Virtual Friends

Posted on 28 June 2009 by christao408

Last month I did some pruning of my Facebook “friends” list. There were several people on there whom I don’t really know and definitely don’t have any regular contact with. Given the amount of information that Facebook provides me, a mostly uncontrollable flood, I finally asked myself, “Why am I getting updates about people I don’t really know, haven’t seen in more than a year, and don’t stay in touch with?”

Now, I’m the first to recognize that a virtual “friend” isn’t going to be the same thing as a real-life friend. But there are “friends” on Facebook who, even if we haven’t spent much time hanging out together, we are still regularly in contact with one another. We comment on each other’s updates and photos, etc.

Same thing here on Xanga. There are many people in Xangaland with whom I feel I’ve developed a close rapport. We share stories about our lives, comment on each other’s stories, have little dialogues. I interact with some of these people more than I do with my family. So I don’t want to suggest that virtual “friends” can’t have a lot of value.

But it does seem like a point was reached where I had to make some decisions, at least with regards to those Facebook “friends”.

I knew that doing so might come back to haunt me. Sure enough, this week I received an email from one of these pruned “friends”:

We used to be facebook friends… OK, we haven’t hung out in a while, but I’m a little surprised that you deleted me. I’m pretty sure that I haven’t done anything to sprite you.

Anyhow, not broken up over it. It’s just kinda funny.

cheers,
R

To which I thought, “You may not be broken up about it, but it must have bothered you enough to send this message.”

After a few days of figuring out the most diplomatic way to say, “I don’t really know you so I don’t feel the need to call you a friend,” I settled on the following:

Hi R,

Rest assured my deleting you doesn’t have anything to do with you having spited me. After the most recent facebook format was put into place, I’ve found it difficult to manage the amount of information I’m receiving. The flood of status updates, quizzes, photo album adds, etc. is making it difficult for me to stay up to date with those people whom I know well and stay in touch with regularly.

Because of that, I decided to start pruning my list of virtual friends. I feel that I don’t really need to be receiving updates on people I’ve only met a couple of times and haven’t had any contact with in a year or more.

I hope you’ll understand my decision to try and define virtual “friendships” less like acquaintances and more like friendships I have in real life.

Regards,

Chris

Do you think I handled it diplomatically enough? It is tough to tell someone that, but I didn’t want to wuss out and make a lame excuse like, “Oh, that must have been an accident.” If I value honesty and directness from others, I guess I should be willing to be honest and direct – and hopefully tactful – myself.

Where are you on the virtual friends issue?

Pat’s Back

Posted on 8 November 2008 by christao408

Trish arrived last night at 2:00. Thankfully, I was able to get several hours of sleep before going to the airport and then several more upon my return. When it comes to sleep, I’m not sure if two halves equal a whole or not, but that’s what I have to work with today.

Trish (she was “Patricia” before but has done a bit of midlife reinvention – good for her) is back after her first visit two years ago.

Right: Trish at Wat Yai in Ayhutthaya in November 2006.

A friend and former professional colleague of Albert’s, we were introduced in 1999 when Albert and I attended my sister’s wedding in Kansas City. Family housing was full, so Trish offered us guest rooms at her house, which was nearby.

Since then she has become a close friend of the family, someone who is always a pleasure to have at birthday parties and holiday gatherings.

A widow with two post-university children, Trish has a taste for style and fashion. While she was here two years ago, she had several outfits custom made from Thai silk, based on her own designs. She received so many compliments that she has decided to start her own online business, selling dresses made to order from Thai silk.

The designs are varied and I’ll share more of them this week, but many are geared towards mothers of the bride/groom, or women of a certain age who are brides themselves. Designs that flatter the women who look more like society as a whole, rather than the unfed supermodels that we see airbrushed on the covers of Vogue.

Above, Trish goes through a final fitting on one of her outfits while Tawn’s mother, Nui, looks on.

(Have to give kudos to jojobaDESIGNS who shared a lot of useful information about online retailing. Check out her beautiful jewelry designs.)

Trish chose a great time to visit. The weather has been cool and breezy, the rain seems to be letting up a little, and not only will she be here for my birthday but also for Loy Khrathong.

Over the next few days, I’ll provide more details about Trish’s visit and the dress-making adventures. That should be interesting. Also, there’s some news on the home front: we may finally buy a television after living nearly a year without one.

Congratulations to Pune and Detlev

Posted on 30 August 2008 by christao408

In February, we traveled up to Chiang Rai in the north of Thailand to attend the Thai wedding ceremony for Pune and her groom, Detlev. Entry about that here.

