Thursday 29th March, Southern Comfort Apartments, Bangkok

A Qantas flight into Bangkok from Singapore. Its really is amazing how graceless some of these Flight attendants are when you compare them to the Asian airlines. First of all the male flight attendants insist on calling me "mate" when I don't even know them. ...and when you want a drink not at the specified time you ineffectively punch the hostess button for 10 mins, only to have to walk to the back of the plane to find them all jabbering about the latest Australian rules football no doubt. When you ask for a drink, you get a glazed "what in god's name is he doing here look" very reminiscent of a KL cab drivers look when you've just stated your destination and hes mentally working out how much to rip you off for.

Still my scotch did arrive eventually and I tried to settle down despite some adolescent Australians behind me who were singing all the songs on the Top 40 audio channel at the top of their voices, slapping themselves on the back, and guzzling copious amounts of Fosters. The Germans around me (the flight was terminating in Frankfurt and had originated in Sydney) were also trying to ignore them with stoic Teutonic fortitude. They're right of course, guys like that eventually run out of steam and fall to sleep on each others shoulders after an hour or so. I speculated on the timing of the Australian general elections to coincide with the Gay Mardi Gras in Sydney on Saturday and wondered how much there would be to celebrate with Arts funding probably being the first for the chop under a conservative government.

They say Keating is on the way out, despite all his blusterings about bringing Australia into Asia, ...well for an Englishmen, I find the man repugnant, fiddling with her majesties bra strap and all that. This man is no statesman, as evident by his ever increasing litany of scumbag insults. May he rest in peace. I don't know how the Australians, some of which I like can put up with such a sleazebag. We developed that place and look at the thanks we get. Theres royalty in my family too you know ....my brothers a queen..

Still...enough about black merinos...

For those who don't know Bangkok airport, you rush out of the plane as fast as you can to make the immigration queues before anybody else. Average waiting time 20 mins though last night, because I was particularly fleet of foot it was 5 mins. Then I waited around the baggage carousel for 20 mins wondering why I bothered, rereading the warning notice about "unauthorised " taxi services outside the terminal building and the prohibition in exporting "graven images of the Buddah". Seems the Thai authorities got a bit pissed off when they visited countries to find the used that these carvings were used for...ashtrays and the like....and slapped a ban on...

The reason for this particular sojourn was of course the Asia-Europe meeting being held this weekend. For some reason I had scored an invitation to a dinner chat with some of these Euro-Asian types and it seemed all politically correct.... I don't really know why this region solicits American aid so much with a short history of 200 years rather than those with cultures stretching back many hundreds of years. Almost as long as Chinese civilisation in relative terms.

So it came to pass that Major, Kohl. Goh, Mahathir, Chirac and Blanchard (the latter without an invitation) assembled in Bangkok Thailand to discuss how we can get rid of the Yank and OZ influence and work more closely with the other region with a long and sophisticated culture. You see Europe has only just woken up to the Asia-Pacific region. Sure they have problems of their own...but high time before Asia turns into "little America"..

Bangkok had been spruced up for the occasion. Public holidays had been declared to avoid embarrassment re traffic jams, in the hope that the populace took off to their home towns for the period, the hawker centres near the World Trade Centre and the Chao Prya hotel section had all been ordered to close up shop to avoid embarrassment re "eyesores" and the go-go dancers at Patpong had been ordered to keep their knickers on, to avoid embarrassment re the other.

Which tempts some interesting speculation...maybe the gals will be smoking cigarettes in a more conventional manner for the next couple of nights...

Saturday 3rd March, Southern Comfort Apartments, Bangkok

Noi, in her infinite wisdom had decided to put me up in room C2 at the Apartments this time. Interesting room with even more than the usual kitsch An enormous siding with about 50 drawers and an enormous bed that I could stretch out both vertically and horizontally with a foot to spare. Basically this is the first bed I have found that could accommodate all 20 or so of my files, all fully open no less with still room left for my out tray and in tray. Previous occupants had left a fascinating collection of reading literature which included Clavell (of course), Tom Robbins, "Even cowgirls get the blues" the Kama Sutra, Russell's "Problems in Western Philosophy", and a few Thai books. I am eying Tolstoy's "War and Peace" at the moment just in case I cant get to sleep tonight.