girl’s night owwwwwt
fon, me, and maegan at warm up:
thailand is definitely a dance culture. it’s so much fun!
fon and her gigantic bike:
WHENBESSATTACKSblog
favorites
favorite drink, pineapple and vodka, with coconut milk (or something) mixed in:
favorite thai band i’ve seen so far, this FANTASTIC blues band that plays at zoe on tuesdays:
favorite dj, shaun (duh):
favorite bar that’s run out of a van, the jack van (next to spicy club):
another late night
went out with nathan, sellli, and another lil’ lady to a couple of clubs/bars. first place was called fashion paris (located under kad suan kaew), it was swankier with v.i.p. sections, fun lighting, and whatnot. there was a dj, and a band. it wasn’t very crowded, which was a-ok with me. nathan doused me and shaun in body glitter at some point.
fashion paris stage:
nathan and shaun:
shaun, you just got glitter’d:
toooooongs:
whiskey and soda (that’s selli in the background):
ladies:
more pictures:
after fashion paris around 5am we went to some other bar, i think it was called lucky club or something? i don’t remember. this is a super cute picture of nathan and selli… unfortunately i accidentally covered the flash with my finger. dang it:
a very thai halloween
so i wasn’t sure if they really celebrated halloween here or not, so i didn’t really give much thought to a costume until day of. shaun talked to our friend nathan and he said that they were all planning on dressing up. me and shaun went to the kad suan kaew mall to look for ideas… if nothing better came up i was just going to buy a sheet and cut some eyeholes in it. we went the the 1 baht store (not really accurately named – most everything is around 15 baht – but still super cheap) and i picked up some devil horns. i brought to thailand one of the dresses i made, a red one, so i figured red dress + devil horns = adequate halloween costume.
the place was pretty well packed out, there were a lot of people chilling in the street between all the bars. a little over half the people were dressed up, and refreshingly there weren’t a lot of ho bag costumes. i saw maybe two scantily clad ladies… and i didn’t see any store-bought looking costumes at all! it was awesome. there was an american indian, jesus, a couple of devils, pirates, nurses, skeletons, ninjas, and a bunch of other stuff. throughout the night people i didn’t know took pictures with me (i don’t really know why, i wasn’t really dressed up that great). there was a fantastic blues band playing for most of the night, and everyone was having fun. first halloween i’ve had in a long time where i didn’t see a single fight break out!
me drinking a cheap chang beer:
shaun (who didn’t dress up, so nathan slapped some makeup on him) and justin (another zoe dj):
nathan in his thai costume with some ninja chick:
the zoe band room:
i didn’t really take many pictures… i should have but i was too distracted i guess. i did take this little video at the beginning of the night (plus there’s a second or two clip at the end of me that shaun took when he thought he was taking my picture instead of video). it’s a little dark, unfortunately:
what i was doing until the sun came up
why dancing, of course!
last night shaun djed at zoe in yellow. once he was done with the set we hung around for a little while until nathan and them closed up the bar, then went to this crazy mega-dance-club place that had like 4 or 5 floors of different dance clubs. we went to the one that (i think) was at the top that was called “scratching” and it was packed out pretty well, but not annoyingly so. i danced the whole time without a break, but shaun went to the bathroom a couple of times. when he came back he said that when he went to pee, these people showed up and started cracking his neck and back for him for tips. i don’t know if that’s what they do in the ladies’ bathroom, since i didn’t go, but it sounds kind of cool and like it would be a little distracting. there were two djs, and they were both good. people here don’t really dance the same way as they do in america, it’s a lot more respectful and a lot less booty-poppin. i didn’t get any strange creepy dudes grinding up on me all night long!
here’s the complex that the club was in (it’s called mandelay something):
we left around (i think) 6am, and the place was still as packed out as it was before. and on a tuesday night! from what i understand it’s just like that in thailand. it’s fun for me every once in awhile, but i don’t think i could dance ’til the breaka breaka every night.
here’s some farang dude with our friend nathan and me:
here’s this guy who works at zoe in yellow, can’t remember his name. he’s the only person who works there who doesn’t know much english:
me and shaun:
aaaaand here’s some random nonsense:
and here’s the sun starting to come up on our way home:
zoe in yellow bar cluster
a panoramic picture (i cropped myself out of it so there’s a little piece towards the middle missing) of the bar cluster around zoe in yellow… including panda bar, cafe del sol, heaven beach, and jar bar. there’s lots more but i don’t know what they’re all named.
firedancer
a firedancer at the zoe in yellow bar cluster:
i think the white guy was drunk, i’d be surprised if he didn’t have some burn marks the way he kept catching the baton on the ends.
there’s a firedancer most of the time at this bar cluster, and there’s always live music. it’s near the u.n. irish pub, and really close to where we live. there’s also a karaoke club or two, plus zoe in yellow usually has some awesome food. lots of rasta bars, which would be kind of annoying in the states but out here in the jungle they seem more appropriate.
zoe in yellow
shaun had his first dj gig at this place called zoe in yellow. it’s a really cool little bar-type place… most days they have a ham hock bbq outside so you can order rad sandwiches and whatnot. i think they liked shaun’s set and asked him to come back to dj the next full moon party.
setting up:
the bar:
a fire dancer outside:
elephants
ran into a “little” elephant on the way out to some bars the other night:
you pay 20 baht for some sugar cane to feed the elephant. pretty cool!
we were on our way to this bar cluster that’s close by where we live. it’s full of mostly reggae bars, but there’s some other options to. one of the bars is called zoe in yellow and there’s usually a dj who plays electronica of various kinds:
there’s this other place called cafe del sol that has live cover music by this one guy almost every night. he’s really good! there’s another place called heaven beach that has a live band i think every night as well. they do covers of mostly 90s alternative music. they’re really good too, and the crowd really gets into it:
and here’s shaun with a big chang beer (it’s cheap and not too bad):
in chiang mai, seeing an elephant doesn’t mean you’re drunk (necessarily)
so there’s this cluster of bars really close to where we live… it’s pretty cool, there’s always live music in one or more of them, and the people are really laid back. there’s a ton of alt 90s music, which is excellent (anyone who knows me know i have grown weary of the retro 80s crap that’s been going on since the 80s ended… enough is enough! bring on another decade for crying out loud! anyway…). it really brings me back to when i first was getting into music, lots of nostalgia and whatnot. me and shaun went and got more than a few chang beers there the other night. we were sitting outside and a baby elephant came up! it was so awesome, though i did feel kind of bad for the little guy, walking around the city. apparently some elephant handlers bring their elephants out at night and get people to buy sugar cane off of them to feed them. it was pretty cool to just see an elephant hanging out though. we didn’t get a picture, but i’m sure we’ll see more. rad! we danced for the rest of the night to the band playing inside. it was really fun, but the next morning i felt like that elephant had come home with us and sat on my head all night. it was worth it though.