Shopaholics in Asia never have to travel very far to reach a gleaming shopping mall. But nothing quite beats the mile-long strip of 6 large shopping centers in central Bangkok connected by an outdoor walkway. The “skywalk” as it’s called opened two years ago but is not publicized and few foreign visitors seem to know about it.

The “Skywalk” is open from 6am to midnight

The walkway, which runs below a stretch of the elevated BTS mass transit system and also connects to three 5-star hotels, can be tricky to navigate (see below). But if you’re a committed shopper, the amount of retail space linked together is far more vast than the world’s largest malls: I calculate 1.5 million square meters compared with less than half that for the South China Mall in the Pearl River Delta, which holds the current crown for world’s largest. The Mall of America, outside Minneapolis, is one-fifth the size of the combined shopping space connected by Bangkok’s skywalk. Conclusion: there are plenty of cash-register clerks here ready to take your money.

What to buy/see/do:

• There are large movie multiplexes at Siam Paragon (Tel: 02 515 5555), Siam Discovery (02-515-5555), MBK (02 611 6444) and two at Central World (Major Cineplex: 02 515 5555 and SFW - SF World Cinema: 02 268 8888). There are also several older movie theaters: Lido (02 252 6498) and Scala (02 251 2861) and Siam (02 251 3508). Go to movieseer for times but double check the times by calling the theater. Movieseer is sometimes wrong in my experience.

• Upscale handicrafts on the top floor of Siam Paragon.

• Kinokuniya, the Japanese chain, has a large and well-stocked book store on the 3d floor of Siam Paragon. For recent releases and to see the best-seller list of their Thai stores go to their web site.

• The food court in the Central Chidlom department store is excellent: good pizza (as a native New Yorker I’m picky about this), tasty Thai noodle dishes, good desserts (brownies and mango with sticky rice are both recommended).

• Siam Ocean World is a fun aquarium for kids in the basement of Siam Paragon.

• There are good gourmet supermarkets in Central World, Central Chidlom and Siam Paragon.

• At Siam Paragon, there’s the usual smattering of luxury shops, including Jimmy Choo, Coach and Armani. You can browse the full list of shops on Paragon’s web site.

• MBK has a huge section exclusively dedicated to mobile phones: new, used and fake. They fix phones and have spare parts and accessories. It’s a daunting but impressive corner of MBK, which is a lower-end shopping mall.

The stretch connecting Central World with Siam Paragon, two giant malls

Some history/practicalities

The skywalk can be accessed easily from two BTS stations: Chidlom and Siam. You can also alight at the National Stadium BTS stop but you need to walk through Siam Discovery, Siam Center and Paragon to get to the skywalk.

Running along Ploenchit and Rama 1 roads, the skywalk was the brainchild of the shopping mall owners, according to Bhichit Rattakul, a former Bangkok governor. As any Bangkok resident will attest, one of the lingering frustrations of walking around the city is the lack of sidewalks – or when they exist their poor quality. So the skywalk was a great idea. You’re above the noisy and polluted streets. But like much of Bangkok’s urban planning the project has not reached its full potential, to use a euphemism. For most of the way the walkway runs below the elevated BTS. But at the Chidlom station you actually have to buy a subway card and pay 15 baht (about 40 cents) to pass through. This “walking toll” seems pretty absurd. One other inconvenience is that you’re also likely to sweat when walking outdoors in Bangkok anytime of year but December or January. But sometimes this beats getting stuck in traffic. Memo to Bangkok’s municipal government: get rid of the walking toll and put some of those mist machines on the walkway to make people more comfortable! Some potted plants would also do wonders.

Here’s the list of interconnected shopping malls, not including the smaller ones:

Central Chidlom: 68,000 square meters.
MBK : 96,000 sq.m.
Central World Plaza: 550,000 sq.m.
Siam Discovery, Siam Center and Siam Paragon: 800,000 sq.m.
Total: 1,514,000 sq. m.

Hotels adjacent to skybridge:
Hyatt Erawan (+66 2 254 1234)
Intercontinental (+66-2-6560444)
Holiday Inn (+66-2-6561555)

Being above Bangkok’’s snarled traffic, a plus

If you’re a frequent user of Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi airport you probably have your own list of annoyances about the sprawling place. Some days it seems this airport disguised as a shopping mall was designed for everyone but the people who use it. Shop after shop of duty free is overpriced and nowhere near as practical-minded as Singapore.

I stomp my feet and make sarcastic comments to blameless flight attendants every time I realize that, once again, we will be disembarking onto a bus and shuttled to the terminal. How can an airport that’s only 10 months old not have enough gates? Apologies for the rant.

