In the overnight border run I made to Singapore, I had errands to run and friends to see. There were some interesting sights along the way. One stop was at an IT mall, to check out some computer and camera component. There, I saw what appeared to be the largest gathering of Singapore’s next generation of geeks!
Hundreds of students on their laptops, with power strips running every which way. They were gathered for a competition of radio-controlled race cars. The next generation will definitely be very wired.
Also made a stop at About Books, an independent bookstore near Tiong Bahru. Great store with an interesting range of titles as well as many other odds and ends for purchase.
Among the interesting items for purchase were these old cameras. Beautiful, eh?
After dinner crowd: Nick, Chor Pharn, David, Otto, Edwin, Kelvin, and me.
One thing I’ve noticed over the past few years is that the transit system is actively trying to train Singaporeans to queue up before boarding the trains, letting passengers exit before trying to board. From what I’ve seen, there’s some success in these efforts.
In one friend’s flat, located in a government housing tract, there were public service announcements on the elevator doors warning elderly residents from those claiming to be fortune tellers.
“Beware strangers telling fortunes or chasing away bad luck. Measures: Be careful if someone approaches you to tell your fortune. Or to get rid of bad luck or evil spirits. He’s just out to cheat you. Ignore him and he’ll go away. Tell your elderly family members not to fall for such tricks.”
Every time I have to make as mundane a choice as what type of toothpaste I should buy, I’m overwhelmed and momentarily freeze with panic. Even in Thailand, my local grocery store or Tesco Lotus has at least a few dozen different combinations of brands, flavors, and types of toothpaste. Citrus, citrus-herb, salt-herb, mint, cool mint, bright mint, gel, paste, fluoride, whitening, stain-removal, super-whitening, etc. The mind spins at such options.
You can imagine my fascination then to listen to a talk by Sheena Iyengar at a TED conference about the art of choosing and cultural bias in beliefs about choice. Ms. Iyengar is a professor at Columbia Business School whose research focuses on choice and how people choose.
In her speech, she examines a trio of American assumptions about choice and discusses studies she has done in various parts countries comparing different cultural reactions to these assumptions. The assumptions are:
Make your own choices.
More options lead to better choices.
Never say “no” to choice.
I’m embedding the speech here, which is worth the 22 minutes of your time it will take to watch. But for those of you who cannot watch the video or do not wish to take the time, I’ll summarize her observations. My own conclusions are all the way at the bottom.
Assumption 1: It is best to make your own choices
If a choice affects you, then you should be the one to make it. This is captured in the American concept of “being true to yourself.” Ms. Iyengar and a colleague performed studies to test this assumption.
In one study, she brought 7 to 9 year old Anglo-American and first generation Asian-Americans into the laboratory, dividing them into groups. The first group was given a choice of six sets of word puzzles to complete and also a choice in the color of pen with which to complete the puzzles. The second group was show the same six sets, but “Ms. Smith” told them which set they would perform and which pen color they would use. The third group was shown the same six sets, but Ms. Smith told them their mothers had chosen which puzzles and color of markers they would use. In reality, the second and third groups performed the same set of puzzles and used the same pen color the first group had chosen.
The results differed markedly depending on how the activity was administered. Anglo-American children in the first group completed two and a half times as many word puzzles as in the second and third groups. It didn’t matter who did the choosing – Ms. Smith or their mother – if their task was chosen by another person, their performance suffered. In contrast, Asian-American children performed best when they believed the task had been chosen by their mother, second best when they chose for themselves, and worst when Ms. Smith chose their task and pen color.
Ms. Iyengar’s conclusion is that the first-generation Asian-American children were strongly influenced by their immigrant parents’ approach to choice. Choice was not just a way of defining and asserting themselves, it was also a way to create community by deferring to the choices of those whom they trusted and respected. The assumption that we do best when the individual self chooses, only holds when that “self” is clearly divided from others. If the individuals see their choices as intimately connected, they may amplify one-another’s success by turning choosing into a collective act.
“People who have grown up in [the American paradigm of choice] might find it motivating.” notes Ms. Iyengar. “But it is a mistake to assume that everyone thrives under the pressure of choosing alone.”
