Bangkok: The North American Tour

I order the American Breakfast. Two fried eggs. Two pieces of white toast. Ham. Bacon.

Halfway around the world, inundated the exotic sights, sounds, and smells of Bangkok, I commit the cardinal sin of wanderlust warriors: crave familiarity and pay extra for it. We are on a two-month tour of Southeast Asia. It is day three.

This does not bode well.

Let me provide a basis for atonement by sharing that the days leading up to this morning’s lapse have been, without a doubt, wondrous.

I take my shame sunny-side up.

First, I paid $1.88 Canadian to eat my fill of the best Pad Thai I’ve ever had. I’m convinced the best there ever has been.

Full justification for 20 hours of continuous travel.

Second, I had one of those genuinely beautiful and authentic travel experiences that most truth-seeking millennials only dream about.

Our travel group of six is leaving Wat Arun, the Buddhist Temple of Dawn. We take a wrong turn and find ourselves alone the quiet and winding corridors where Buddhist monks reside. Something striking is how clean and well-maintained the compound is. When renouncing all worldly possessions, the monks appear to have started by abandoning litter and dirt. The result is quite serene.

The white stone path we’re following is spotless, reflecting the afternoon sun to give the appearance of glowing. Glimpses through doorways reveal equal tidiness inside where ornamental effigies of Buddha stand out against modest living quarters. Appointed with only a wooden sleeping platform and a hook for robes, they are perfect spaces for seeking enlightenment or filming very succinct episodes of MTV’s Cribs.

We come across an exit and find ourselves on a back street. Immediately, a car horn shatters the residual peace of the temple. We’re back in the Bangkok we’ve come to know over two days.

Except, we aren’t. No English signage. No sales people. Within five minutes of walking, it’s clear our route is off the tourist track.

Within ten minutes, we’re in a different world.

We’re walking the border of what looks like a late-stage shantytown. Houses are stacked on houses. Corrugated tin roofing stretches as far as the eye can see. Open-air gaps that serve as windows give an unobstructed view of clothes being washed, children being wrangled, and dinners being prepared. Thousands of lives carried out in asynchrony. In the air, the aroma of oily cooking intermingles with the stench of wet garbage. The overall feeling is one of barely contained chaos.

Perspective inducing.

For a while, I’m silent, lost in thought. A shout from Chris, my long-time roommate and travel companion, snaps me from my reverie.

“What’re you thinkin’?”

“I think I understand why people become monks.”

Approaching a canal overpass, we hear peals of laughter, unadulterated joy ringing out in defiance of its surroundings. There’s the dull thump of a soccer ball being launched followed by the clanging of chain link. It’s a futsal game, soccer where a smaller playing area means fancy footwork trumps cardiovascular fitness. The court is ingeniously integrated into the support structure of the overpass, creating a permanently shaded recreational space.

It’s three local boys, not older than twelve, playing against three white twentysomethings. The gameplay is impressive and we spend a moment gawking at the fence.

“Wanna play?”

We don’t need to be asked twice. The next hour is magic. Strangers become teams. Sport transcends language barriers. Twelve-year-old Thai kids show us that skill trumps puberty. We walked home in the rain, smiling through a tropical downpour.

See? Super authentic. Couldn’t have been planned or paid for. The kind of experience to be recounted at a cocktail party before breathily insisting that the world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.

A moment by the company formerly known as Kodak.

Now, I want a day off from being worldly. A day where things are familiar. I stuff my mouth with a forkful of American Breakfast and decide on a mission:

Today, I will do a tour of the North American businesses in the blocks Khaosan Road, the backpacker nexus of Bangkok and location of my hostel. I will see how the forces of local culture, tourist influence, and incumbent Western business norms shape them. I will learn what a 7-Eleven, McDonald’s, Burger King, and Starbucks look like when reflected across the international date line.

Go online and you can find professional photos of every temple in Thailand. This is the stuff you can’t google.

7-Eleven

These are everywhere. As my friend Killian, who arrived in Bangkok ahead of me, put it, “I’ve seen more 7-Eleven’s in Bangkok than I have traffic lights.” I’ve been counting since. So far, he’s right.

Walking inside, any hope of familiarity is dashed.

Because Thai 7-Elevens are not restricted to the position of gas station sidekick, they play a more diverse role in the retail landscape. In addition to salty snacks and pop, Thai 7-Eleven’s offer a wider range of everyday essentials from books of Buddha’s teachings to skincare products.

Nothing makes you feel more manipulated than staring at a shelf of Thai whitening creams and remembering that these same companies sell self-tanner.

I make the decision to pick up some chips and a drink. Results are mixed.

The two chip flavours are ‘Tomato’ and ‘Extra Barbeque’. Tomato is a win. It’s the exact, nostalgia-inducing taste of Campbell’s Tomato Soup. There’s no need to dip a cracker - the soup is the cracker. On a ranked list of human accomplishments this chip is second only to the moon landing. It is one above the artificial heart.

When in Rome.

