Shabushi, a Movie & the Black Swan

 

For those of you who don’t know about the Black Swan in Bangkok, I’m sorry: you are missing out on a gem of a pub—it’s perhaps even my most favoured pub on the planet... just so long as they have Guinness on tap, which apparently has been a bit of a challenge when teachers have gone to visit this year.

 

Shabushi,

My first stop into the Black Swan during the trip was on a Friday after hanging out downtown with a few students for a movie & all you can eat at the sushi bar Shabushi. The students & I had gathered together to go watch Unknown at Paragon Cineplex (another item on my checklist) in the afternoon. We needed to kill a few hours’ worth of time before the film began and to wait for Bank—another student—to arrive, so we meandered around downtown Bangkok for a couple hours, looking for stuff to do & places to eat at.

While we were killing time, I asked them to take me over to Siam Centre, which the news had reported last year to be “gutted by fire” during the political riots in the area last year. We walked along ped-way underneath the BTS line to the large shopping complex & I was surprised to see that the building looked pretty much as normal as it always had, except for some scaffolding erected along its south-facing exterior like an enormous bamboo spider’s web. As we walked past the dusty construction area and entered the mall’s southern entrance, it turned out that the shopping complex was mostly untouched and that what the news reported to be “gutted by fire” was only really fire damage to maybe a few stores on each of the first 5 floors on the south side of the building. We walked through the mall up to its eighth floor & all of the shops that had been there before I left in 2009 were still in existence, doing fine & dandy. ...I guess this further goes to show that what the media reports generally needs to be taken with a great deal of salt.

Speaking of salt, we were getting hungry after all of this waiting. Oom, one of my students who had graduated last year, grabbed her ringing mobile phone from her bag & answered the mysterious caller with a barrage of incoherent (to me) Thai. After a short exchange, the phone conversation was over & she let us know that Bank would be downtown shortly. We were going to meet him for lunch at Shabushi in Siam World (or Siam Discovery... I always get the two mixed up!) on the opposite side of Siam Paragon (notice a common theme in the naming conventions for all these shopping locations?) from where we were. So, after grabbing a half-dozen escalator rides, walking along a kilometre of outdoor concrete footbridges, whisking ourselves through a few glass-and-metal doorways, inundating ourselves with the chilly, pleasant wonder that is air-conditioning and queuing up for the final few escalator ascents, we arrived at Shabushi, grabbed a number & waited for Bank to arrive.

No sooner had Bank arrived then we realised that waiting for lunch at this location would end up eating up all our time before the movie began. A crisis ensued—we were all hungry & wanted to eat before making the trip back to Paragon’s top-floor cinema. A flurry of Thai progressed around me & then Winner and Oom disappeared. Bank and Tony turned to me and explained the situation: the two who had left were off scouting other Shabushi locations to see if we could get fed sooner than waiting where we were. Ten minutes later, Bank got a call: with a few nods of his head to the invisible caller, he placed the phone back in his pocket stood up & explained that they had found another location which was serving sooner than where we were. We grabbed our stuff, jumped on the escalator & proceeded on another whirlwind journey filled with glass, air-conditioning, foot bridges and passageways before we arrived at another Shabushi location, where we sat down & gorged ourselves on tasty Japanese delicacies that motored along a conveyor belt in front of us.

A Movie

One of my favourite things about watching movies in Thailand—aside from being able to reserve your seats when you buy your ticket so you don’t have to waste an hour waiting in line at the door—is listening to the King’s Anthem that plays before any type public performance in the country. The version of the anthem that plays in the theatres almost always has the same audio track regardless of the location you’re watching movies & the audio hasn’t changed in 4 years. What has changed, and what seems to change almost annually, is the series of pictures or video clips that accompany the anthem on the screen: they portray a story of the Thai king & what he has done for the country, or they depict scenes of Thai national pride. These images, along with the musical score, never fail to give me goose-bumps—especially at the end of the anthem, during the choir’s crescendo as they sing “Chai-oh” with lusty vigour. The sense of national pride & communal patriotism that this song exudes is something in which we Canadians fail horribly. The vigorous respect and awe that this performance of the anthem reflects toward the Thai king is something I wish we, as Christians, could emulate when we choose to venerate our own King. I am moved; I am swollen with wonder whenever this song is performed at the theatres. It is something definitely worth taking in if ever you get a chance to visit Thailand.

