Sunday, November 7

If you were to ask me on a Friday evening or a Saturday morning what I’d like to do, I would almost always choose to be either by myself or with Roman, exploring the city or swimming in the pool or watching a TV show at home. But I know that always staying in the situations I find easiest and most comfortable isn’t always, you know, conducive to growth and all that shit, so I’m trying to get out and see other people more, especially as restrictions are starting to ease.

On Friday evening, I met up with Van, a Filipina woman I met on Bumble BFF. We had chatted about Filipino food online (she misses it sometimes, I’ve never had it) and decided to meet at a Filipino restaurant in Thong Lor. I asked Van what foods she’d recommend, and we ordered chicken adobo (they were out of pork), sinigang na bangus (milkfish served in a sour broth with vegetables), rice, and brazos des Mercedes for dessert (a kind of Spanish-influenced rolled cake made from meringue and filled with custard).

Van has a very calm, open demeanor and was easy to talk to. When I’m connecting with people online, I don’t always gravitate toward other introverts, I guess because I’m afraid of awkward silences. But the dinner was a reminder how much I can enjoy people who are thoughtful, and gentle, and not necessarily super chatty. I mean, some of my best friends are other introverts!

On Saturday morning, Roman and I met up with his friend Daow to go to Bang Krachao, or The Green Lung. It’s a part of Bangkok that gets its name from way the snaking Chao Phraya river carves it into a lung-like shape. It’s also known as a little green oasis not far from the city center.

We met up with Daow, took a taxi to Wat Khlong Toei Nok, and then walked to the old-fashioned rickety little pier near the temple. A tiny, skinny wooden boat with a loud motor attached to its back pulled up to the pier to ferry us across the river. Daow, who can’t swim, looked nervous as we carefully stepped down onto the wooden slats that served as the boat’s seats. When we sat down, we seemed to be situated almost below water level in the small boat.

But the trip across the river was short, and we stepped out on the other side into a lush jungle. We passed raised wooden houses built on wetlands, brackish swamps, and marshes covered in fine green algae. We passed small houses with narrow farms where the owners grew bananas or papayas or vegetables. Daow pointed out and named many different kinds of plants, and if anything was edible, she plucked it off the tree, wiped it off briskly with her hands, and passed it to us to eat. We sampled a small green guava with deep pink flesh, tart red mulberries, sour green fern heads and sweet green plant tips, and hot Thai chilies. 

We passed a table set up along the road where a man was selling produce from his farm—bananas and banana blossoms, chilies, wing beans, edible white flowers, greens, and pumpkin. Daow said something to the man, then reached into a bag filled with small tube-shaped vegetables, and handed me a crunchy, fresh-tasting young lotus root. She also made a big deal out of a very phallic-looking symbol the farmer had at his stall, telling us how Thais consider the object good luck, especially one so big!

I wanted to buy all the vegetables from the farm stand, but I still haven’t made it through the organic produce we ordered in a farm box last week, so I just picked up a kind of fish-based chili paste from the farmer.

And all this before we even entered the botanic gardens, where we wandered on little paths through the verdant, sprawling grounds, rested at a little covered gazebo, and passed over foot bridges where large fish followed along in the water, their mouths parting into hopeful little o-shapes, waiting to see if we had bought some of the technicolor puffed snacks the few other guests in the gardens had purchased to toss to them.

We reached a kind of visitors center just as it began to rain, and we ducked into an open air café, bordered by wetlands on one side, just as the downpour started. We ordered iced teas, and then lunch, as the rain fell hard all around us (Roman and Daow got eggs served with “Vietnamese bread” and I got a kind of Japanese curry with rice). We also got a kind of…tube…filled with a durian snack. Daow told us it was made with very ripe durian, which was cooked down for at least half a day with coconut milk, sugar, and a little salt, until it became reduced and smooth. It was the first time Roman had tried a durian product, and though I don’t think it was as strong as a ripe durian, or as strange an experience as biting into a fruit with that particular flavor, it did have the unusual unique-to-durian combination of sweetness ending on a spicy, garlic note.

