way of Korea. And now here I stay, in Bangkok, what some have called "The City of Angels" and I do say these some people have labeled it right. This place is flippin' full of angels, nutty and wild as they may be, but angels none the less. Bangkok is amazing and awesome and breathtaking in so many ways and also amazingly grimy in so many ways. I just can't call it quits.

I showed up here almost three weeks ago already.

I thought I would be passing through, a quick re-introduction to the city and country who's company I briefly but intensely enjoyed 4 years ago. I thought I would be in Indonesia already by this time. I thought maybe a max of 4 days or so in Bangkok and then I'd be out.
But then I show up in old Khao San road and my buddy E-danger, an old an important friend from Hawaii, who I was scheduled to rendezvous with, tells me he's heading to Laos the next day at 8 in the morning. At this point it's one in the morning and I had been traveling across countries for something like 20 hours straight and had just booked myself in to a cushy hotel room (by Khao Sarn Road standards) where I was looking forward to having a good rest.

But adventure called, a new country's stamp in my passport was hard to pass up, so off I went.

I will riff more on Laos later, but I'll just say it was a treat to visit a communist country, something I had never really considered (although I should have) as being all that different than visiting any other country.

So anyway, a few days later and I was back in Thailand hanging with E-danger and Nic Metro, a character who was actually the whole reason for the trip to Laos in the first place, and also another friend from Hawaii, and perhaps most importantly, a stalwart of the international road.
We were hanging around the outskirts of Korat, the second largest city in Thailand actually, located in the North East. Nic has been doing a stint teaching English at a High School there, a stint he reckons is pretty much a path towards a permanent career teaching English in different capacities in Thailand.

It was a good time in the country and in a different big city of Thailand.

I got back to Bangkok and truth be told at this point the past two weeks is a bit of a blur. I don't know how it has been so long that I have been here, but really I've been doing a lot. I've hired a local guy to help me with developing my website, I've been to a number of galleries and openings to meet artists and gallery owners, I've been to two Universities to meet young art students and see what that is all about, I've been to famous temples to see what kind of art is going on there, and I've hit a number of markets and streets to see what sort of art is going on in those enclaves. And everywhere I've went I have been HYPED OUT OF MY MIND at how awesome, hip, deep, and plentiful the art in this massive town is. Bangkok is basically BANGING!

But anyway, there is much more to come, many words, many pictures, and things to buy from me from my travels soon to be posted on my web store! So stay posted, it's late as hell for me, I've been up late hanging with new artist friends, guys that run t-shirt lines and make music videos for Thai reggae bands, and now its time to call it quits before I get up early and hit Bangkok all over again, until then, Sawadee Krap!

-Daikon Deezy aka. Mikey Fresh