Pune has since moved to Germany with Detlev and today, Saturday the 30th of August, they are having their German wedding ceremony. Tawn and I were originally going to attend, but the Italy travel plans by Tawn’s parents threw our plans for a trip to Germany into disarray.

Nonetheless our thoughts are with Pune and Detlev on their special day and we send them them the following wishes:

Congratulations!

A Whole Family of Visitors

Posted on 28 August 2008 by christao408

Earlier in the week, we had the pleasure of entertaining a family of four from Hong Kong including two- and four-year old children. There is nothing to make you look at your city through a different set of eyes than to see it with someone of an entirely different age.

But first, catching up on other news:

Kenny was curious what the flowers that Tawn buys and arranges look like. I’ll try to include more of them over time, but here is the $2 bunch of orchids:

Also, from one of the English-language papers in town comes this advertisement about various elective medical procedures you can have done by the Pratunam Polyclinic, the same one that did work on Miss Tiffany Universe 2007. Please note that the orchiectomy is no longer available. Instead of just revising the advertisement they simply crossed it out. “Nope, we sold ’em all out for today.”

Like me, you might wonder what an orchiectomy is. A quick Google search removed the mystery: the procedure is more commonly known as castration.

Which explains why it is no longer available. See this entry from April about the debate over teenage castration by young men who think they may end up being women. (Interesting side note: when I browse through my blog’s footprints, at least a few times a week I find people who linked to my blog by performing a search similar to “teenage+castration” or “teenage+transsexual”. That’s food for thought, isn’t it?)

Back to my guests. Tehlin and I went to school together in California, studying the same major, and have stayed in touch throughout the years. Tawn and I attended her wedding to Chris (same name, different bloke) in Manila in January 2002, where I actually did one of the readings.

After picking them up at 4:00 am thanks to a typhoon-delayed flight, I was back late that morning to meet them in their hotel lobby so we could set out for a little sight seeing. They stayed at the Peninsula, a hotel so nice I felt guilty waiting for them in the lobby lounge. Not so guilty as to forego an order of tea, served in this beautiful silver tea set:

The Peninsula is on the west bank of the Chao Praya River, opposite the core part of the city. The hotel is designed so all the rooms have a river view, below:

We took the public river taxi to the Grand Palace and discovered that a nearly five-year old really isn’t interested in glittering spires and jade Buddhas. Especially on a hot day. Here are some shots from along the way.

Below, at the Oriental Hotel pier, directly across from the Peninsula, I saw what I thought was an interesting picture: a cross-river ferry completely surrounded by the water hyacinth that chokes many of the waterways in Thailand.

I’ve been to the Grand Palace at least twenty times but I try to find one new angle from which to view it each time I visit. Here, a kinaree – a half-human half-bird creature, stands in front of four Khmer-style chedis.

Despite all the interesting things to see, Sam was most interested in the minnows hiding under the water lily pads.

By the time we finished with the Grand Palace, there wasn’t much energy left to see anything else. We returned to the hotel for a rest and then went out to dinner at a riverside restaurant with a great view.

Not wanting to wait for the public taxi and hoping to add some excitement to Sam’s life, I hired a long-tail speedboat, below:

If you have enough people, it is actually a pretty affordable way to catch a breeze and zip around. Sam was alternately thrilled, terrified, and tired. Here’s a brief video:

While Chris and Sam went swimming at the hotel’s beautiful pool, Tehlin and I caught up and had afternoon lattes. Forgetting my senses for a moment, I ordered an apple tart to go with the latte:

The next day we did some shopping as Chris and Tehlin were looking for home furnishings. Having just spent a lot of time going through our own remodel, we had some ideas about where to take them. Several hours later, passing through Central World Plaza, I decided to stop for one big bite of sushi:

Sam and Chris returned to the hotel after Sam took a rather nasty header running directly into a bench at the Paragon mall. Don’t know why he didn’t see it, but he side-swiped it and did a forward flip, landing squarely on his back. Chris and Tehlin decided it didn’t require a trip to the emergency room, though Sam did look sore the next day. Hopefully he is back up to speed soon.

Meanwhile, Tehlin and I kept shopping and then stopped in the afternoon so she could see our house firsthand. Isabel loved walking on the jute rug, after first being a bit cautious about its texture.

After an hourlong foot massage during which three staff members handled Isabel and kept her from injuring herself as she jumped from massage chair to massage chair, we headed out and regroups with Chris and Sam and Tawn for dinner.

So nice to have visitors in town. In fact, the day after Chris and Tehlin headed back to Hong Kong, we were able to have dinner with Steve, who was in town from Los Angeles for business. You can check his blog to see if he gives a fuller account of the pleasant evening.

