IN THE KINGDOM OF SIAM

BANGKOK - FEBRUARY 1997

After New Year in New York, I spent one week in Paris (in early February), and flew to Bangkok by the end of the month. It was the second time I was in Thailand, after the 1983 visit. This time I stayed at the Siam Intercontinental Hotel, a landmark that was closed on June 30, 2002, and destroyed afterwards. This post is dedicated to the late Siam Intercontinental Hotel, a remarkable hotel torn down to give rise to an incredible shopping centre named Paragon... A disaster!


"GARDENS - The Siam Intercontinental Hotel Gardens won an award for its environmental protection work in 1999. However, when the hotel's lease expired, it was torn down to make way for a shopping centre, reducing the 26-acre gardens to a few acres"


"SIAM INTERCONTINENTAL HOTEL - Opened in June 1966, the design seemed to resemble a hat worn by an early King of Ratansakosin. The view of its destruction is disgusting"


"RECEPTION, with flowers"



"VIEWS from my room: gardens and pool"


"ROOM"


"PEACOCK near the jogging trail"


"RIVER CHANNEL"

NEW YEAR IN NYC - PART II

STROLLING AROUND THE BIG APPLE - JANUARY 1997




"THE CLOISTERS house the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection of art and architecture from medieval Europe religious and secular art. With approximately five thousand works of art from about 800 through the fifteenth century, the Cloisters are located on Fort Tryon Park overlooking the Hudson River in northern Manhattan, showing some of the most dramatic scenery in New York. The building incorporates elements from five medieval French cloisters and from other monastic sites in southern France. The highlights, of course, are the five medieval Cloisters, and the Unicorn Tapestries, a series of 7 wool and silk tapestries depicting The Hunt of the Unicorn. In the Spanish Room the 3-paneled Altarpiece of the Annunciation, a 15th century work by Robert Campin, is shown. Three of the cloisters have gardens planted according to horticultural information found in medieval treatises and works of art, such as tapestries and stained-glass windows. The first time we were at the Cloisters was in 1979, and we fell in love with the building"


"JAZZ AT THE VILLAGE VANGUARD, one of my favourite jazz clubs"


"FERRY - On the way to the Statue of Liberty"




"THE STATUE OF LIBERTY Enlightening the World was a gift of friendship from the people of France to the people of the United States and is a universal symbol of freedom and democracy. Thus, it makes sense to post on her on July 14th... The Statue of Liberty was dedicated on October 28, 1886, and restored for her centennial on July 4, 1986"



"DOWNTOWN AND THE HUDSON boat tour"


"ELLIS ISLAND is a symbol of America’s immigrant heritage. From 1892 to 1954, this immigrant depot was the main entry facility for immigrants entering the United States. Nearly twelve million landed here in their search of an economic opportunity. The Ellis Island Immigrant Station was designed by architects Edward Lippincott Tilton and William Boring, who received a gold medal at the 1900 Paris Exposition for the building's design"


"WTC - Love this picture!"


"WALL STREET, Trinity Church and the Portuguese flag. The flag is no longer there, as the Bank that used to display it moved away"


"NYSE - The NYSE originated on May 17, 1792, when the Buttonwood Agreement was signed by twenty-four stockbrokers outside of 68 Wall Street in New York under a buttonwood tree. On March 8, 1817, the organization drafted a constitution and renamed itself the "New York Stock and Exchange Board". This name was shortened to its current form in 1863. The New York Stock Exchange building at 18 Broad Street opened on April 22, 1903!"


"CHELSEA PIER - Not to be confused with Chelsea F.C. of the Special One - José Mourinho! Lovely sunset"



"UNION SQUARE BIO MARKET, just in front of the Blue Water Grill, a restaurant I like."


"DRAKE SWISSOTEL - Preparing to check out!"

***

FOR THE RECORD - NOV/DEC 1996!

***

On the last post I forgot to mention that still in 1996, and after Madrid and Toledo, I flew once again to New York early November, to Paris mid-November, to Brussels and London by the end of November, to Cape Verde - Sal and Praia - in early December, and finally back to NYC. From all these trips, there is only this conference picture in Praia, Cape Verde, that I post here as a memory of a nice time...



"CAPE VERDE CONFERENCE"

NEW YEAR IN THE BIG APPLE

MINUS 13º CELSIUS - DECEMBER 1996


"THE DRAKE SWISSOTEL at Park Avenue and 56th Street was for many times my home in New York. It was a quite nice European style hotel with a superb location. Last time in NYC I saw that there were works on the building, hopefully a renovation of the hotel. It would be a shame if we lose it as a lodging possibility..."



"DIM SUM AT 20 MOTT ST. - On Sunday, December 29, 1996, we headed to this Chinatown eatery, which used to be always crowded, for an excellent dim sum"


"CHINATOWN FISH MARKET, for the benefit of Ming the Merciless"


"DOM, West Broadway, where you'll find home furnishings and accessories that you just don't see anywhere else"


"CHRISTMAS TREE, Rockefeller Promenade"


"THE NUTCRACKER - George Balanchine's Nutcracker is a Christmas' must at the New York City Ballet! 2007 season is from November 23rd through December 30th"


PARK AVENUE at 54th Street, just two blocks down from the Drake..."