Assumption 2: More options lead to better choices
Ms. Iyengar traveled to locations in Eastern Europe where people had had to adjust to the transition from a communist to capitalist society. She discovered that many of the perceptions Americans have of choice are often trivial (my choices of toothpaste, for example). She stumbled upon this when offering interview subjects a choice of beverages before the interview – seven different types of soda – only to discover that to the interview subjects, she wasn’t offering seven different options but only one: soda. If she offered juice, water, and the seven brands of soda and she asked how many choices they had, they uniformly identified three choices.
Americans have been conditioned to see each of these little choices as significant and as a representation of who we are. “Coke or Pepsi?” becomes a lifestyle and identification choice rather than a meaningful distinction between beverages. A Polish interview subject summed it up well when saying that he didn’t need the choice of twenty different types of chewing gum. “I don’t mean to say I want to have no choice,” he said, “but many of these choices are very artificial.”
“The value of choice,” notes Ms. Iyengar, “lies in our ability to see the differences between the options. Americans train their whole lives to play ‘spot the difference.’ … Though all humans share a basic need and desire for choice, we don’t all see choice in the same places or to the same extent.”
Ultimately, too much choice can lead to “suffocation by meaningless minutiae.” Ms. Iyengar has observed in her studies that when people are given more than ten choices, they generally make poorer choices. And yet many Americans believe they should make all their own choices and seek out more of them.
Which leads to the third assumption:
Assumption 3: Never say “no” to choice
Ms. Iyengar interviewed parents whose infants had developed cerebral anoxia (a loss of oxygen to the brain) and had to be placed on a ventilator. The decision had been made to remove the infant from the machine, letting it die within a few hours, instead of keeping the infant on the machine in a permanent vegetative state.
Ms. Iyengar interviewed parents in France and in the United States in the months following their infant’s removal from the life support machine and subsequent death. The difference was that in France, the decision to remove life support had been made by doctors whereas in the United States, the parents made the final decision.
Ms. Iyengar wondered whether this decision affected the way the parents coped with the loss of their infant. Ms. Iyengar and her researchers found that it did. Even up to a year after the loss, approximately 90% of American parents were expressing negative emotions about the event compared to only about 67%* of French parents. French parents’ comments were characterized by statements like, “He was here for so little time, yet he taught us so much.” American parents were characterized by statements like, “I feel like they tortured me; how did they expect me to make that choice?”
Yet, when American parents were asked if they would rather have had the doctor made the decision, they said no. Some 75% of them couldn’t imagine turning that choice over to someone else, despite the negative repercussions of having had to make that choice themselves. Among French parents, only about 33% of them indicated they would rather have made the choice instead of the doctor.
*I’m estimating percentages based on the graphs. In her speech, Ms. Iyengar doesn’t provide specific numbers.
Ms. Iyengar concludes:
“The story Americans tell, the story upon which the American dream depends, is the story of limitless choice. This narrative promises so much: freedom, happiness, success. It lays the world at your feet and says, ‘you can have anything, everything.’ It’s a great story and it’s understandable why they would be reluctant to revise it. But when you take a close look, you start to see the holes and you start to see that the story can be told in many other ways.
“Americans have so often tried to disseminate their ideas of choice, believing that they will be, or ought to be, welcomed with open hearts and open minds. But the history books and the daily news tell us, it doesn’t always work out that way. The … actual experience that we try to organize and understand through narrative, varies from place to place. No single narrative serves the needs of everyone, everywhere. Moreover, Americans themselves could benefit from incorporating new perspectives into their own narrative, which has been driving their choices for so long.”
For me, this speech was thought-provoking, a reminder of something I know experientially to be true but which slips to the back of my mind all too often: There is no single right way of looking at the world. Our values and frame of reference through which we see the world are tremendously dependent upon our culture, background, experiences, and upbringing.
The fact there is no single right way is the source of so much conflict and miscommunication in the world. If we really want to understand other people in this world, we have to check our assumptions and be prepared to see the world in radically different ways.
On the day after Christmas, my Thai teacher of the last four and a half years finally tied the knot. There’s no doubt she’s a patient person – continuing to tutor me after all these years is all the evidence of patience you would ever need – and her patience finally paid off as she married a handsome, decent, and loving man. Tawn and I were very honored to be invited to the ceremony and I thought I would share some of the photos with you.
