Bird's Nest - A Delicacy

Bird's nest soup is a delicacy in Chinese cuisine quite popular in China and Hong Kong. Chinese believe that the natural collagen in bird's nest is good for the skin and keeps it looking young. Some also consume with the belief that it has aphrodisiac benefits.

For the first time I tasted bird's nest soup in a Cantonese restaurant in Hong Kong. I quite liked the texture of the soup, continued there after without hesitation, thinking that bird's nest is name of a Chinese dish.

Actually these bird's nests are built by Swift birds with their saliva. These nests are in the shape of a cup. These are harvested, cleaned and cooked as a delicacy in Chinese cuisine. These bird's nests are quite expensive as well.

During my latest visit to Indonesia, I had the opportunity to capture a video of cleaning process of such white nests. Here it is:

(Video captured with Samsung Galaxy Note)

Bird's nest originated from Indonesia and today, Indonesia is one of the major exporters. Currently commercial production of these bird's nest are now undertaken in Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam etc. Hong Kong has overtaken China as the major importer of bird's nest. 

When you are travelling to Hong Kong, China or Singapore don't forget to taste this dish. You will like it. 

Now the key question is to whether bird's nest is considered a vegetarian or a non-vegetarian dish. Since it is not meat or egg, in my opinion vegetarian's are good to go. Willing to hear other views.

Simple And Poignant Things In Bangkok

Last decade saw raise of economic prosperity in Thailand. Today progress can be seen in every nook and corner. Thai upper middle class is burgeoning at a steady pace. At the same time, we can still notice the simple and poignant things all around. Few examples here:

- Last year I went to see a movie in MBK (MahboonKrong, one of the popular malls in Bangkok). When the movie was about to start, suddenly all the people in the theatre started standing up. I was confused as to why they were trying to leave when the movie is about start. I was wrong. They were all standing respectfully as short clip about King Bhumibol Adulyadej was going to be shown next, that is before the movie. I felt so moved that I too stood reverentially.

- During my recent visit, at the buffet dinner in the hotel, I saw unusually more number of vegetarian dishes. There were also few yellow flags around these dishes with Thai letters. My Thai colleagues explained that for nine days, Thais practice vegetarianism, some of them very strict. These nine days coincide with Dasara or Vijaya Dashami or Dussehra days!

- Nationalism is pervasive all around. Every day at 8am  and at 6pm the Thai national anthem is played invariably in all the channels both radio and TV!


During my childhood, cinema theatres were ending shows with our National Anthem - Janaganamana being played, with all of us standing up with respect. God knows, why and when this practice was stopped.

Why don't we have the Indian national anthem played everyday at 8 am in all Indian channels? How difficult is to bring such measures? Or it doesn't matter?

Thailand - Travel Report

In this post, I will be splitting the subject into two parts -

• Economic progress of Thailand and                                                                                                    

• Arithmetics of VisaOnArrival.

First time I travelled to Bangkok was back in 1998. Those were the years Thailand was accelerating its growth engines. Patpong, ladyboys, sukhumvit, NanaPlaza, Pattaya, go-go-bars, massage were the words popular world over while describing Thailand travel experience.

Economic Progress:
Early to late nineties in Thailand, the ratio between business tourism and sex tourism were almost on par. But now the business and shopping tourism amounts to at least 80 per cent.

A number of Japanese majors like - Toyota, Honda have their car manufacturing plants, which exports to most of the Asian countries including India. Same is the case with Korean companies.

Progress of the country can be easily measured when you see the smiling polite Thais. A number of them can comfortably converse with you in English now, compared to earlier days. Countries growing wealth is evident all over the place.

Arithmetics of VisaOnArrival (VOA):
Probably Thailand was one of the first few countries to offer VOA facility to a number of major nations. For VOA they charge THB 1,000 (approx. USD 32).

From the latest statistics that I could see, 500,000 Indians travelled to Thailand way back in the year 2007. In a rough guesstimate, the foreign tourist inflow into Thailand, should be around 30,000,000 in a year.

Out of which even if they don't charge VOA fee for half the visitors, 15,000,000 visitors a year net the country a cool USD 480 million!

On top of this even if each of the tourists spends USD 100 during their stay, which is too low, there is any additional inflow of at least USD 3 Billion (30,000,000 X USD 100).

Sounds simple, right?

That's how these economies are doing a targeted growth.

Hello, any one listening???