Bangkok Guru

About two weeks ago while cruising the web I stumbled across this Thai Stars website which claims to be showcasing the best sites on Thailand and I thought it was interesting. I was just checking out a couple of sites listed there and out of a sudden noticed that someone had also included Bangkok Guru on the list on my behalf so I want to give that nice someone a big thanks!

At that point, Bangkok Guru had just been added (based on the amount of votes it had) and was just plodding along on the list. Sure enough, I was heavily biased and gave it a good 10 and simply hoped a few more people would follow suit and give Bangkok Guru that much needed push.

A fortnight down today, I returned and much to my delight noticed that my blog is now stood firm on a respectable second place effectively challenging for that one top spot! So people, if you read my blog and like it and want to do me a bit of a favour, I’d appreciate it if you’d spare 5 seconds of your wanking time to check out the competition which ends 30th this month and give Bangkok Guru whatever score you like - although a lovely 10 would sure make my day!

Right enough ramblings. It’s a Friday night and there can be one thing and one thing only that I’m about to do. Yes you know what it is haha. Tonight will be a big one as I plan to visit a few different places and if you’re lucky I will come back with reviews that will sure keep you even more addicted to this site.

Have a lovely weekend!

OK the other week I started a poll on Bangkok’s favourite shopping mall and I’ve decided to end it today. The results were close. The votes have been counted and verified and I can reveal to you that Bangkok’s favourite shopping mall as voted for by Bangkok Guru readers is the popular MBK shopping mall aka Maboonkrong (มาบุญครอง) Shopping Centre!. So to mark the end of the first poll on my blog and celebrate MBK’s triumph I’ve decided to write a post dedicated to the mall today.

If you’re a Bangkok shopping virgin, I can easily say that MBK is the other shopping heaven in Bangkok apart from Chutachak weekend market. The major difference is that it’s mercifully equipped with air conditioners! I enjoy MBK way, way better than Chatuchak, even though the amount of shopper traffic here is rather mind bogglingly choking if you know what I mean.

Eight floors well worth of shopping trail including a nice cinema, the whole mall is beautifully decked to the full with tonnes of items both needed and unneeded for shoppers. Shop, stop, bargain, buy, and shop. That’s the sequence I believe!

Strolling in between each and every boutique and stall on all floors, you will get eateries and restaurants squeezed in for most sorts of sustenance and if you feel the need to be frugal having spent a huge chunk of your budget, there are also two food courts, one on the fifth floor and the other cheaper one on the sixth.

In MBK, there are an awful lot of shops selling second hand authentic and fake jeans and bags of all sorts and designs in the mall’s basement, the third and the sixth floors.

There’s also a whole floor, the 4th, that’s dedicated to mobile phones and electronic gadgetry for people wanting to get their hands on the latest mobiles, spy cameras, webcams etc.

If you’re not a fan of fake culture, there are a plethora of boutiques selling shit loads of local branded clothing - good, cheap and real. AIIZ is a prime example and can be found in the basement.

So if you’re a shopaholic but can’t cope with the stifling heat of outdoors shopping in Bangkok, MBK Shopping Centre is the place for you!

When you plan your next trip to Bangers and want to treat that special one of yours to a good meal, then give Sirocco a go. For location and views, this place is difficult to beat. Any pictures you see of the place will never do its quite enough justice. You’ve just got to be there sky high on the 65th floor and out in the open air in the bar drinking and/or eating while checking out the fantastic bright lights of the city at night far below.

Nicknamed the Dome, Sirocco is real chic and you’re really mixing it with the fabulous people here and as a result paying the heavy price for it. I can tell you now that this place is not cheap even by Western standards. The food is ok, yeah just ok, nothing particularly amazing. But as I say, here the great views and fine drinks are everything.

So if you’ve got a bit of dosh to spare, I recommend having a nice meal, ordering a couple of drinks and enjoying the stunning views as the band plays and please don’t give the bill another thought. For such a high rise treat, Sirocco is definitely the place to be seen and of course the place to see the whole of Bangkok.

I went there once with my ex and although we didn’t eat or drink that much the bill was still quite hefty. Thankfully, it was her treat otherwise I would have been fucked!

On my previous post I mentioned starting my night out with a mate in Flix, RCA so today I thought why not write another post on it since after all Flix is one of the best bars in this zone and also quite popular amongst clubbers of all sorts. If you haven’t been to or even heard of Flix, you might like to check it out:

The club: brash 2 zone, funky-looking partying colossus with a respectable amount of room for dancing, all cast in rather modernist glass and steel. As I say the decor is real funky and there’s a cool bar at which to comfortably kick back and fellow clubbers watch from. On the ground floor also lies a table service while the balcony is ideal if you want to view the whole thing all at once.