Above, photos of Khru Kitiya (“Khru” means “teacher” in Thai) and her husband, Khun Por. It is common for Thai couples to go for professional wedding portraits weeks or months in advance of their wedding. These portraits are often elaborately staged in specialized studios, many of which are located in our neighborhood. The photos are then displayed at the wedding reception for guests to enjoy.
The wedding ceremonies were held at a facility on the north side of the city that is built in a traditional Thai style. This main building is part of a rooftop reception area with open-air pavilions on either side of the deck. Because it was a very bright day, although pleasantly breezy, most guests were hiding in the shade. Notice all the shoes of the guests who are inside the main building.
The day consisted of three distinct events, of which we took part in the second two. The first began at 7:30, when the monks arrived to conduct a traditional Buddhist ceremony, complete with chanting and the splashing of holy water. The families of the couple then feed the monks in order to make merit for the newlyweds.
The second event was the Rot Nam (“water pouring”) ceremony. Family members and friends bless the groom and bride by pouring a small amount of water on their hands, which are held in a prayer-like position, while wishing them happiness in their marriage. You will notice that both the groom and bride are in more traditional outfits, symbolically joined by a string, and have additional blessing marks on their foreheads.
The third event was a Chinese style luncheon banquet, held downstairs from the pavilions. There were probably 200 guests and we enjoyed dish after dish of tasty food while listening to speeches by Phuu Yai (“big people”, or guests of honor) and teasing by the two masters of ceremonies.
One special treat after the speeches was that Khun Por and Khru Kitiya performed a duet for the guests. Singing in front of a crowd is always a little scary but doing that on your wedding day just raises the stakes!
After the cake was cut, Khru Kitiya did something unconventional for a Thai wedding: she threw her bouquet to the crowd of unmarried women. This is something borrowed from American style weddings and I’ve never seen it at a Thai wedding before. Unfortunately, her aim was a bit wide and the bouquet ended up in the hands of a young lady, recently married and expecting her first child!
It was a very fun celebration and we were glad to have been invited to be a part of it. I hope Khun Por and Khru Kitiya have a long and happy life together!
A year ago Christmas day I received my provisional Thai Driver’s License. Provisional means it was only good for a year, so as Santa left for points west and Boxing Day dawned on Wat Arun, I was faced with another trip to the Department of Land Transport (DLT) to renew my license.
Many farang (foreigners) ask why I bother getting a license. While the vast majority probably are smart enough to leave the driving to others, untold numbers of farang drive about the Kingdom with nothing more than their International Driver’s License, or even less. I, however, wanted to make the effort to follow the law and have my license if I was going to continue taking on the traffic-choked byways of the City of Angels from behind the wheel.
Heading to the DLT on the last Monday of the year was not the wisest choice. I spent a half-hour orbiting the parking lot searching for a place to park. The chaos there – traffic going every which way, regardless of the painted stripes and arrows – was like a driving examination writ large, and nearly everyone seemed to be failing. Finally, as my bladder strongly suggested it might be best to abort the mission, a spot opened before me, one with blessed shade.
The process of getting a driver’s license at the DLT is more painless than you might expect. Even if I didn’t speak a fair amount of Thai, I would still have been able to work through the steps without the assistance of a native. The main counter on the second floor is staffed by friendly employees who review your documents and there is an English language list of what is required, should you be missing anything. Ad hoc photocopy vendors are in the hallway to take care of any last-minute copying needs so as long as you have all your documents with you, you will be in good shape.
Alas, I was ill-prepared and arrived at the DLT without a medical certificate stating that I was free from whatever diseases would prevent me from the safe operation of motor vehicles. Drat. A trip to my local hospital and a return to the DLT would consume the rest of the day. Cannily, I asked whether there was a clinic nearby. Certainly, replied the friendly staff member. Downstairs in the motorcycle department.
Or, at least that is what I understood. This tale illustrates how knowing not quite enough Thai can be a challenge. I went downstairs and read a sign that I thought said “medical inspections” but which, upon later reflection, must not have said that. Asking at what, in my vision of the world, was the medical inspections counter, another nice lady gracefully cleared up my confusion and explained that the nearest clinic was on the main street and to the left at the first traffic light.