"42ND STREET with a view towards the Chrysler building. This picture was taken from Tudor City, where we stayed in 1979, the first time we went to New York (without the young lady, who was not born yet...). Other memories from that trip can be seen here, and here, and also here!"


"UN BUILDING seen from Tudor City"



"UN GARDENS with the Chrysler and Queensborough Bridge"


"METROPOLITAN MUSEUM"




"HAPPY NEW YEAR - On December 31st, 1996 we went to see "Cats" and then joined the crowd in Times Square/7th Av! The temperature was MINUS 13 Celsius..."



"BACK TO THE DRAKE - On the way back to the Drake, we took these two pictures at the Redeye Grill, home of the Dancing Shrimp..., and at Harley-Davidson Cafe"

POR TIERRAS DE CASTILLA LA MANCHA

TOLEDO - OCTOBER 1996

Toledo, the capital of the province of Toledo and of the autonomous community of Castile-La Mancha, is an interesting town located 70 km south of Madrid. It sits on a large hill, and is surrounded on three sides by the River Tagus. In 1986, it was included in the World Heritage Site List of the UNESCO. According to UNESCO, the reasons to include Toledo in the List were the following: «Successively a Roman municipium, the capital of the Visigothic Kingdom, a fortress of the Emirate of Cordoba, an outpost of the Christian kingdoms fighting the Moors and, in the 16th century, the temporary seat of supreme power under Charles V, Toledo is the repository of more than 2,000 years of history. Its masterpieces are the product of heterogeneous civilizations in an environment where the existence of three major religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – was a major factor». Many famous people and artists were born or lived in this city, including De La Vega, Alfonso X and El Greco.


"CALLE SANTA ISABEL - The old city retains its medieval road plan, with an irregular terrain and twisting streets. Here we are on our way to visit one of the must-sees in Toledo - the painting by Domenikos Theotokopoulos (El Greco) known as «El Entierro del Conde de Orgaz» (The Burial of Count Orgaz), a masterpiece of painting! It's the biggest painting of the Spanish 16th century (4.8 x 3.6 meters). It represents an old legend: when in 1312 don Gonzalo Ruiz, count of Orgaz died, both Saint Stephen and Saint Augustine helped to bury the body inside this church owned by the count. The composition has two scenes: one terrestrial (the lower side of the painting) with the representations of contemporaries of El Greco (including his self-portrait and his son's portrait); and another celestial, on the upper half of the composition"


"CATHEDRAL - The Cathedral of Toledo, one of the three 13th century High Gothic cathedrals in Spain, is considered to be the masterpiece of the Gothic style in Spain. It was built on top of a Muslim mosque, and before that it had been a church in the sixth century during the reign of the Visigoth King Recaredo. Its construction started in 1226 during the reign of Fernando III and was concluded in 1493, when the vaults of the central nave were finished, during the times of the Fernando and Isabel"


"AYUNTAMIENTO - The City Hall, located next to the Cathedral, was built in 1575 when Baroque-style was taking over from the Renaissance-style. It resembles El Escorial as its builders were the same - Juan de Herrera, Nicolas de Vergara el Mozo, Juan Bautista Monegro and Jorge Manuel Theotokopoulos. It has two floors with impressive towers on each side with impressive spires"



"PLAZA and HOUSES - Toledo has several imposing plazas, as well as interesting houses"


"MONASTERIO DE SAN JUAN DE LOS REYES - An architectural jewel of the Spanish Gothic style whose outstanding features are the cloisters and the arched galleries. The ground floor houses numerous sculptures along with some fine carved stone reliefs depicting images of animals and vegetation. The upper storey has a richly decorated mudjar-style ceiling"



"MURALLAS - There were Walls to protect Toledo since the Romans and the Visigoth times, but the Muslims were those who, after capturing the city in 711, reinforced the old city walls to adapt them to their new military function as the frontier capital of the newly created Islamic State. The old Moorish wall still stands. It's still possible to see some remains of the Visigothic wall near the Puerta de Bisagra"


"BRIDGE - San Martin Bridge was built in 1203 to replace a previous bridge made out of wooden boats that was destroyed by floods. It too was partially demolished in the fourteenth century when the city was under siege during civil war in the Kingdom of Castilla but was restored shortly afterwards. San Martin Bridge has five arches and is flanked by two solid defensive towers with decorative facades"


"RIVER TAGUS, 1,038 km in length, is the longest river on the Iberian Peninsula. Its source is the Fuente de Garcia, in the Albarracin Mountains. After that, it runs through Aranjuez, Toledo, Talavera de la Reina and Alcantara in Spain, as well as Constancia and Santarem in Portugal to come to the Atlantic Ocean by Lisbon, where it has a magnificent estuary"