The music: this place typically plays proper house, funky house and techno. I don’t go to RCA that often but when I do, it’s usually Flix that I end up in. It’s mainly because of the music that can actually sometimes be hard to come by in Bangers if you know what I mean.

The crowd: I’m not suggesting you get trouble in other RCA clubs but I tend to find that there’s a street more laid back crowd in Flix who genuinely come to dance and enjoy themselves, whereas in some other clubs you get quite a few posers.

The price: Whiskey (Black Label) - 2000 baht, Mixer - 60 baht, Beer - 160 baht

And here’s what the place looks like:

Flix is one of my favourite bars in RCA. At weekends, it can get busy and packed but then again it’s like this pretty much everywhere you go in Bangkok. And from time to time, they do have cool special night events with guest DJs from the West and Japan too so if you fancy some proper funky dance stuff in Bangkok you know where Flix is!

Saturday night I went to meet up with a mate in Flix, RCA. I ain’t been there for ages. In fact the last time I went there was back in April during Songkran water fight festival. Anyway, we stayed in Flix for about an hour and thought it was wank so rightly so decided to move on to another bar on the other side of Rama 9 Road opposite RCA. The club is called Baroque and here’s my review:

The club: From outside it might look a bit like a Muslim mosque but as you approach the club it becomes clear this is probably the last place religious lunatics would want to spend their time in evidenced by a huge crowd of party goers waiting to get in. At the main entrance, you can tell this is sure an elegant bar by any standards thanks to its picturesque yet vibrantly modern interior.

The music: Two houses to cater for two different musical appetites, live music and House respectively. We spent our evening in the House section for musical reasons and I thought it was one of the best nights out I’ve had in recent months. The banging tunes were wicked and solely what everyone was in there for. In the other room, we didn’t go in but according to my mate it’s similar to what other nightclubs in Bangkok has to offer i.e. live bands and DJs taking turns every hour or so.

The crowd: Quite a few girls in here, many of whom genuinely fit and young so that’s quite a blessing and for some unknown reason there ain’t that many young lads, mostly just well dressed men in their late 30s to 40s. The bar is busy at weekends for obvious reasons, though thankfully - unlike Ekamai - there’s still a bit of breathing and dancing space for everyone!

The price: Whiskey (Red Label) - 1100 baht, Mixer - 60 baht, Beer - 150 baht.

And we must not forget the highlights:

And better still, here’s some pics from the Miss Maxim contest held in Baroque earlier this year

So my verdict is if you’re into House/Trance like many of us, there is every reason why you should love Baroque. And icing on the cake is the fact that it closes a bit late, usually at 3am or 3.30am so do expect a few more people migrating here from neighbouring RCA after 2am!

OK I know you guys are gasping and fancy going out somewhere this weekend. As it has inevitably become my regular hot spot , I’ve decided to create a rough map of bars/clubs in soi Ekamai and soi Thonglor which I think is pretty accurate and informative

Quite frankly, I’m probably the last person you would want to turn to when it comes to photo editing/tweaking so please bear with me this time, though I must say it did take me quite a bit to come up with this less than attractive map, so let me know what you think. Thanks!

PS. If you want a review on any of the bars I haven’t covered here on Bangkok Guru, let me know and I will try my best to sort it out for ya!

If you’ve recently been following Thai politics, you probably know that on Tuesday Prime Minister Samak was found guilty of flouting the constitution and as a result disqualified from the post. His appearances on a TV cookery show and acceptance of payments for them were a clear breach of constitutional rules that prohibit MPs from working for a private company for fear of conflict of interests.

After the court’s verdict, many people were relieved that Samak’s exit would help ease the ongoing political tensions, lead to the dispersion of the thousands of protesters at Government House so hopefully everyone could get on with things eventually. Well, not quite that.

Today the leading coalition party PPP’s spokesman has come out and said that his party have unanimously agreed to re-nominate Samak to become Prime Minister again, although the other smaller coalition parties are against such an idea. He also revealed to The Nation newspaper that the decision was made partly based on the advice given by former PM Thaksin Shinawatra, now living in exile in London.

My colleague says Thaksin insists on the PPP re-nominating Samak because he wants to get back to those who have hitherto caused him so much trouble - an interesting, yet possible theory indeed. She says Thaksin has given the advice (more like an order) despite knowing full well that it would provoke the PAD-led protesters even more and could possibly lead to a new wave of violence on the streets of Bangkok. She says Thaksin doesn’t want things to end happily and has shown his true colours, even to his own supporters, that he doesn’t give two shits about anyone else.