Or, at least that is what I understood. As I traipsed the considerable distance back to Paholyothin Road, avoiding the drivers still participating in the parking lot-wide driving exam, I wondered whether I had misunderstood a second time. My confidence was boosted at the traffic light, though, when I made out the words “clinic” on a sign board and walked past a broken down photocopy machine and into the pale green interior of a small shop house.
Sure enough, for 100 baht a woman of unknown medical experience will listen to your breathing with a stethoscope and then sign a medical certificate clearing you to drive. No, I have no idea what she was checking but presumably she heard my heart beating. Have pulse, can drive.
Once I returned to Building Four, Floor Two of the DLT with the medical certificate in hand, the process was head-spinningly fast. While Thais have several dozen counters at which to be helped, we farang have two cubicles at the far end of the room that have been set aside for foreigners. Thais may find this unfair, but I figure it is just desserts for the double priced admission I have to pay at Calypso Cabaret, even though I’m a resident foreigner.
Within ten minutes of entering cubicle 18, I exited with my very own five-year Thai Driver’s License. After all the hassle of getting there, finding parking, and locating a clinic for a thorough medical examination, the actual bureaucratic process of filling out forms, taking a picture, and printing a new license took all of ten minutes.
As I pulled out of my still-shady parking space, I marveled at how easy it can sometimes be to do the right thing and follow all the steps required by the Thai government of farangs living and working here. And then just as my car reached the exit, two taxis ahead of me had a small fender-bender. The drivers exited their cars and spent several minutes arguing over the imperceptible damage to their vehicles, unaware of the line of blocked cars behind them growing longer. As the Skytrain glided by overhead, I put the car in park and snuck another look at my picture, grinning back from under the laminate of my new driver’s license.
More than halfway through our seven different modes of transportation, Matt, Craig, and I ended up arriving at the Grand Palace just as it was closing, so instead we walked down the block to Wat Po, also known as the Temple of the Reclining Buddha. This temple, which tourists usually see after sweltering in the hot sun over at the Grand Palace, rarely gets as thorough a viewing as it deserves.
Predating the founding of Bangkok, the temple houses a 15 meter (46 foot) high, 46 meter (140 foot) long statue of the Buddha in a reclining pose, covered in gold plating with mother of pearl inlays on the soles of its feet.
That the soles of the feet are so prominent seems appropriate, because Wat Po is also the home of traditional Thai medicine, a large portion of which is massage. Thai massage uses a combination of stretching and deep tissue work and can be very therapeutic. In fact, a well-regarded school is located on the temple grounds and my visitors stopped in for an hour-long foot massage.
The temple is in the final stages of extensive renovations, and the entire place seems alive with color and light. Here are a trio of chedis, which contain the remains of various members of the Chakri dynasty. The current king is the ninth member of this dynasty.
New roof tiles and paint seem to almost pulsate with color.
And mirrored tiles catch the sun from every angle.
While there, we came across a group of university students who are studying tourism. They had to film themselves giving a speech (in both Thai and English – the Thai version is on the other side of the cue card) about the temple. I watched for a few minutes and then asked some questions, thoroughly embarrassing the young ladies.
The upside of my guests getting massages was that we were at the temple well after the time that tourists normally leave. The temple’s website still lists the closing time as 5:00 pm but almost half a year ago they extended it to 9:00 pm every night. The temple is beautifully illuminated as the sun goes down and is all the more enjoyable and inspiring when it is almost completely devoid of tourists.
With the sun going down early now that we are heading into winter, the sky quickly went through various shades of blue to pink to purple, making for some amazing contrasts with the vivid hues of the chedis and temple buildings.
There are many spotlights to bring out the details of the structures, including these decorations made from shards of broken Chinese pottery. Almost looks like the decorations on a cake, doesn’t it?
I’ve made up my mind that in the future, I am taking guests to Wat Po around sunset, a perfect time to see the real beauty of the temple without the crowds. Plus, there is a really nice restaurant called The Deck that is just across the street along the banks of the Chao Praya River. It is a nice place for an evening meal as another temple, Wat Arun (the Temple of Dawn), is right across the river and is also lit up at night making a pretty backdrop. Ironically, it looks better at dusk than it does at dawn! (Here’s a picture of Tawn and me dining there a few years back.)
