Perhaps you’d like to know what happened after I was robbed at Bangkok Airport security last month. Well, the saga continued with more “investigations” and a mysterious wire transfer. Transparency is not the first word that comes to mind. Continue Reading »

If I were ever tortured, my captors would break me by playing the morning music from the elementary school next door.

– Dan, after the fifth straight day of waking up at 7:15 AM to enjoy a 45-minute syrupy Thai musical loop resembling “It’s a Small World After All” followed by a live, 15-minute booming drum and bass cadence used to drive a herd of students to their seats. Continue Reading »

I was robbed.

It didn’t happen at a grungy guest house, in a crowded local market, or down a dark alleyway at night. It happened in Bangkok’s shiny new Suvarnabhumi Airport at a gate security checkpoint. Worse yet, the thief was a security employee. Continue Reading »

Early on New Year’s Eve, before the festivities began, we dropped by a local cafŽe in order to perform our annual year-end ritual of reflection and looking forward. Although the specific exercises have evolved, the objective of our ritual remains the same - reflect on the past year and determine themes for the year ahead. Continue Reading »

This is great! I’m getting kisses from random gender benders.

– Audrey, on our 2008 New Year’s Eve night out in Bangkok.

Last night, we found ourselves welcoming in the New Year in true Bangkok style - with a band, a late night street food nosh, and a swamp of kisses from a horde of Bangkok’s third genders. Continue Reading »

By way of a Buddhist festival that we stumbled upon here in Bangkok, we found some fitting wishes and words of wisdom for the new year. In the festival pamphlet, designed very much for locals with a nod to us non-Thai speakers, we discovered a list of wishes and matching offerings for each of the nine participating wats (temples). From this list, we inferred something rather noteworthy. Continue Reading »

That’s Christmas in Bangkok to you and me. Krung Thep (City of Angels) is the Thai name for Bangkok, Thailand - the location from which we happen to be writing this post.

We first imagined this post being entitled Wishing You a Very Chinese Christmas, but a quick decision five days ago altered our trajectory and landed us in sunny Bangkok instead. Continue Reading »

As we write this, we are in Tbilisi, Georgia and about to head to Armenia. But just after spending almost five months in Southeast Asia and releasing our site, we find that we’re being asked “what was your favorite ______ in Southeast Asia?”

Here is our attempt to answer those questions, preempt a few others, and provide an overview of our experience. Continue Reading »

We’ve often been asked “What’s the best food you’ve had in mainland Southeast Asia?” If forced to choose, we’d opt for an easy way out and vote Thai food as the king of cuisines in the region. And after eating our way through Bangkok, Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, and Krabi in the south, our vote more specifically goes to Krabi. Continue Reading »

Most people visit Krabi to transit to the various beach paradises nearby. We came to Krabi and stayed for two weeks. Though it doesn’t have any particularly amazing sites, the town and its people impressed us as friendly, approachable, and authentic. But as our days in Thailand came to an end, we opted to rejoin the tourist route to explore nearby beaches and take in some excellent diving. Continue Reading »