Christmas in Bangkok

Since I have not been home to enjoy the holiday season I treated myself and traveled into Bangkok one night for a dinner at the top of The Banyan Tree Hotel which has a great view. Bangkok although in a predominantly Buddhist country does get some Christmas flair going for it, at least it has the capitalist part of Christmas down...every mall has decorations and sales. So I traveled to Bangkok with a friend. While trying to find out hotel (the taxi drivers are not very good with directions here for taxi drivers) and although I gave him the address in Thai he could not figure out where this hotel was. We pulled up to a hotel with one letter difference in it than ours and since this is Thailand and spelling is always quite arbitrary we thought we had finally arrived. We paid the taxi driver...because even if this is not our hotel we are not getting back into his cab. As we approach the door they open it for us...but quite a weird scene was going on to our right. We see a man hand a lady a bag and as she opens the bag she screams and a live rat jumps out. Now the lady is scared but the rat is even more scared and he takes off...where? but of course in the door of the hotel being held open for us. The only clear place of shield in the lobby was a fake Christmas tree...decorated with tinsel and adorned with fake gifts around it. Well the rat digs for cover in the tinsel and presents. My friend and I just look at each other and enter the hotel..I mean what could we do. Part of me wanted this to be our hotel because the journey has been long, but on the other hand there was a pretty big rat in the lobby. Meanwhile we are at the desk two dudes (one who originally had the rat in the bag...why we will never know) are crouched around the tree trying to catch the rat with a box and a bag. The rat is rummaging in the tinsel and gifts...pretty funny site to see as the nice guy at the front desk tells us this is not our hotel. We leave the comical scene and grab another taxi. Finally we find our hotel where I am grateful for a hot shower (this was also a treat because I do not have this luxury in my town) and no rats. We ate dinner 61 stories up in an open air restaurant elegantly titles "Vertigo." The view of Bangkok at night is really pretty. I walked around the city and found some comforting Christmas decorations. Christmas in Thailand won't be the same as at home but good thing there is always next year.
This is one of my favorite pictures.