Gallery of the Absurd

Spend any time at all in Thailand and you'll discover one of its hidden delights. Signs and sights are often incongruously screwy. More than once you'll find yourself knitting your brow, scratching your head, and thinking, "Huh?"  People write whole blogs about this topic because the material is everywhere, though it is beginning to disappear with the whitewash of westernization.  

In fact, the Thais may be becoming ashamed of their own typos. Seen on jersey barriers along a highway: a series of signs that read "SAFETY FIRT" in enormous, bold black letters. A few yards farther along, the offending typos had been blacked out so that the signs read simply "SAFETY." Finally, a few of them had been triumphantly corrected to "SAFETY FIRST."

A gallery of the absurd for your amusement:

The traditional Thai greeting, similar to the Japanese bow, is a prayerful
gesture called the wai (pronounced "why").  Here, Ronald McDonald offers both wai and wifi.

Where else could one find a hotel inadvertently designed to simulate a luxury liner colliding with a lighthouse?

Seen in an Aussie bar on Walking Street. Arabs keep out, but we respect your beliefs.

Entering Walking Street, you may expect "Passion of Colourful Paradise."
Could this be something like Disney's "Let the magic begin"?

Upon exiting Walking Street, you are wished a passionate evening ... I think.

We understand no smoking in the elevator, but what is that other ban all about?
Only in Thailand might you see a sign forbidding opened durian fruit.
Otherwise known as the world's stinkiest fruit, durian
tastes heavenly but smells like a cross between raw sewage and advanced decay.
Even Andrew Zimmern couldn't get past the smell to taste the ambrosia. 

The first line describing Koh Samet in a hotel handout makes it sound like
an S&M paradise: "A most idyllic Island for bathing and restraining."  What?

This international restaurant offers not only Thai, European, Chinese, and
Japanese food, but also free gruel! Count me in for this deal.
Another restaurant on the same street advertises "Western-style Chinese
food."  Pu-pu platter, anyone?

Pattaya also shows an absolute lack of reserve about matters that Westerners might find tasteless. 

Obviously a great deal of beer is drunk in this establishment. Ironically, the
toilet is located seemingly a mile away, in an adjacent hotel's garden.

These two off-color "laffs for the day" appeared in our luxury hotel's lobby.
But that's okay; there are no English-speaking children staying here.

Observed above the hippo pond at Khao Kheow Zoo. It's touching that they care
more for their animals than for the well-being of your cell phone.

Come to Thailand, and you'll find that the list indeed gose on.