I Could Have Danced All Night

Sala Rim Naam Seen From Chao Phraya River

Before we departed from Thailand we wanted to immerse ourselves in another bit of traditional Thai culture. To that end, we booked a dinner online at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel Sala Rim Naam venue.

Located across the Chao Phraya River from the hotel, Sala Rim Naam is a richly decorated pavilion in the Northern Thai style.  Our reservation included a four course meal.

After the meal we were entertained by a performance of about 20 dancers who performed multiple traditional Thai dances accompanied by period musicians.

The Meal

Dining Area

After the short boat ride across the river, we were greeted by Sala Rim Naam staff, lead to the pavilion and seated in a large dining area at a white clothed table.  The venue was five-star class.

Main Course 

The meal started with a spicy minced pork salad with ground toasted spices and mint leaves, steamed Thai dumplings with herbed minced chicken and peanut as well as deep-fried chicken wings marinated with yellow turmeric.

Other courses followed that included thoughtful presentations of spicy prawn soup with lemongrass, stir-fried squid with salted egg as well as stir-fried beef with hot basil leave and mushrooms.

The meal was simply wonderful!  The strategy in Thai cooking is to balance spicy with sweet to create an amalgam of taste exceeding the flavor boundaries of the base ingredients. Needless to say, it was quite a meal.

The Dance

Dancers

As the dancers entered the pavilion and mounted the raised performance stage, we could imagine similarly costumed dancers entertaining Siamese royalty centuries earlier.

Our only reference point for such traditional Thai dancing was from the 1956 movie The King and I with Yul Brynner and Deborah Kerr and its performance of "The Small House of Uncle Tom." Guess we need to get out more.

The costumes, headgear and masks worn by the dancers were well detailed and clearly designed to pay homage to the traditional dancer dress during the time of ancient Siamese rulers. The skill of the dancers was proficient, but short of professional theater level. Female dancers performed, as tradition dictated, with their fingers pulled back in ways we could never achieve.

Warrior dancers wore masks and brandished weapons while engaging in faux combat.

There was also a nod to modern-day Thai boxing with two dancers engaged in a theatric kick-boxing exhibition.

Overall it was a lovely evening with delicious food and a dance experience one could only find in Thailand.

After the performance, we posed for photos with the dancers and then departed for our boat ride back across the river and an Uber ride back to our hotel.


This is a 30 second video showing just a fragment of the evening's dancing.