Bangkok's GNP

We arrived in Bangkok late at night so when I went to the included breakfast the next day I  had not been outside. Attempting to be friendly, I asked the four men next to us what they were doing in Bangkok and they looked a bit sheepish.  Also they were a tad weird and almost as sketchy as our hotel -- although that would be difficult to replicate in a human form. David, #2-3 son, told me to stop asking groups of men what they were doing in Bangkok. He said we are in the sex capital of the world. Men are here to have sex with Thai teenage prostitutes.

Oh, how could I not have  known that and then  why are we here for a week for Christ sake! Then I ask where that section of town is and I find that it is on every downtown street and alley and we are directly in the middle of it. 

When we walk to a coffee shop,  young girls line the streets and yell invitations to  David, #2-3 son, to 'date' them. Their come-ons  are totally shocking. I have taken to not walking anywhere with him.  

The men who are here in these bars  are really all sent from Central Casting. They are either Australian football players gone to seed at 45 or 50, or  Brits who are about 50-75 who are alone and living as T.S.  Eliot says, "Lives of  quiet desperation."  

So the prostitutes caterwauling rages on.  They sit on stools in front of their tiny bars and call customers. Because life has to go on for the 15 million people who live here, and kids play on the street, families dine together and ignore the prostitutes and the fat pasty white johns, and it is one big neighbourhood.. All this takes place in 88 degree heat. It is a thick soup complete with spice.

Oh,,btw husband #1 who chose Bangkok as a destination, ignores it all and listens to physics lectures through his ipod when he walks around and sees nothing, not even the bed bugs.

When I told my friend about Bangkok he said I had to include the lyrics from  ONE NIGHT IN BANGKOK by Murray Head.  Once you've seen the place you realize how perfect the lyrics are.

One night in Bangkok makes a hard man humble
Not much between despair and ecstasy
One night in Bangkok and the tough guys tumble
Can't be too careful with your company
I can feel the Devil walking next to me

Bangkok, Oriental setting
And the city don't know what the city is getting
The creme de la creme of the chess world
In a show with everything but Yul Brynner

Time flies, doesn't seem a minute
Since the Tirolean Spa had the chess boys in it
All change, don't you know that when you
Play at this level, there's no ordinary venue

It's Iceland or the Philippines
Or Hastings or, or this place

One night in Bangkok and the world's your oyster
The bars are temples but the pearls ain't free
You'll find a God in every golden cloister
And if you're lucky then the God's a she
I can feel an angel sliding up to me

One town's very like another
When your head's down over your pieces, Brother

It's a drag, it's a bore, it's really such a pity
To be looking at the board, not looking at the city

Whaddya mean?
Ya seen one crowded, polluted, stinking town

Tea girls, warm and sweet, warm, sweet
Some are set up in the Somerset Maugham Suite

"Get Thai'd", you're talking to a tourist
Whose every move's among the purest
I get my kicks above the waistline, sunshine

One night in Bangkok makes a hard man humble
Not much between despair and ecstasy
One night in Bangkok and the tough guys tumble
Can't be too careful with your company
I can feel the Devil walking next to me

Siam's gonna be the witness
To the ultimate test of cerebral fitness
This grips me more than would
A muddy old river or Reclining Buddha

But thank God, I'm only watching the game, controlling it

I don't see you guys rating
The kind of mate I'm contemplating
I'd let you watch, I would invite you
But the queens we use would not excite you

So you better go back to your bars, your temples
Your massage parlors

One night in Bangkok and the world's your oyster
The bars are temples but the pearls ain't free
You'll find a God in every golden cloister
A little flesh, a little history
I can feel an angel slidin' up to me

One night in Bangkok makes a hard man humble
Not much between despair and ecstasy
One night in Bangkok and the tough guys tumble
Can't be too careful with your company
I can feel the Devil walking next to me