Market Friday: Window shopping and enjoying Christmas decorations.

This year I was very surprised by how super fast time had flown by. Last week I had to visit Chinatown to get my Chinese calendars. This time I had to get a new pocket diary and a table calendar. In the past, we could get free wall and table calendars from banks and gold shops. Nowadays, businesses had to cut costs so we no longer get free calendars and nice desk diaries. So, I had to take the bus and skytrain to my favourite shopping center in Sukhumvit road. The Emporium has been quite a house hold name for some luxurious items and a very popular food hall on the fifth floor.

The skytrain stop at Prompong had a specially designed connection to three shopping malls via the extraordinarily wide yard. The new shopping mall opposite the Emporium was much more luxurious with expensive brand names. This area attracted lots of tourists and expats working in Bangkok. It’s such a convenient meeting spot for friends; several eateries and coffee shops were in walking distance. In the past, families with young kids liked to gather here to take photos of extravagant Christmas decorations.

Time has changed many things, this year the Christmas decorations were very modest and fewer than last year. I used to have such a great time browsing at various Christmas decorations in different corners of the yard and inside shopping malls. However, the lighting decorations were quite lively and movements of people made the whole place more vibrant and energetic. Looking at the road, the evening traffic jam was as bad as ever. Sukhumvit road has become too narrow to accommodate many new condominiums along the area. This whole road was always very busy and never seemed to go to sleep. This area has become very attractive to young generations and many new businesses.

I went inside the Emporium for my new diary and a quick walk. The store seemed to be rather quiet though the food hall area was very crowded. The Christmas decorations were rather halfhearted as if the ran out of ideas or inspirations. The diary section has become very small; I guessed most people had stopped using paper diaries! I was glad to find the one that was right for me though the price has hind up by 30%. I would have to find a cheaper version next year.

I was hoping to run into some old friends who used to hang around the coffee shop and tearoom there. But I didn’t see any of my old friends there as I could do a few years ago. This place used to be our meeting place for dinner or afternoon tea. After the plandemic, the old lifestyles had disappeared and most people just used to stay home for long period of time. Driving long distance has also become a tedious task. We used to just drive around town to drop by at friends’ houses. I missed the good old days of activities and lots of communications. People have become more withdrawn and preferred to keep to themselves out of harm’s way.

The Emportia shopping mall seemed to have lots of young visitors. But the big coffee shop seemed rather quiet. I liked the leafy garden in the court yard where there’s a flea market and fast food stalls. Shopping around for designers’ clothes was very alien activity for me. I couldn’t see that these expensive clothes would be suitable or useful for my gardening lifestyle and down to earth routine. But it was fun observing the trend of popular brand names and how they remained in a different dimension of reality.

I was probably the worst dressed shopper in the whole of the luxurious shopping mall. Most people had at least one or two brand name items on them. The overseas tourists seemed very well dressed with expensive and tailored clothes. The gap between the haves and haves-not continued to widen these days. The cost of electricity bills of one shopping mall could be paid for three villages’electricity bills. And the government was trying to impose carbon tax on poor people and small businesses. The crooked politicians had taken they’d own decisions in signing treaties which degraded the sovereignty of our country without any study of the pros and cons. Now the ordinary people would have to suffer as a result of corrupt politicians.

Three years ago, an executive of a crypto company suggested that the Thai government should buy Bitcoins and treat them as parts of the reserves. Some academics and opinion leaders were quick to ridicule the idea, I guessed they were hired to do so. Most highly educated people knew very well that all the top millionaires and billionaires here have bought Bitcoins for their investments. But there was still a big effort to prevent ordinary people from being interested in cryptocurrencies.

I walked around the rich and wealthy areas of Bangkok and saw lots of ordinary hard working people traveling on crowded buses and trains. If these workers could no longer afford to live or work in the city, the rich people would suffer from unexpected inconveniences.

The prospect of extra taxes (carbon taxes) would decimate these people’s chance of making a difference in their lives. Besides these taxes expedited to the UN would become unacceptable (the news about billions went missing at the UN reminded me of aided money went missing in Ukraine). We had to blame our corrupt politicians and bureaucrats who committed treason in secret. I just hoped that whistleblowers would emerge to tell all in the near future. Meanwhile, lots of stressful working people would look forwards to a peaceful and prosperous Christmas holiday.

Wishing you peace, good health and prosperity.

Stay strong and cheerful.

#marketfriday hosted by @dswigle.