& the Black Swan

After we had finished watching Unknown, the students each went their separate ways, braving the city’s rush-hour traffic to head home in time for supper. I opted to stay downtown and meet up with some current & some previous GES teachers at the Black Swan, which was only a few sky train stations away. We had planned on making our rendezvous at this English public house for 7pm, but as things so often go when planning with GES staff, it turned out that plans had changed while I was downtown... and that the gentlemen with whom I was to meet had now planned on leaving their respective locations at 7:30.

It was a Friday evening and a cricket match was playing on the televisions strewn about wood-paneled walls of the English pub. Having just been able to scam a rogue wi-fi connection on my phone for about three minutes before it faded away, I managed to discover the change in plans via Facebook and proceeded to guard my large table from the cricket fan base who was eying my prime real-estate among the shadows like a pack of lurking hyenas, ready to strike at the first sign of weakness. Twenty minutes passed. Forty-five minutes ticked away until I finally broke down & ordered some onion rings to assure the pub girls that I wasn’t just loitering at a large table without throwing down any cash. I was getting antsy. It was well past 6 now, and no-one had showed up yet. Should I give up on waiting & just order the pub’s infamous Hawaiian burger to appease my growling stomach, or should I hold out a little longer, just in case...

I broke down & decided, in a compromise, to order a draft pint of Guinness which would help me bide the time before the gents would arrive. Flagging down the pub girl before she made her way down the wooden, spiral stair-case beside me to the main floor, I asked her for the glass of suds. With a forlorn, apologetic look, she explained to me that they had run out of Guinness until the next shipment arrived on Monday.

Fail.

No worse of news could have reached my ears at that moment. I had travelled half-way around the world with a mental check-list of things to do while back in Thailand, and having a pint of Guinness with friends over delicious hamburgers at the Black Swan ranked pretty high on the “must do” section of the list. How could it be that they were out of the one thing that would make my experience complete? My mind went into disaster-recovery mode: how could I salvage the experience? “Well,” I thought to myself, “Craig’s going to be coming. He’s a fan of Kilkenny, and it’s not a bad alternative. Perhaps I’ll have to make do with Guinness’ lighter-coloured brother.” Before the girl had a chance to leave, I asked her for a pint of Kilkenny instead. To my chagrin, she sheepishly responded that it too was unavailable until Monday.

Epic fail.

She suggested Tetley’s, to which I acquiesced. I’ve never had Tetley’s before, but it turned out to be the furthest possible thing from Guinness or even Kilkenny: it was a bitter, light-bodied lager that definitely was no substitute for a much-desired stout. The night was turning out to be an exceptional disappointment: no frothy suds, no friends, no internet to confirm what was even happening in the outside world. I had decided, at this point, to grab a burger & scarf it down before heading back to GES for the night. At least I’d be able to munch on the tasty burger.

Before I could wrangle one of the pub girls over to the table—which was feeling more & more like the vast expanse of intergalactic space—a familiar head started bobbing up the staircase, complete with enormous, bushy eyebrows. Tyler had arrived. He crossed the threshold, put his motorcycle helmet down on the seat beside him and said, “Hey.” Pub solitude had finally been vanquished.

Within another 15-20 minutes, the much-coveted table that I had been guarding alone for the past 90 minutes transformed into an over-stuffed collection of friends, food and jovial conversation. Stories were swapped; french-fries were stolen from Chris Martin’s plate while he was lingering outside; friendly jibes were made in Tyler’s direction prophesying when he would ask others if they were going to finish all the food on their plates; glasses were emptied & refilled and consolations were passed around the table about the Pub’s empty kegs. Apparently, the Black Swan had been plagued with dry kegs on several occasions this year. McLatcher piped in that it was probably Michael’s fault, seeing as whenever he comes—or even thinks of coming—to the Black Swan, the establishment never has Guinness. Although Michael hadn’t come that evening, he had thought about it, and apparently that was enough to ensure the lines were dry. The whole table chuckled and bemusedly agreed that this probably was the reason for the troubled taps.

Burgers having been eaten & pint glasses with but a drooping halo lingering within, the conversations continued long into the night until the lure of sleep beckoned us homeward. We parted ways severally: some of us grabbed taxis while others hopped on motorcycles and whisked on through the night, leaving only the pub’s wooden sign waving us a farewell in the gentle breeze of our departure.

That day was a very good day.

Scratch 2.5 more items off the checklist…