I’m happy to announce that there is a way around one of the more grating annoyances: the long immigration lines (often much longer than at the old airport, but don’t get me started). Here’s a trick that in my experience few people know about. After you disembark from the plane (or bus) you walk through the giant cylindrical tube that eventually takes you to the immigration counters. As you walk up the ramp to immigration, if you see that the lines are too long, turn around. Walk further down the giant tube to the other entrance ramp marked immigration, which brings you to a separate set of immigration counters. Because human beings have a herd mentality when disembarking from airplanes, following each other blindly down corridors, one or the other of the immigration areas is often empty, saving you 30 minutes.

Bangkok’’s Suan Lum Night Bazaar, open for business

For months, one of the most popular tourist attractions in Bangkok has been on the brink of closure. In February officials announced that the Suan Lum Night Bazaar, a warren of small shops spanning over 20 hectares in central Bangkok, would be ploughed under to make way for, alas, a shopping mall. April 30 was the ultimate deadline for shopkeepers to clear out.

But perhaps owing to the slowing economy the plans appear to have been postponed. Central Pattana, the company that acquired a 30-year lease on the land, is now talking about closing down the place next year.

In the meantime, the message for tourists and Bangkok residents alike is that the night bazaar, open daily from 4 until midnight, is thriving. On a recent visit, touts were offering hour-long foot massages for 250 baht ($7) and imitation Croc sandals (the trendy über -comfortable and usually brightly colored footwear) were listed at the equivalent of $6 – the starting point for a session of hard bargaining no doubt. Satirical t-shirts were on sale everywhere, including one with the images of Bush père et fils and the caption “Dumb and Dumber.” And the lager at the giant beer garden next door was flowing freely.

“We’ll be here as long as they will let us be here,” said one vendor selling jewelry.

As anyone who has visited Bangkok knows, the city needs another shopping mall like it needs another 5 million cars on its traffic-clogged streets (see previous post). The Suan Lum Night Bazaar (which gets its name from Suan Lumpini, the fabulous park across the street) has personality and a much more organic feel than Bangkok’s many malls, which all ultimately look like close facsimiles of each other. Many vendors at the bazaar claim they make their wares — t-shirts, sun dresses and leather purses – themselves. At Leather Design by Hob (stall B215) custom purses, wallets and belts painted with funky designs go for the equivalent of $7 to $15. At stall B212, homemade brightly decorated wall clocks are priced at around $27. You don’t have to like all the stuff being sold at the night bazaar but the creativity of its vendors is refreshing and fun to witness.

Khun Patchara will be happy to sell you one of his hand-made wall clocks

Privately, many Thais mourn the eventual loss of the bazaar. It’s a great place to take friends and visitors, they say. But you’re unlikely to hear Thais discussing the topic too loudly in public. The land is owned by the Crown Property Bureau, the royal family’s asset management company, and anything resembling criticism of King Bhumibol Adulyadej is deemed taboo. This is probably wrongheaded: King Bhumibol has said he needs to hear more critiques of his rule and he has lashed out at those who use the country’s lèse-majesté law for their own political gain.

Thailand’s royalty is a debate for another day. In the meantime, the night bazaar — its shops, its nightly traditional Thai puppet show (admission $26), its food stalls and live music – beckon.

If you isolated the lichen-covered stone jars scattered across the central plains of Laos they might seem like nothing more than a dull collection of weather-worn rocks.

But there’s something magical about the rolling hills outside the town of Phonsavan, a half-hour, $53 flight from Lao capital, Vientiane. In the late afternoon, if the sun’s out, the ancient stone jars have a faint glow.

Archeologists are still trying to figure out the who, when and why of the Plain of Jars. The most convincing theory seems to be that the giant jars were some sort of funeral urns and may date back 2,000 years. But the provenance of the jars doesn’t really matter when you’re sitting on a hill, watching distant thunderstorms.

The sky rumbles, the wind whishes and the crickets chirp – not too loudly, if they’re smart. Locals collect the bugs and then fry them as a snack.

The grassy landscape here is beautiful because it is so distinct from the surrounding thick jungles.

But I’m not sure beautiful is the right word. The town of Phonsavan used to be called Muang Baek, which means “city of pine trees.” Many of those trees burned down or were blown to bits during the Vietnam War when the U.S. military dropped a reported 2 million tons of explosives during a total of 580,000 bombing missions between 1964 and 1973 in Laos. It’s been said before but this region of Laos is one of the most heavily bombed places on the planet.

Can you call anything beautiful that was partly created through such terrific violence?

Even in the tropics a Francophile needs a little foie gras once in a while – and some decent wine to wash it down.

If you’re a fan of fine French food and need a fix in Bangkok, there’s good news: Reflexions, the French restaurant at the Plaza Athenee on Wireless Road, recently imported two Frenchmen to revitalize the place.

Thomas Deledalle, the restaurant manager and Thibault Chiumenti, the chef de cuisine, quit their jobs as maître d’ and an assistant chef, respectively, at Daniel, the high-end and reputed eatery of Daniel Boulud in New York City, and moved to Bangkok three months ago.

