Imagine yourself in a crowd of a million people dressed in red – much like a football Saturday in Madison. Yet, the difference is that at a whopping five feet, eleven inches (on a good day), you’re taller than everyone else. That was me last night. Chinese New Year in Bangkok, in the largest Chinatown in the world.
The party literally consisted of a million Chinese people dressed in red and gold. It figures those Commies would pick red. All were moving in one direction or another, yet I couldn’t understand what all the hubbub was about. When asking about fireworks – which I had to refer to as “boom-booms” (Uncle Jack would appreciate) to cross the language barrier – I sadly learned that I had missed all the action by an hour. Showing up at 9pm clearly didn’t pay off as much as it should have. However, there were still hundreds of vendors and thousands upon thousands of people in the streets. Highlight of the night: drinking beer in the street and making friends with dim sum sellers.
Bangkok seems like a pretty legit place. A lot of Americans write it off as a seedy city pretty quickly. Yet, Bangkok has hundreds of years of history and a number of cultural things to see and do. While it might be known for other things, its “red light district” is fairly compact and the remainder of the city is comparable to any major city in the U.S. – sans ridiculous heat and humidity. Some might consider Bangkok to be a shock, but after experiencing India, this city, to me, is basically Manhattan with a lot more noodles and a different language.
Chinese New Year
The party literally consisted of a million Chinese people dressed in red and gold. It figures those Commies would pick red. All were moving in one direction or another, yet I couldn’t understand what all the hubbub was about. When asking about fireworks – which I had to refer to as “boom-booms” (Uncle Jack would appreciate) to cross the language barrier – I sadly learned that I had missed all the action by an hour. Showing up at 9pm clearly didn’t pay off as much as it should have. However, there were still hundreds of vendors and thousands upon thousands of people in the streets. Highlight of the night: drinking beer in the street and making friends with dim sum sellers.
Green Dragon
Bangkok seems like a pretty legit place. A lot of Americans write it off as a seedy city pretty quickly. Yet, Bangkok has hundreds of years of history and a number of cultural things to see and do. While it might be known for other things, its “red light district” is fairly compact and the remainder of the city is comparable to any major city in the U.S. – sans ridiculous heat and humidity. Some might consider Bangkok to be a shock, but after experiencing India, this city, to me, is basically Manhattan with a lot more noodles and a different language.
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