OF BIKES AND BIKES

The python bit into a tray of pinakbet and was sashimi-ed by men with funny caps...

...to fete The Water Boy who wrapped two mandatory sessions of E-Learning in a payment request submission...

...while being chased by ducks, dogs, and humans littering a morning routine of dead ends on Pchum Ben Day...

..that smelled like a dentist's clinic and the rotting motorbike parts emailed one piece each day to a team meeting in Bangkok...

...to inform the overseer of an emerging budget redeployment for the contract renewal of a draft preliminary report...

...about AI and women and how a key informant on science diplomacy can sustian one's self as foretold in a concept note about an absent host...   

...who explained that reinforced concrete design is not a tough adobong atay but more like a flaky pinangat na tilapia and a stringy litsong manok...

...packaged as a famous longganisa that were offered to the concelebrants of the Chaplaincy...

...before a late breakfast near where the best ever skin flute was played to an audience of inihaw na tilapia and ham scraps.

BANGKOK ON A VISA

"I'll see what I can do" said The Voice, 30 minutes before the embassy closed down for the day.

She came through at 5:02 pm after a brutal day at the freezing halls of an Imeldific floating volume of concrete where support for gender equality in the energy transition was expounded.

It was a huge relief, a comforting bowl of Nagoya pork ramen with raw sea urchin gonads on the side. 

That evening, a carnal dream fidgetted with darkness so intense it induced a specialized travel pouch tucked in a hotel safe and a leather satchel entrusted at the airport lavatory to squirt the detailed outline of the game plan in Bangkok for a recipe of a heavenly Tom Yum soup with a platter of Moo Pad Prik that cheered a roadside parade of red plastic chairs and tables.

The Virtuous appeared confused and Miss Universe has not slept in the last 2 days.

Thus was how The Moderator stepped into the 7th floor of Chulalongkorn University to ease a roundtable about the equitable extraction of critical minerals before slipping out for an appraisal on strategic business develoment in a virtual longtable of Moo Grob and Sai Ua that extended down to the basement of the Siam Center. 

The inbox was mined at the breakfast buffet of the Mandarin Hotel where misplaced phones are also displayed.

Aid diversion, terrorist screening, fraud control, and forex losses were in the menu.

The Rubenesque Volunteer watched over an inception meeting as the working girls of Nana argued about phasing out fossil fuels, loud enough to disorient the trains that run on Phad Thai and Leng Saeb.

Back at Chula, qoutes were extracted from long speeches.

"An Asia that should be for everyone" echoed during the long walk back to reveal curvaceous and buxom blurs.

The sky finally cried as forecasted, and rained with Moo Sam Chan Tod Nam Pla and what is called a condensed egg.

The visa is good until January 2027 but for a single entry only. 

So complimentary drinks, noodles, and a fruit basket were packed but a slab of expensive swiss chocolate was left in the fridge for the barefoot housekeeper.

At the Suvarnabhumi Airport, I was tempted to invite the most exquisite natural beauty I've encountered to share a lunch of bananas. 

But I got distracted by The Mature-ILF so no, I don't actually need a visa to Bangkok for the next trip. 

Said so our tattooed barkeep in Bakal 2.

A VISA PARADOX

A decameron at least.

That is the required number of days in applying for a non-immigrant visa for Thailand.

It was chaos until finally, the online payment button was discerned by The Ironman while engaged in the apprehension of Ted Kaczynski amidst a slew of emailed correspondence.

But in lieu of a visa, 10 bottles of ice cold beer crushed an Entered Apprentice's frozen slices of salmon sashimi instead.

The decameron looms.

A champion emerged in the podium of Comparative Bid Analysis to qualify for a substance screening and an outline review. 

But the entry permit remains in limbo, an eerieness that spooked the weekly catch-ups, scary enough to resurrect a lost driver's license --- rabies-free and decorated with a refrigerated bunch of grapes and reheated litsong manok bathing in a cup of kinamatisang kalabaw and a saucer of menudo that were imbued with the gaminess of carinderia dinakdakan and kilaweng kambing. 

The Royal Thai Embassy acknowledged payment made, enough assurance for the The Phantom Biker to keep to his morning routine of clandestine disposals and provisioning for the evenings.  

A scandal of Korean nipples and butts packed printed travel documents in a 2-page note about the ritual of the First Degree.

For the first time, breakfast at the San Lorenzo Sunday Market tasted of uncertainty.

Yet we walked on along car-free Ayala Avenue where I lose my thoughts counting joggers with the sexiest outfit and those with the darkest armpits. 

It may be a tough call, chewy like the casing of New York-style hotdogs at Paseo de Roxas.

But when life is pelted with lemons, have a ramen feast and that's what we did before checking in my Philippine departure and Thai arrival cards...