Simeon's Bangkok Shenanigans

Simeon is a total night owl. He refuses to sleep at night but loves to sleep in. Early airport runs definitely don’t vibe with his internal clock. Once again, I had to wake the poor kid up while it was still pitch black after maybe four hours of sleep. Luckily, waking up is the only hard part. Once he’s actually up, he handles it pretty well. At the airport, we found a play area where kids were running wild despite the early hour. Simeon and Arthur joined right in. They both hid in a little playhouse, built barricades so the other kids couldn’t get in, and Simeon would peek out the window and yell, “Go away!” (Arthur taught him that one.)

The flight was smooth. Simeon slept through most of it. He didn’t get a chance to eat, but it was a fair trade-off for the peace and quiet.

In Bangkok, he didn’t exactly have a lot of freedom. The traffic there is pretty intense. For safety, he was either in the baby carrier or carried by Johnny while we were on the move. Let me tell you—carrying another human being in that heat with total body-to-body contact is pure hell. Both of us were dripping sweat the entire time. Honestly, even when he wasn’t in the carrier, it looked like someone was constantly dumping a bucket of water over his head. He was the only soaking wet kid at the playground. Maybe the local kids are just adjusted, or maybe he’s just a hyper-sweaty type like his dad. Or both. Either way, the poor guy was constantly drenched.

He got to run around to his heart’s content in Lumphini, Chatuchak, and Queen Sirikit Park. In Lumphini Park, he went wild on the playground. His favorite was this play set with a steering wheel. He’d wait for the other kids to leave, then quickly grab the wheel and “park” his imaginary big truck. The other kids were out of luck because once he was in the driver’s seat, he wasn’t letting anyone else near it. At Chatuchak, he was fascinated by the wild garden sprinklers. It turned into a game for the whole family—racing to see who could stay the driest. He climbed all over some old, rusty workout equipment, chased away crows, and gave me a heart attack when he tried to crawl into a bush where we’d seen a monitor lizard earlier. By the time we hit the Butterfly Garden, exhaustion must have set in. His mood flipped instantly, and he started running away, insisting he wanted to be alone and that nobody could follow him. We had to surround him as a family to stop his sudden quest for independence.

On the way to the Big C Tiwanon mall, we were crossing a pedestrian bridge when he vanished into thin air, only to reappear by the stairs. With zero sense of self-preservation, he decided he wanted to walk down the stairs himself. Thank God a kind older lady was there to stop him.

In a nearby park, he found a bamboo stick. At first, he was just playfully swinging it through the air, then banging it on the ground and trees. Eventually, he spotted a water valve sticking out of the grass. It was just sitting there, made of metal, and apparently, Simeon didn’t like its look. First, he tried to turn the water on. No luck. Then he got mad at the “broken” valve and tried to punish it with a few swings of his stick. I stopped his little rampage, but then he spotted something even better to destroy. A memorial. I have no idea what it was for, but I managed to prevent any actual vandalism, and the stick was confiscated for good.

He really enjoyed the Taling Chan floating market. He tried the local food, fed the fish, and made my hair stand on end when he suddenly sprinted to the water’s edge to get a better look. He loved the boat ride. Surprisingly, he didn’t complain or try to jump out. He just sat there quietly, enjoying the breeze in his hair and the murky water splashing against the boat. At the second market, he was all about the animals. He walked right into the pen with the bunnies and guinea pigs, trying to catch the poor things. He also got to pet some little pigs and goats. With Johnny’s help, he even tried his hand at the shooting gallery. He didn’t exactly hit anything, but he got a consolation prize anyway—a keychain from Arthur.

On our last night at the accommodation, after we got back exhausted from walking all day, the “young master” woke up from a long nap with way too much energy. Out of boredom, he decided to leave his mark on the place for the owners. He tried to rip the blinds off a fake window and attempted to smash the iron, telling me I’d just have to buy a new one. He scattered the silverware, jumped on the already broken armrest of the sofa bed until it gave way even more, and tried to “reconfigure” every piece of electronics he could find. It’s unbelievable how many breakable things he managed to find in such a minimalist space. That was my cue that I (we) wouldn’t be getting any sleep that night before our early flight.

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