Modern, with high ceilings and silent films projected onto the wall, Reflexions is on the second floor of the Plaza Athenee. The prices are steep by Bangkok standards – my foie gras was 850 baht ($25) and my lamb main course was 1,200 baht. But the mashed potatoes mixed with black truffles that accompanied the lamb made it all worth it. When I complimented Deledalle on the spuds he brought out a small copper pot with a generous second serving.

What I liked most about Reflexions, though, was the selections of wine by the glass. Wine is so horribly overpriced in Thailand because of taxes and duties that you often end up shelling out big bucks for plonk. Deledalle has cleverly picked a small selection of bottles that are not big names but have the complexity and character of the more expensive stuff.

Two reds, a 2004 Château d’Aquéria, from the southern Rhone region, and a 2002 Bordeaux called Les Amants were both very good. I didn’t try any of the whites. The advantage of ordering by the glass at Reflexions is that you can ask to taste a wine and if you don’t like it, order something else. I rejected the Burgundy on the list because it tasted like it had been open too long.

The Reflexions
Plaza Athenee Bangkok
Wireless Road, across from the U.S. Ambassador’s residence.
Tel: +66 2 650 8800.

Yes, eating out is great in Bangkok. But beware the dinner hour: if you need to move more than a few hundred yards, half of your evening might be spent stuck in a taxi watching your driver tweeze facial hair. This makes Saturday or Sunday brunch all the more appealing. No traffic!

Here are three tranquil, verdant gems in a city that nobody has ever called a garden spot:

Agalico inside…

Agalico: Hidden away off of Sukhumvit Soi 51, this is a fabulous place to meet friends over tea and scones. Don’t come here too hungry – not counting the scones, brunch is limited to cakes and a quiche of the day. The big draw is the garden, which is several times larger than the tearoom itself. Agalico is the brainchild of a young Thai aristocrat, Poomchai Chumbala, who lives next door in a magnificent house and who likes the idea of sharing his gardens with the public, a notion he picked up while growing up in England. Try reserving the air-conditioned pavilion set amid the plants and fountains. Open only Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. 10am to 6pm. Tel: +662 662 5857. See www.agalico.co.th for directions.

Agalico outside…

The Eugenia: The Taiwanese owner of this boutique hotel has blended the Mediterranean with the Orient. It’s French windows but Asian antiques, a mix of a colonial hunting lodge and B&B in the English countryside. It’s a bit of a stretch to include this on the brunch list because technically they stop serving at 10am. But if the earlier hour doesn’t bother you, the oversized sofas are a great place to convene for a morning repast with friends. The Eugenia is worth the trip just to look around: the pool and palm trees, the French-style dining room, the various stuffed animals on the walls. Sukhumvit Soi 31. Tel: +66 2 259 9017. www.theeugenia.com

Crêpes & Co: The name says it all. A wide selection of crêpes in a charming setting. Service can be a bit slow on Sundays when it is often crowded (you’ll need reservations). If the weather is bearable, opt for the garden. Opens at 9am daily. Sukhumvit Soi 12. Tel (662) 653-3990. For directions see www.crepes.co.th.

Last-minute Christmas shoppers in Bangkok can pick up beautiful silk scarves, home-made jewelry, mulberry-paper greeting cards, cutlery, artisanal soaps, lotions, locally grown tea and coffee, pottery, and lots more handicrafts at the Ambassador Hotel (Sukhumvit Soi 11) on Saturday, Dec 22. The craft fair, which runs from 10am to 2pm, works on the fair-trade concept, only selling things made by Thai artisans; 70 percent of sales revenue goes directly to the people who made the handicrafts.

If you miss the Dec. 22 craft fair, the ThaiCraft Fair Trade Co. has monthly fairs in Bangkok. See www.thaicraft.org for the schedule. E-mail domestic@thaicraft.org to get on their mailing list or sign up on the web site.

Handicrafts galore

A half-dozen vineyards have started up in Thailand in recent years, part of the global trend to make wine at non-traditional latitudes. Most of the Thai wine, to be honest, is plonk. But one exception is Chateau de Loei, located on a plateau near the border with Laos. Their best wines are not bargains – upwards of $20 – but they’re very drinkable.

Natthawat at work in his vineyards.

Natthawat Limwatcharakorn, the winemaker, recommended three vintages. I tried all three (tough job, writing this blog) and confirm that they go well with a good Italian meal or non-spicy Thai dishes. Here they are:

2003 Shiraz Reserve, 1,365 baht
2005 Shiraz Reserve, 760 baht
2005 Chenin blanc Reserve, Premium Cuvee extra dry, 990 baht

You can find these wines at the Chateau de Loei shop in Bangkok. 7/4 Soi Soonvijai, New Petchburi Rd, Bangkok. Open from 10am to 7:30pm every day. Tel: 02 319 5390.
http://www.chateaudeloei.com/index.html

I did a bit of schlepping last weekend: Hong Kong-Bangkok-Hong Kong-London. Here are some opinionated travel notes.