So, the drama looks set to continue for at least weeks, if not months, to come. And this is all down to one man and one man only. As a responsible journalist, I want to remain as politically impartial as possible but admittedly I sometimes do get a bit carried away and this is one of those several occasions if you know what I mean!

Anyway I’ve got a personal message to Thaksin if he’s reading my blog: “Please come back home mate because - one way or the other - everyone terribly needs you!”

Bangkok’s BTS sky train is a relatively fast and reliable way to make your way around town and to avoid the chaotic, traffic plagued roads below. As of now there are two sky train lines:

The Sukhumvit line has 16 stops and connects On Nut with Mo Chit, with en-route stops including Siam and Asoke (Sukhumvit). The Silom line has 7 stops and connects Sapan Taksin with National Stadium and its en-route stops include Silom aka Sala Daeng and Siam. The two lines connect at Siam.

The BTS skytrain connects with its MRT Underground counterpart at Sala Daeng (Silom Underground), Asoke (Sukhumvit Underground) and Mo Chit (Chatuchak Underground). Most of my journeys on the BTS are between On Nut, Siam and Chong Nonsi where I get off and walk a bit further to my office.

The skytrain fares are cheap starting from 15 baht to 40 baht which is still pretty much next to nothing. Tickets can be purchased from machines located at the stations. Unlike the MRT Underground ticket machines, a lot of machines for BTS tickets still only accept coins, not banknotes so you might have to change your note for coins at one of the information desks.

Back to the ticket machine, choose the zone your destination is in and it will automatically calculate the correct fare for you. You’ll be provided with a small cardboard ticket, roughly the size of a standard credit card to be inserted into a turnstile to access the platforms. Comes the end of your journey, you do the same to exit the platform but this time around it’s not returned to you.

Trains run from 6am morning to 12pm at night, are very frequently packed but thankfully are air conditioned. All upcoming stops are announced in both Thai and English.

If you live and work in Bangkok and are tired of the shitty traffic here, I’d highly recommend adopting the BTS skytrain as your primary mode of public transport.

There’s dozens of skyscrapers towering the skies of Bangkok but by far the tallest and most impressive has got to be The Baiyoke Tower II which was opened in 1998 and is about 310 metres high.

It’s also the 26th tallest building in the world. In fact, there’s roughly 2060 steps from bottom to top and it would take you over an hour to reach the top on foot - so much, much easier by lift!

Architecturally speaking, the piling of the building runs a staggering 60 metres deep underground, easily the height of a 20 storey building. Go up the lift to the 77th floor and from there you will find another lift to the 84th floor for the revolving deck.

When you get there, you will understand why the viewing area is so attractive to both locals and foreign tourists alike. The views are simply amazing and up a little further is the wicked revolving deck that lets you enjoy the whole of Bangkok so far as your eyes can stretch.

Don’t forget to bring your camera as there’s some great photo oppornities and when you’re finished, there’s a nice little bar up there for you to sit, have a cold one and take in the great view.

Open Monday-Friday: 10.30am to 10.00pm and weekends & bank holidays: 9.30am to 10pm

Fares: Adults - 120 baht, children - 60 baht

Last Friday we took afternoon off work and went on a bit of a field trip to our local cinema to check this newly released film Bangkok Dangerous out. We initially bought ourselves standard seat tickets but we didn’t know that our seating was way too close to the screen so had to upgrade to premier seats costing double but thankfully many, many times as comfy.

Anyway, as you should know the film was shot in Bangkok starring Nicolas Cage and several home-grown Thai acting talents. It’s a remake of the original Thai version made a couple of years back. I didn’t see the original one but according to my friends it was even better than the remake so I’ll find the time to check it out and let you know.

And for those of you who may not know, The Thai cast in Bangkok Dangerous include Shahkrit Yamnarm - Kong, Panward Hemmanee - Aom, Nirattisai Kaljaruek - Surat and Dom Hetrakul - Aran. There’s also this Hong Kong actress Charlie Young who played Fon.

Here’s the film preview:

And here’s the hostess bar that enjoys quite a few scenes in the film:

Admittedly, it might not be the best of Nicolas Cage’s films but if you are his fan and fancy seeing Bangkok scenes from the Hollywood perspective like we did, I recommend giving it a go.

If you’ve already seen it, please let us have your comments/reviews. Thanks!