Pent-up anger fueled the flames of arson when forty days of anti-government protests ended on May 19 with the surrender by protest leaders to the police. The crowds that had blocked one of Bangkok’s main intersections for more than a month dispersed but before they did, violent elements in the crowd set fire to several buildings around the city in what appeared to be a deliberate and preplanned attack.
In addition to more than 80 people killed and 2100 injured during the protests, one of the victims of the arson attack was the the 44-year old Siam Theatre, which was one of only two remaining single-screen first run cinemas in Thailand’s capital.
Opened in 1966 in Siam Square, one of the first shopping areas in what is now the nexus of Bangkok’s lively Ratchaprasong shopping district, the Siam Theatre along with its sister complex, the Scala, were a reminder of a bygone era. Tickets were still paper and you chose your seats from a photocopied seating chart, which the ticket cashier then dutifully crossed out with a pen. The ushers, uncles that seemed to have been working at the theatres since the very opening, dressed in black slacks, white shirts, and yellow jackets.
In the aftermath of the fire, the bulldozers have moved in and started to demolish the burned out shell and surrounding shops. The property owner, adjacent Chulalongkorn University, has long held a master plan to redevelop this area into a more modern shopping complex as they did just down the block a year ago. Their good fortune, then, that this damage paved the way for the master plan to be implemented.
One wonders why we need another mall in a neighborhood (and an entire city) that is teeming with them. Siam Square and the Siam Theatre were unique elements of the city and were especially important to teenage and university life. As I understand it from my friends who grew up in Bangkok, hanging out in Siam Square was a rite of passage in that period of life where you transition from childhood to adulthood. Another few blocks of those memories have been razed.
Thankfully, the Scala Theatre and the nearby Lido three-plex, both operated and owned by the same family that owned the Siam Theatre, continue to operate.
While some guests were in town, we took a trip to Amphawa, a town in Thailand’s smallest province, Samut Songkhram, to visit the weekend evening floating market that is there. We arrived late afternoon and had no trouble hiring a long-tail boat and heading out on a tour of the khlongs, or canals, of the province.
For those of you who have never been, here is a three-minute video with commentary to give you a sense of what such a boat ride is like.
Above, a flower vendor about to set out for the market.
One of the buildings at Wat (temple) Chulamanee. This building, interestingly enough, was not the main Buddha image hall. Instead, it was a recently built building that houses the remains of the temple’s former head monk, who was apparently highly revered.
Inside the building there is an altar like display, a wax effigy of the monk, and his mummified body in a glass coffin. Uncommon as in Buddhism bodies are normally cremated, but I’ve seen this a few times before.
Wat Bang Khae Noi, another temple on the western shore of the Mae Khlong River. This one has beautiful teak carvings on the interior walls depicting the stories of the Buddha’s previous lives.
A new, more modern arrangement of statues at the temple, overlooking the river. The kneeling figures are not Buddhas but are disciples, praying to the Buddha image in the center. On the right is the depiction of a Buddhist angel. This display wasn’t here last time I was at this temple a year or so ago.
Bruce and Howie enjoying their ride along the river.
Sunset along the Mae Khlong River. (Note that this is not the same as the Ma Kong River, which runs between Thailand and Laos and Thailand and Cambodia.
The flooding in Samut Songkhram province has been very severe. They had just experienced three days of heavy storms and the water level was very high. To get an idea of just how high, notice that in the picture above, the customers at the floating food stalls are sitting on benches that go down one or two steps. Compare that to the picture below, taken in July, when there were at least ten or twelve steps above the water, consistent with where I’ve seen it on all my previous visits.
There is something about monks that makes them very photogenic. Perhaps it is the bright saffron robes, a brilliant color that creates notable contrast in photos. Perhaps it is the pared-down simplicity of their person: no hair, no eyebrows, nothing but their robes and an alms bowl. Perhaps it is the beauty of and image repeated, when you see a row of monks. Whatever it is, I’m not the first photographer in Southeast Asia to notice that almost anytime you have a monk in a scene, there’s the opportunity for an interesting photo.
Last week while walking to the Skytrain station in the front of my alley, I passed a less-common sight: a row of novice monks collecting alms without any adult supervision.
There were nine of them – an auspicious number – along with a tenth who was armed with a megaphone and was announcing their presence. Unfortunately, I didn’t understand exactly what was happening. Normally you can find a few monks from the local temple on the next corner up, right at the Thong Lo fresh market. They are there every morning and the locals, mostly the housewives and housekeepers who are shopping for the day’s ingredients, will make offerings to the monks.
