Postscript: Expatriate fast-food cravings in the here and now...
A very brief follow up to my story on visa-runs and Whoppers in 2000BC: what do Hanoi/Saigon expats secretly (and not so secretly) yearn to eat in Bangkok today?
LAST WEEK, after I posted a story about turn-of-the-century Hanoi expats dreaming of Whoppers in Bangkok, I got a few comments on FB. Some folk mentioned many of the other reasons they were to happy to visit the Thai capital ‘back in the day’: a trip to the dentist, buying jeans/ shoes that fit, a slap up of middle eastern grub down that warren of Soi and sub-Soi on Sukhumvit…
Back in 2005, after getting smashed up halfway down the highway from the coastal city of Phan Thiet to Saigon (I was in a taxi with a driver that was overtaking vehicles that were overtaking vehicles, at considerable speed; our time together ended when he zoned out, gazed across the fields, and then drove us into the arse of a truck that was turning off the road — but, um, that’s another story), I was also ‘happy’ to be evacuated to Bangkok to receive a standard of service that Vietnam lacked. At Samitivej hospital on Sukhumvit, all the King’s (Harvard trained) doctors and all the King’s nurses put me back together again (more specifically, they reconstructed my humerus with umpteen pins and a plate). Post-op, I was bed-bound (I also had a broken foot) for days and, when the morphine waned, in a lot of pain. But I was also privileged (and insured) enough to be reading the Bangkok post in the morning, ordering meals, say, scrambled eggs for breakfast, pad Thai for lunch, a piece of salmon for dinner (everything came with broccoli), all delivered to my private room.
But as the memoir piece I wrote was anchored around a fast food franchise, one which has been in Vietnam for years already1, I wondered what chain is it that expats pine for in this day and age? There’s always something there that’s not here (Saigon or Hanoi). When trendy burger chains like Shake-Shack and Five Guys open in Bangkok, I suppose they’ll be a thing. As I wandered around the Sathorn, Silom and Siam neighbourhoods last weekend, I kept my eyes out for an additional punchline. But it wasn’t until I got back to my beloved Phuong 19 that I got one. When I bumped into an expat friend and told him I’d been in Bangkok for the weekend, his eyes widened and he leaned back as if to better visualise that ‘something’ he yearns for, that ‘something’ that Bangkok has and that Saigon hasn’t…
“Did you go to Taco Bell? Oh man, I’d fly to Bangkok just to eat that shit.”
When BurgerKing opened in Vietnam, the first outlets were in the airport -- so fast-food loving expats could get their fix before they even left the country. Or, in some cases, I am told after a night on the sauce, a hoard of expats might even ride out to the airport just to eat Whoppers. But it should be noted that both McDonald’s and BurgerKing have fallen well short of their initial growth projections. Meanwhile, the stock of pho and banh mi continues to rise in the US and all around the western world. To all the gobshite keyboard warriors who wrote “So who won the war anyway?” when these symbolic US fast food giants opened in Vietnam, well, what can I say but eat that.
I never understand why expats miss things like Branston pickle or marmite… my biggest gripe was the opening of the evil that is Starbucks in a country famed for amazing coffee…at a fraction of the price.
On a side note, my daughter will no longer eat Burger King after it being the only place to get ‘breakfast’ before an early flight out of Saigon. She projectile vomited said burger over her seat (and those nearby) just as we touched down in…Bangkok…
I would add Kinokuniya book store as a thing that Bangkok has that Saigon doesn't