Massage Meditation and Media

August 29th, 2003 at 12:00am

I’ve had a few days now here to do all the things I needed to, and now I am ready to make a move. I will most likely head north to Chiang Mai in the next day or two.

Yesterday I took a trip over to Wat Po, the home of the giant reclining Buddha and location of the famous massage school in Thailand. Everyone always says, ‘you HAVE to go to Wat Po for a massage,’ so I finally did. And what was the verdict from someone who has spent more than a year in Asia and has had countless massages? Yes, It was really good, and worth the extra money. The woman I had was spot-on with her position and power. My only complaint ‘if’ I have one, is that the sala is a bit cramped and crowded and loud with everyone talking. I sort-of expected Wat Po to set the example for other massage salas, but their’s was as standard or even sub-standard as any other. Still. I think they do an excellent job on massage and that is what really matters. You don’t pay $10 and get the Hyatt Regency after all.

After that I walked over to another temple, Wat Mahadhatu, to inquire about doing a meditation course there. I spoke with a female monk about the setup. She was interested to have a chance to practice her English, so we spoke more about her daughter and family than the meditation. I think it would be a good place to go if you didn’t have a lot of time and needed to stay in Bangkok, but personally I found this temple to be a bit dark and dirty and more disturbingly, there were at least 4 or 5 drunk Thai men that I had to pass while walking down the alley to get to the place (although really I have nothing bad to say about them because they did show me where to go), but I thought, well I just don’t know that this is the best environment for me. I did get some good information on all the places to go in Thailand though, and yeah, so that is why I am leaning more towards Chiang Mai.

What else. Yeah, always fun to watch the tourists and see what everyone else is doing. Seem to be a lot of Americans and Europeans around at the moment, must be because it’s August and summer holiday, which means they will all be gone in another week or two. You’ve still got all sorts, including the ‘hippies’ who walk up and down Kho San Road in their bare feet. I would love to just ask one of them if they’ve ever heard of Hepatitis. Really.

Hey whatever. The most interesting thing happening in town is the APEC summit coming up next month. Lots of big wigs heading over, from Bill Gates to George W. himself, and even though the ‘President’ is not actually coming over until mid-October, the secret service are already here looking for terrorists. The Bangkok police are even going after tourists who appear suspicious because they are ‘buying too many newspapers’ and seem ‘too interested in the news.’ Read it in the Bangkok Post! I have never seen one cop on Khoa San Road, and now even where I am writing this, there are 8 of them having breakfast across the street. Cops everywhere in Bangkok. Should get interesting around here in the next month.

Anyway that is the latest going’s-on around here. I’ve got a few more things that I’d like to babble on about, like how ‘safe’ I think it is in Asia at the present time, or about how I just got finished reading Michael Moore’s ‘Stupid White Men’ and I now have hope that not ALL Americans are brainwashed by the US government, or that I still think colonic irrigation will cure so much disease in the world, but I have plenty of time to get into all of that later. Now it’s time for a coffee.

Bet you never saw a picture of the Reclining Buddhas feet

Entry Filed under: Bangkok,Thailand