It was unusual to see a who group of novices actually walking the street, so I imagine perhaps they are part of a group that will be entering the monastic life and this is part of their training. Just a guess, though.
Just a note for when you travel in Southeast Asia: Buddhist monks (at least the Theravada variety who wear these saffron robes) do not accept monetary alms directly as they are forbidden to by the Buddha’s teachings. Offerings are made of food, robes, candles, toiletries, etc. Monetary donations are made directly to the temples where they are handled by lay members. In my travels to Hong Kong and Singapore I have seen “monks” on the street soliciting cash donations. It is likely they are not legitimate.
September 28, 2010 will go down in the history of Krungthep (Bangkok) as the day when the scars from May’s political violence truly began to heal for the Big Mango’s shoppers. It will also go down as a red-letter day in the spreading influence of American fast food and the subsequent spreading of Thai waistlines.
To the first point, Central World Plaza, the largest of the buildings that were badly damaged in the fires set by angry protesters after their leaders surrendered to police on May 19, reopened today.
While about 70% of the mall reopened today, the 70% that suffered no damage in the attacks, the remaining portion depicted above is expected to be rebuilt and open next August. The portion opening today includes the Isetan department store, the 15-screen SFX World Cinema, and the grocery store.
Can a mall’s reopening indicate political healing? Of course not. That was just a banal attempt to hook your attention as a reader. Under the surface, the issues and power struggles remain, yet to be resolved. But for those of us who live here, whose lives were disrupted by the political events of April and May, the opening of Central World Plaza is another sign of life getting back to normal.
In other news – and possibly an attempt to draw away some attention from Central World’s reopening – the first Krispy Kreme doughnut franchise in Thailand opened today at the Siam Paragon mall, just down the street from Central World. Doughnuts have been popular in Thailand for at least a few years, as evidenced by countless Dunkin’ Donut and Mister Donut outlets. Last year, a Malaysian chain called Daddy Donut entered the market and they even have a mobile donut truck that sets up in different locations to sell donuts to hapless passersby.
Nonetheless, there is no lack of hoopla surrounding the opening of this first Thai Krispy Kreme. If you want my opinion, I think the fad won’t last. The Hong Kong locations of Krispy Kreme only lasted a few years before they closed and I don’t think the Bangkok crowd, which is quite fickle with its fads, will turn Krispy Kreme into an overwhelming success.
The big question is this: What’s the big deal? Thai culture has so many fantastic desserts and snacks and they are inexpensive, readily at hand, and perhaps slightly healthier than a doughnut. As I notice the Thai high school and university students in their uniforms, bigger, taller, and heftier than their counterparts were even a half-decade ago, starting to approach the bodily proportions of their peers in the American Midwest, I can’t help but wish the influence of Western style fast food chains would wane.
So here’s to progress, as it were. A reopened mall and a new fast food shop. Bangkok, you’ve come a long way.
Few of us have bodyfat percentages in the low single digits, ripped abs, and toned glutes that look even better in spandex than they do naked. So believe me when I say this entry isn’t intended to poke fun at someone who is a bit flabby in the nether regions. It is about something that is wrong, something I saw as I was walking down the street Sunday morning. Wrong in terms of “that’s not how a foreigner should be dressing in Bangkok.”
As I was walking from the Skytrain station towards Sukhumvit Soi 2, a farang (westerner) woman went zipping by me on a microscooter – you know, one of those skateboard-like vehicles with a tall handle. My first thought was, oh, what an interesting way to get around. When I noticed what she was wearing I quickly reached for my camera. It’s a bit hard to see the scooter as she’s blocking it, but I think this picture tells the story pretty fully:
What’s wrong here? As evidenced by the glances the woman is getting from the Thai women, what’s she’s wearing isn’t really… street-appropriate, shall we say. Unless you are a street walker, which I assume she’s not. Much too sheer and revealing for running out and about on a Sunday morning in Bangkok. Even if she was on the way to the gym (she stopped at the Starbucks around the corner, if you must know), some cover-up is called for. This isn’t the type of culture that goes for bare shoulders and revealing, tight-fitting outfits.
christao408 