Extra Barbeque is a miss. Abandoning the accepted definition of barbeque flavour as a specific combination of sweet and smoky, this chip goes with the more literal interpretation of ‘the flavour of something you might put on a barbeque’. Specifically, a chicken skewer. The result is one part tummy ache for every two parts grease.

The drink is not so much a miss as an abomination. For background, heightened image-consciousness among the younger generation of Thai men has led to an increase in the consumption of male-targeted beauty products. Now, imagine you are the Chief of Product Innovation at a Thai beverage company and you hear about this trend one day at lunch. The expectation is that you might shrug, think “Neato!”, or, at the very most, buy your teenage son a face cream and count yourself progressive.

The reality is ‘Man-some’.

Man-some’s label is a non-subtle attempt to convince the drinker that consumption of the beverage will bestow upon them dashing good looks. The logical basis for this is the debunked premise that consuming collagen orally prevents wrinkles. The illogical basis for this is a sexy man face.

Cold drink. Hot you.

The flavour of Man-some approximates green apple, but it’s hard to taste through the overwhelming horror of its sweetness. Man-some’s flavour suggests a glucose content that would thicken your blood into simple syrup. I sampled the sugar-reduced version. I’m convinced that imbibing a bottle of full strength Man-some would cause diabetes to run in your family for a minimum of three generations.

7-Eleven in Thailand is a different beast.

McDonald’s

McDonald’s has done something that corporations everywhere envy: successfully gone global by adopting to local cultures while keeping their identity recognizable. Thailand is no exception.

There’s a framed picture of the Thai King. His unblinking stare, commonplace around Bangkok, lends much of the city an undeniably Orwellian feel. The menu has all the mainstays – burgers, fries, pop – but a few new members have joined the ensemble: a chicken carbonara wrap, a surprising number of items featuring ham.

The camera placement sure doesn’t help.

In the main restaurant area, there’s a lone sink that appears to have gotten lost on the way to the washroom and made a life for itself next to the ordering counter.

True accountability for ‘Employees must Watch Hands’.

It’s the first time I’ve seen this cultural tweaking first-hand. It’s unnerving.

Every Olympics there are ads where athletes talk about the sense of comfort they get when they find a McDonald’s while training abroad or competing at the games. They walk into the restaurant, point to a Big Mac, and say things along the lines of “It feels like you’re back at home!”

In reality, it feels like you walked back into your house only to discover that, while you were away, somebody has broken in, rearranged your furniture, replaced your curtains, and individually touched every item in your fridge. The sense is one of violation.

Burger King

In a city where every inch of available cement has been colonized by street vendors, Burger King sports a spacious umbrellaed patio.

This, Dane Cook, is the BK Lounge.

In Thailand, Burger King is premium. Etched insignia on gleaming floor-to-ceiling windows premium. The last Burger King I visited in Canada kept the lavatory key behind the counter to prevent the handicapped bathroom from being used as a private injection site. This is vertigo inducing. It’s like finding out that, back home, the pimply, overweight exchange student in your remedial algebra course is heir to the Saudi throne.

I entertain the idea that this is a fake location, the one they use for TV ads.

The only modifications to the menu are the translation to Thai and added option of chili sauce. Notably unchanged are the prices. 209 Baht for the Whopper combo comes out to $7.83 Canadian. Totally reasonable by North American standards, but five times the price of the average meal everywhere else on the block. Michelin Tire taste at Michelin Star prices.

Deep in its heart, mustard always knew it was the expendable one.

There’s no picture of the king here, Thai or Burger. But, in a country where royalty is taken very seriously, I can’t help but wonder what locals think of the cardboard crowns.

Starbucks

There’s an icy blast of conditioned air and, suddenly, you’re back. When Hollywood inevitably greenlights a Wizard of Oz remake, this is where Dorothy will appear post-heel click.

The papers on the newsstand are in English. The menu too (or as close to English as any Starbuck’s menu is). There’s space to manoeuvre and I’m not sweating. There’s no way this is Bangkok.

A photo of what is conceivably any Starbucks in North America, complete with overpriced coffee and ethnic minority workers.

The challenge in providing a description is that everything is so standard. Artsy photo of rural coffee production. Check. Little tables and plug access so aspiring artists with MacBooks can pound out that screenplay. Check. A perfect replication for weary expats and tourists.

The only difference is that, in a Thai Starbucks, it’s feasible that the employees know the guy in this photo.

I leave almost immediately.

Being inside that Starbucks reminded me why I was so thrilled to come to Southeast Asia in the first place – for adventure, greater perspective, the ability to read Dr. Seuss’s ‘The Places You’ll Go!’ without pangs of regret.

A common phrase in Thailand is “Same, same. But Different.” It’s a staple in the vocabulary of Thai sales people and tour guides, usually said quickly as a way to settle some uncertainty while remaining ambiguous. Are you sure there’s no meat in this one? Is that a real Rolex? Why am I paying double what he paid?

Same, same. But different.

Frustrating as it can be, it serves as a valuable reminder to embrace the discomfort that comes with new experiences. So much of life is “Same, same.” It’s the “But different” that makes it exciting.