Hong Kong Airport’s Terminal Two: “T2″ caused such a splash when it opened in February that my extended family went out to see it. They found it bright and modern, praised the selection of shopping and restaurants in the adjoining SkyMart mall, and gave it a good report. That said, they weren’t actually flying anywhere. It’s a bit of a walk from the Airport Express: I ended up going up one escalator, down another, collected my boarding pass, and then realized I would have to go all the way back. We all have things that make us proud of our cities. Mine is that, on good days, I can leave my apartment 1.5 hours before departure, and still have time to hit the Starbucks, pharmacy and W.H. Smith. T2 puts that at risk, though I realize it is still miles better than Heathrow (see below).

Suvarnabhumi Airport: There were teething problems when it opened, but I didn’t encounter any long lines, overcrowded bathrooms or broken runways on my last few trips. On arrival, I made it from gate to car in 15 minutes, and then from airport to town in 35, which in Bangkok is miraculous. On departure, I was happy to spend extra time in what has to be one of the best airport food halls, where I always make a point of visiting the gelato bar. And, there is the 24-hour Chang Foot Massage & Spa, where you can get a one-hour treatment for 600 Thai baht (a little less than U.S. $20). It’s an odd experience, as it happens in a communal room with semi-private booths, and you can hear the slap of therapists’ palms on other people’s flesh. I can’t think of a more Thai send-off. The only annoyance is that you can’t board with a bottle of water, even one bought in the departures hall.

The lovely Bangkok airport. Photo by Joyce Hor-Chung Lau

Thai Airways: I chose Royal Thai Holidays because it was an affordable option for a single traveler in high season. (Round-trip flight, private car transfers, two nights at the Landmark Hotel, breakfasts, taxes, fuel and insurance cost about H.K. $5,000, or U.S. $640.) There are minor downsides, like no individual TVs in economy. Plus, they have apparently hired an English grandmother to run their F&B operation. The Chinese vegetables and pork were overcooked to the point of disintegration, and the dinner roll was oddly leftover-Christmas-cake-like. But the staff were nice and very attractive – both the men and the women – as they smiled and smiled and smiled, and wandered aimlessly around the cabin.

The Landmark Hotel: It doesn’t have the charm of riverside luxury hotels like The Oriental or The Peninsula (my top Bangkok pick, and not only because the current chef was formerly in charge of Gaddi’s in Hong Kong). And when I have to stay in the downtown Sukhumvit area, my choice is the five-star JW Marriott. But it had no package deals, so I went to the four-star Landmark. On the plus side, there’s a great rooftop pool where you can sit outside with lunch and a glass of wine. On the downside, there is no wi-fi (you have to pay to use the broadband) and no spa (though they will send a masseuse up to your room).

British Airways: When I told my Englishman friend in Hong Kong that I was taking BA, he put his head in his hands in dismay that I would fly his national carrier instead of Cathay. I was going to defend BA by saying I liked the Traveler Plus option, as it has a wider seat and far more legroom than economy, but isn’t as pricey as business. However, that was before my flight was delayed for 14 hours because of “a mechanical problem in London.” I was offered a hotel room, but preferred to wait at home, so all the compensation I got was taxi fare. Just let me take one final swipe by saying that, just because your plane is a day late doesn’t mean all the newspapers on board have to be, too.

Heathrow: So much criticism has been written about this airport I thought I’d have nothing else to add. (See “Worst Airport in Europe? Cast Your Vote!” Only Charles de Gaulle does worse.) Suffice it to say that, after the 14-hour delay, our plane had to circle round and round because Heathrow had a runway problem. And this was before that flight from Beijing had to do an emergency landing. People all over the U.K. — probably all over the world — can’t wait for the new Terminal 5 to open in March.

Most of you who had visited Bangkok city know that BTS Sky Train is one of the easiest way to get around in Bangkok. BTS stands for Bangkok mass Transport System. In peek hours Bangkok city roads always have heavy traffic jam. If you choose to reach your destination by a taxi car, then you most probably will get frustrated by the long ’Q’ of vehicles in Bangkok roads. Use sky trains to travel to places close to the BTS stations. BTS sky trains in Bangkok have the capacity to carry over 1,000 passengers and is faster and safer than a taxi car. The sky trains run daily between 6:00 am and 12:00 midnight with frequent service throughout the day. See some pictures of BTS sky train captured using my Sony digital camera.

Sky Train- A view from Siam Paragon

Inside of Bangkok BTS Skytrains