[maclaudser]

Senaratne, I'm sure you know what the word serendipity means. That's my feeling about the sois, you never know what you will find and there's often a surprise or two.

I live off a soi, off a soi, off the Sukhumvit 100s and pass through other sub-sois on my way to various places, such as work and maybe Seacon Square.

I found out just the other day that at the end of out small soi there is a small village library.

Not far away we also found a great furniture shop run by a Sikh-Thai couple who also run their own furniture factory.

Another day we went to visit a friend not too far away and dropped off at a car wash. There was a restaurant opposite where we ate while we waited for the car to get washed. Next to the car wash was a TV/radio repair shop (good to keep in mind).

Just outside our soi is a 7-11 and a 24-hour Tesco Express, very handy, and opposite is a small Thai steak restaurant, also handy. It's very much a local shop but the guy does a great T-bone steak and an even better chicken steak with the best sauce I've ever had. Down the road is a makeshift shelter-style restaurant on the bank of a small lake where locals go fishing.

I went to visit a friend once further downtown, still on Sukhumvit, and noticed a small shop selling only harps -- yes, harps! Further down was a small police office. My friend told me later that the police office is there because an old princess lives in the house that the police are guarding.

Someone else I know who lives in a soi off Sukhumvit lives in a flat in a compound where his landlord has a mansion which is a scaled-down version of the US White House. The daughter of Rama 6 lives at the end of his soi. She's really old I think that fact she lives there might have something to do with why that soi doesn't connect Rama 4 Road to Sukhumvit, as a lot of other sois do. In there next soi there are 3 Isaan/Lao restaurants.

I definitelty agree with Jerome that there is so much to discover in the sois - even off the non-touristy end of Sukhumvit.

[PVaQlNaP]

I like the malls for the same reasons

[nAKMzyBN]

Oh, I forgot to mention the motorbike taxi guys. How could I forget about them? At the very least, their orange shirts are good for practising your Thai number reading skills. I would venture that they know pretty much everything that goes on in the neighborhood too.

[nAKMzyBN]

One of my favourite things about Thailand is the soi, those multitudes of little side streets that run off the bigger roads that are little microcosms of the real Thai lifestyle.
I’m not talking about any of the sois that run off of Sukhomvit or Silom or any of the other major tourist places. I’m referring to the sois that all but the most adventurous tourists would probably not see.

One of the simplest pleasures in life is strolling down to the soi in the morning and sitting on one of those stone table and chair sets-you know the ones with the checkered pattern on top of the table- with a drink and some of those little fried pockets with curry in them, reading the paper while secretly people watching.

You can get your laundry done at the same place. Stores in the soi are also a great place to practice your Thai language skills (or lack of them.) Bumbling and stumbling away to the old ladies in butchered Thai, reactions are priceless and encouraging.

Apart from going to work or the bank, you could probably stay in the soi for a week, since everything is available- well in the soi that I’m thinking about it is- a little internet shop with two computers that need to be switched on when customers come in, a drug store, numerous restaurants, a little market selling groceries, and of course the ubiquitous dvd man.
Don’t forget the soi dogs, which I always steer quite clear of.

I may be becoming a bit of a soi otaku. I recall one time we were heading home in a taxi and we were still about 2 klms from home when I spied a fascinating soi and asked the driver to stop. We got out and walked the rest of the way home, slowly through this unusually long, narrow soi that was so lively it was invigorating. People were just going about their normal dusk-time lives- schoolkids running up one side of the soi, a baby’s cries coming from somewhere, an old lady watching TV by the window, the sai krok guy setting up, it was so perfect it almost seemed fake, like a movie set or something.

Give me a small apartment in a real soi over a luxury falang-filled condo anyday.

[bobibnoxx]

Yes. I agree with Jerome. Once I got up early in the morning and walked along a soi for about a kilometer around 4. 30 when the sun had not yet risen.

It was not the concrete jungle that you see in the city. The owner of a small shop was still opening the doors of the shop. I walked in, sat on a bench and asked if coffee was available there. He said yes. I had a coffee, paid some 20 baht (if I remember right) and walked off.

Sois are more worth seeing than the concrete jungles of the city.

[nAKMzyBN]

Actually I heard that those motorcycle taxi guys are pretty good with the girls.
Anybody heard anything about this one way or the other?

[PVaQlNaP]

Actually I heard that those motorcycle taxi guys are pretty good with the girls.
Anybody heard anything about this one way or the other?

It's a reputation often associated with them yes. They are a group of males hanging out (when waiting for customers) and you know what group of males usually end up talking about right? or how they react when a girl shows up

That said due to the nature of their work they often chat with people, and since most often work in the same area for years they become fairly familiar with people.

And I bet they don't mind doing girls favour by dropping them off a bit closer

[RayFairhurst]

One of my favourite things about Thailand is the soi, those multitudes of little side streets that run off the bigger roads that are little microcosms of the real Thai lifestyle.
I’m not talking about any of the sois that run off of Sukhomvit or Silom or any of the other major tourist places. I’m referring to the sois that all but the most adventurous tourists would probably not see.

One of the simplest pleasures in life is strolling down to the soi in the morning and sitting on one of those stone table and chair sets-you know the ones with the checkered pattern on top of the table- with a drink and some of those little fried pockets with curry in them, reading the paper while secretly people watching.

You can get your laundry done at the same place. Stores in the soi are also a great place to practice your Thai language skills (or lack of them.) Bumbling and stumbling away to the old ladies in butchered Thai, reactions are priceless and encouraging.

Apart from going to work or the bank, you could probably stay in the soi for a week, since everything is available- well in the soi that I’m thinking about it is- a little internet shop with two computers that need to be switched on when customers come in, a drug store, numerous restaurants, a little market selling groceries, and of course the ubiquitous dvd man.
Don’t forget the soi dogs, which I always steer quite clear of.

I may be becoming a bit of a soi otaku. I recall one time we were heading home in a taxi and we were still about 2 klms from home when I spied a fascinating soi and asked the driver to stop. We got out and walked the rest of the way home, slowly through this unusually long, narrow soi that was so lively it was invigorating. People were just going about their normal dusk-time lives- schoolkids running up one side of the soi, a baby’s cries coming from somewhere, an old lady watching TV by the window, the sai krok guy setting up, it was so perfect it almost seemed fake, like a movie set or something.

Give me a small apartment in a real soi over a luxury falang-filled condo anyday.

Beautifully written!

[NutChusty]

You make the Soi seem so romantic, well the Soi I stayed in was not like that, it was dusty, noisy, had a filthy factory, to many dogs, and I loved it, just for the change, but no way I would want to make it my permanent home..