A pilot and a flight attendant get married

Posted on 17 May 2008 by christao408

Moving from the subject of same-sex marriage to the subject of different-sex ones, Saturday we went to the wedding of Tawn’s school friend Bua and her fiancee Pom. Their engagement party was thirteen months ago and it is hard to believe a year has passed so quickly.

Bua is a Qantas flight attendant and Pom is a first officer with Orient Thai Airlines (a mostly domestic Thai carrier) and so their engagement party and subsequent wedding was airline themed. Here’s the wedding invitation:

We arrived at the Hyatt Grand Erawan with Pim and her husband Arm to find the area just outside the ballroom converted into a check-in lobby, completed with two “Love Airways” podia, below.

We sat at a table of Tawn’s school friends, all of whom have had babies recently. Unfortunately, with 600 guests the bride and groom were never together long enough for me to get a picture of them! We had plenty of time to visit with our friends, though, and to play with the babies. Actually, there were a lot of guests with young children. Bua had arranged for a play area outside the ballroom complete with small jungle gyms, toys, and a clown armed with incredible balloon animal making skills. He made a good Mickey Mouse, a passable Ultraman, and an amazing Little Mermaid.

Below left, Tawn and a shocked Nam-ing, Jaa and Teuk’s 6-month old. Below right, me with Jae Jae, Saa and Job’s 3-month old, in his cute little jeans. Unfortunately, Pim and Arm’s nearly 3-year old daughter, Tara, decided she would rather go visit her grandparents this evening. Tawn even tried to convince her by telling her that her Uncle Chris would be there, but that didn’t seem to be much of a selling point.

The food was a Chinese banquet with an especially tasty Peking duck. The skin was super-crispy and the plum sauce was unusually not sickeningly sweet.

Come over for breakfast, won’t you?

Posted on 4 May 2008 by christao408

The second half of our weekend was more relaxing and less do-it-yourself than the first. We had ten friends over for Sunday breakfast – a real breakfast, starting at 10:00, instead of one of those brunches. Homemade buttermilk biscuits with sausage gravy; oven roasted potatoes and bell peppers; soft scrambled eggs with salsa; and assorted fruits. Mimosas and fresh-brewed coffee and tea for those who were thirsty.

What an interesting mix of guests we had. Brian made it to our house for the first time as he had been out of town on occassions when we had previously invited him. Stuart and Piyawat were both able to make it as were Ken and Chai. Of course, no party is a party without Vic there, and Doug brought two guests: One of them, Gaye, is a native of Istanbul who has been studying massage in Chiang Mai for the past several months before returning home this Wednesday. The other, Orn, works for the American Chamber of Commerce in Thailand in membership and outreach. Needless to say, they both had such interesting stories to share.

Sometimes after we throw parties the question arises, “Was it worth the effort?” While I did choose to do a little extra cooking Saturday evening to prepare (I rendered the drippings from some fresh pork belly to make my own lard, which is the best fat to use when making roasted breakfast potatoes. Dinner potatoes with rosemary are better with olive oil, though.), the dishes were all very easy to make, so this time both Tawn and I were relaxed enough to really enjoy the party and the answer to the question is definitely, “Yes!”

Thanksgiving Day 2007

Posted on 22 November 2007 by christao408

In most any big city on earth, the vestiges of your own foreign culture and traditions can be found. From the little Ethiopian enclaves in Los Angeles to the Bangladeshi community in Stuttgart to the remaining bits of the French in Laos, we bring a bit of ourselves and our cultures wherever we go.

Yesterday evening our bit of American culture in Khrungthep was found in a restaurant located down a scrappy soi behind a theatre with a marquee proclaiming it as “the best female impersonator show in Bangkok”. That was where our slice of Thanksgiving Day was located.

Left: Roka and Jhone, after she told Jhone (who is in sales) that she would never buy anything from him.

As Roka, Markus and I walked from the Skytrain station to join the ten other people in our party, I was thinking about how exciting my blog entry the next morning would be: a play by play account of the experience of a Cajun/Creole Thanksgiving Dinner at the Bourbon Street restaurant.

Sitting down to write this morning, there are certainly plenty of things to tell:

I could tell you how disappointed I was that Tawn couldn’t be there, since he was at the airport picking up his partents. I could tell you about the chaotic mess and disorganization that left our group waiting, even though we had reservations, for a half-hour before we were split into two tables and, eventually, reunited to one table. Or I could tell you about the buffet which, while the food was tasty, was constantly running out – especially of turkey, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin and pecan pies, the staples of a Thanksgiving dinner.

