I pour the filter coffee I have brewed into my sweetheart’s mug, the one with a thermos interior, a snug lid and a bottom that sticks to surfaces so it’s hard to knock over. It’s perfect for our condo’s executive lounge, where the long communal table has a marble top and is high enough I can stand while I write.
Outside I see the office workers scurrying back and forth between the gleaming towers and the subway. In a few hours, when the rush hour has passed, I will bring my notebook and coffee mug (now empty) back upstairs and change into my gym gear – tank top, hoodie jacket, tracksuit pants, and a duffel bag with shoes and clean clothes.
Time for a workout and my commute to the gym. I walk to the nearest MRT station, the Thai Cultural Centre, get on a train towards Bang Na. I hop off three stops later at Sukhumvit, switch to the BTS station, Asoke. Get on another train, this time in the direction of Mo Chit, another three stops and I’m out at Chitlom.
Seems like a lot, but it’s clockwork now. It’s our life in Bangkok.
I scan my key fob at the gym’s entrance. Once inside, I’m greeted by familiar colours; just like the one at my home gym 1,477 kilometres away. The difference is in the faces and the music. The former friendlier, their bodies more ripped and tanned; the latter harder, more punishing, as though a soundtrack for beasts that pump iron. Which is what we are, or what we are aiming for.
The hex bar for deadlifts, competition plates. Barbells and kettlebells, squats and Farmer’s Walk. All the right vibes. Stronger lifts. We are beasts.
After showering and changing, I head back upstairs and out to the walkway that connects the BTS station and all the malls – Amarin Plaza and Erawan on one side, Gaysorn Village opposite, and further on to CentralWorld (and Siam farther still).
The Ratchaprasong Walk is a sea of people and somehow everyone can stare at their smartphones and never collide. Moving in the city is an urban dance that you must learn and once you have learned it, you never forget.
I’m reminded of when Ekin was our local guide in Hong Kong (ignore the fact he’s from Flushing, NYC). He would lead us all over the Central Elevated Walkway, from the Prince’s Building to The Galleria, then onwards to The Landmark and Alexandra House. I never fully appreciated it back then; mainly I was thinking, You’ve gotta be kidding me. Not another mall.
Years later and it’s Jess who’s our guide when we return. She’s been in Hong Kong for, what, over half a decade now, more, and she still barely speaks any Cantonese. We love her anyway. Her generous nature; her Taiwanese-American hospitality; her bright, bubbly smile.
And now it’s my turn to play host.
I’ve had my fair share of tourguide duties, to friends in Malacca and Japanese engineering students in Munich. Even showing our photographer friend where the best sakura spots in Shinjuku Gyoen are, and then the funkiest, most umami tsukemen in Tokyo afterwards.
Today I meet two friends – acquaintances, really, if I’m honest – on the Ratchaprasong Walk, the traffic streaming along Ratchadamri Road beneath us. They arrive wearing vertical stripes in burgundy and black. Not quite the same shirts but points for effort. (I know of two who can pull off couple shirts more effortlessly but I shan’t name names; I hear modesty is a virtue.)
I suggest Japanese food since they probably have had their fair share of Thai food already. Also, I want ramen. They will eat what I eat, since it’s my treat. I don’t quite put it this way; I can turn on the charm when I feel like it. They end up thinking it’s their idea.
We have hot bowls of seafood and chicken broth, artfully layered dangles of noodles, a trinity of toppings: pork chashu, sous vide chicken, the rarest slice of beef. Then over to Gaysorn Tower, through the rainbow-hued Village (post countdown, somehow Christmas decorations are still up), to the boutique café where we have chocolate croissants crowned with almond flake and a strong piccolo latte for that early afternoon pick me up.
They tell me their stories but it’s their glances and nervous finger tapping that tell me who they are. Sure enough, they start taking pictures, posing from a well-thumbed manual for the most dreaded of breeds – influencers. Or wannabes. I’m not sure of the difference.
I tell the truth; I have to go, a prior engagement. No need to tell them that that engagement is hours away. Back on the BTS; nine stops later and I’m at the Lat Phrao-Phahon Yothin intersection. I stroll into the departmental store, past the mannequins wearing loud, red Lunar New Year arrivals, and plop down on the first available bar stool.
No alcohol, though; this is a coffee bar, though I wouldn’t have refused a strong drink either. Instead, I eschew both liquor and latte and opt for their black cacao, if only for the name. An iced dark cocoa brew with cold milk; it hits the spot after the heat outside.
Time for people watching: the coffee geeks and the pretty young things, the casual passers-by. Perhaps they are wondering about the odd fellow in his hoodie jacket and tracksuit pants, his duffel bag slung across his shoulders. Or perhaps not. We never know when we are being observed or whether we are not; it doesn’t matter in the end.
We all come and go. We see what we see, then that passes into memory. A tiny boat folded from paper drifting down the stream, caught in the current, always moving onwards till it’s out of sight.
A text message. My date is done with work. Time to meet. We will have xiaolongbao and pale shrimp fried rice. Spicy dumplings and double boiled chicken soup. And the best part of the day? When we are done with dinner and it’s time to head home together.
The MRT again, five stops this time. We know without checking. It’s our life in Bangkok.