On our way back to the pier, we stopped in at a fighting fish farm, where they had dozens and dozens of cages of fighting fish in all different colors. There were pieces of cardstock placed between the individual fish cages so the fish couldn’t see each other and start trying to fight. The guy working there explained to us (via Daow) that they’d open the following week for the fish fighting, a kind of show I don’t fully understand but that of course involves betting. 

And then we took a boat back to the busy side of the river.

On Saturday evening, I went to the final student showcase of the weekend theatre class that Darren teaches. I’m not really sure why I went. This is the class I visited and spoke to about playwriting, and while they’re very sweet, eager 12- to 16-year-olds, I don’t really know them or need to, like, support their work. But at Darren’s Halloween party, a bunch of the theatre people in the room said they’d be going, and so it seemed like a good event to attend—I could see the kids perform again, continue some conversations, make some connections, etc.

But when I arrived, I realized a couple things—the kids would be performing Shakespeare, and I was one of the only non-parents in the room.

I’m just not crazy about seeing Shakespeare performed unless the actors are really, really good—it’s too hard for me to follow otherwise. And when it got going, well…I think it would be hard for anyone who didn’t have a kid in the show to stay all that attentive to it.

But the real challenge of the evening was Robin. The moment I walked in, Darren introduced me to him—a British expat and freelance journalist in his late sixties who was dressed in a fedora, trailing black scarf, and skinny jeans. He kept sidling up to me all night, saying he wasn’t going to ask where else on my body I was tattooed, or trying to get me to order a wine instead of a soda water, or telling me I looked like a French movie star and now it was my turn to say he looked like Sean Connery. I spent quite a bit of the evening walking away from him, although it wasn’t that easy since I was seated next to him during the show.

I also found myself seeing Darren from a new perspective—like one of the theatre teachers I had growing up who I was always a little afraid of. He was dressed in Shakespearean garb, checkered leggings, and heeled character shoes, and he was dancing all over the stage, leaping into the air, guiding the children, playing high, sharp notes on a recorder, and making pronouncements in his booming, well-enunciated English accent. He absolutely puts everything into this work, and I admire that. Maybe it just means I’m afraid of human emotions, but it’s a kind of avid energy that can feel a little frightening to me.

The second half of the show was better than the first—they started with Midsummer Night’s Dream, and then shifted to enactments of Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes, which I think the kids enjoyed quite a bit more. And there were a couple very excited, very cute younger siblings in the audience who were absolutely cracking up during Revolting Rhymes, which was delightful.

They ended the show with Time Warp from Rocky Horror, and I kind of died a little. Darren performed the Riff Raff part (and its choreography) with total, 100% commitment. He gave a full-on, explosive, entirely unself-conscious performance, while the kids kind of awkwardly danced around him, and I found it both excruciating and fascinating. Then when Darren invited the audience up, Robin leapt onto stage and starting doing the pelvis thrust, and I was so embarrassed I couldn't watch.

And that was my Saturday! I don’t usually write anything very dishy on this blog, because I wouldn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings…but I also want to be able to use this as a journal to include my personal reflections while living here and, well, it’s a pretty small group that has access to this, so I’m going to include it.

On Sunday, Roman and I got caught up on some admin tasks we hadn’t had time for during our busy week—applying for voiceover work and signing up for Covid boosters. Then Roman went out to Chatuchak with one of his new friends, and I chatted with family on Zoom, wrote this blog, blended up my fermented chilies to make hot sauce, submitted my novella to a third round of agents, prepared breakfast for Monday, swam in the pool, and checked out a used book sale at a library in Sathorn (but they were mostly selling genre fiction that didn't appeal much to me, and I left empty-handed). 

Tomorrow the students will be coming to school for the first time. I’m excited, and anxious, and I’m sure I’ll have more to share soon. First, some pictures from the weekend...