But before we arrived at the restaurant last night, as we walked by Benjasiri Park, there was a beggar in the middle of the sidewalk, legless, pulling himself by his hands and holding a plastic cup in his teeth. A man crawling like a worm.

So as I sit down to write this morning, as those of you in the United States are just finishing up your turkey dinners, let me instead tell you this about last night’s little slice of Thanksgiving in Khrungthep:

I am thankful for the health I and my friends and loved ones enjoy, giving us the means to earn a living, enjoy our lives, and walk upright in this world. I am thankful for the bountiful food we had and the means by which to eat so well. And not least, I am thankful for the pleasant company and the six new friends I met, the opportunity to visit and talk and laugh and learn about different lives and different experiences that brought us all to the same table.

Whatever your worries, whatever your ills, remember to count your blessings and be thankful for them. For if you have the means to access a computer and the leisure time to read or write a weblog, you most likely are among the fortunate.

Happy Thanksgiving!

From Left around the table: Marc, Piyawat, Stuart, (a friend of Doug’s whose name I did not catch), Steve, Markus, Roka, Jhone, Nicha, Doug, Brian, and Tri.

First Thanksgiving in Bangkok

Posted on 27 November 2005 by christao408

Thanksgiving weekend came and went and not a single turkey was sighted in Bangkok. In fact, Thursday was another “regular” day for me – not that I’ve been here long enough to have truly established a routine. The good news is that I was able to get several days’ worth of work done while my colleagues in the US were busy eating and then digesting their holiday meals.

On Friday morning – Thursday dinnertime in the US – Tawn and I started two separate phone calls to the States to talk with relatives. The day concluded with the gala 32nd birthday celebration and housewarming for Tawn’s high school friend Eddy Ritthiworachart. Eddy and his partner, Lek, purchased a 3-bedroom house in a suburban Bangkok development almost two years ago. Eddy’s responsibility since then has been to take it through an extensive finishing process to create a tranquil oasis for Lek, a doctor who usually works seven days a week and wants somewhere to unwind on his occasional days off.

Eddy partnered with Ble, a fairly well-known designer here in Thailand, to shop for antiques and pull together a design for the house. The results, as you shall see below, are fantastic.

Sadly, Eddy has no experience throwing parties so he asked us to host the party for him. His new kitchen is still unfurnished, so it really turned into a catering event of sorts for us. Things worked out beautifully and the dozen or so guests had a wonderful time.

Image 1: Living and dining room area in Eddy’s house with a gilded Naga horn in the style seen atop temples in northern Thailand.

Image 2: Tawn with his friend and Hill & Knowlton colleague, Mon.

Image 3: Tawn looks on as Ble, the house’s designer, unveils his contribution to dinner – a variety of Thai-style appetizers very creatively presented in a huge bamboo steamer.

Image 4: Chris and Tawn in the lovely outdoor courtyard of Eddy’s house.

Image 5: Eddy figures out how to handle the trick candles we put on his birthday cake. After blowing them out, they would relight, much to his shock and irritation. The house ended up filled with smoke. Finally, some water was brought in as the solution.

Image 6: Tawn’s friend Kat, Eddy’s boyfriend Lek, Eddy, and Kat’s friend Candy have a good laugh in the foyer.

Image 7:Tawn and his friend Tao have a good laugh over an antique Chinese drum that Ble and Eddy used as a side table.

Image 8: Party-goers – from the left: Ble, Mon, Eddy, Tawn, Candy, Kat, and Lek.

Visiting Friends in SF

Posted on 3 September 2005 by christao408

Out in San Francisco this weekend to visit friends.

Paul and I took BART out Friday evening to see Bruce and Howie. They live out in San Ramon, 45 miles east of the City.

Bruce’s parents were in town from the central California coast – the area where “Sideways” was set. I’ve wanted to meet them and was glad to have an opportunity.

Dinner was supposedly a “simple” affair. Not the case, really, as Bruce is a passionate cook and his simplest meals are actually very grand. This evening, he prepared four different gourmet pizzas for us, preceeded by an amuse bouche of mussels – the recipie came from this book. Very tasty indeed.

This morning (Saturday) I woke up early and had breakfast at Miss Millie’s restaurant (24th Street and Castro) with Bob, Anita’s roommate. Bob’s partner is also in Thailand, so we have lots in common. Bob looks a lot like my friend Albert. I’m going to make it a project to get a picture of both of them together.

After breakfast I headed to the airport where I did a fun overnight trip to JFK. More about that tomorrow.

christao408

The adventures of an expat American who moved to Bangkok for his husband.

Tag Archives: friends