Restaurants, Field of Battle

If you go to a restaurant to blank out, to get away from it all, or if you are accompanied by a boring companion to whom you would rather not talk, that’s fine, you are well catered for in Bangkok. But, if you believe that fine food should be enriched by fine conversation, then you have a problem, Bangkok restaurants.
There is a rule of thumb about noise which we may call the one metre rule. If you are located one metre from another person with normal hearing and have difficulty communicating in a normal voice, then the noise level is too high. Technically, this level is approximately 55 decibels. Now the normal distance between diners across a table is about one metre. Ergo, if you have difficulty in communicating you are likely to be in a Bangkok restaurant.
Some restaurants warn you by advertising live music or karaoke. If that is what you want, fine, exit quiet Bangkok. It is not enough to listen for a moment at the door in the early evening and say it is alright, not too loud. As the night goes on it will get louder and louder. Next are ALL the other restaurants which have foreground, not background, music. Is it that Bangkokians don’t want to talk? They most certainly do, and the way to achieve it is by raising their voices, louder and louder. Next, are ALMOST ALL the restaurants which install television sets. The year of disaster was the year of World Cup matches when restaurants vied to acquire one rai large television screens lest they might lose one soccer crazy customer. The television set relays the wretched noisy game show which you left home to avoid, or shows an endless film video. Finally, I have even been to a restaurant, which like all the others has loudspeakers in every nook and cranny, but which also places an individual radio on each table! It appears that the restaurant proudly possesses its own transmitter so that you can boost the sound at half the one metre distance to your companion.
The “music” played over the loudspeaker, the film being shown, are all chosen by the staff who stand around unemployed most of the time, most restaurants opening from seven in the morning until midnight. Naturally, during the hours when customers arrive, they resent having their entertainment interrupted and may turn it louder to drown out the annoying voices and calls of customers.
What is the remedy? Best is to walk out and say the noise in this place is unacceptable. Even if the waiters hear what you say they will look at one another in wonderment that anyone would consider their favourite musak objectionable. Or you can stay and fight. You ask sweetly if they could reduce the volume, just a little. Then ask again when you will be told that it was already reduced. Looking doubtful you ask once more and there is a noticeable diminution. However, with painstaking skill the sound is again gradually increased! If you are alone in the restaurant you can ask to have the noise switched off altogether. No! It is set irreversibly by some remote power. Or, if it is switched off, it will be immediately switched on again when other customers appear the door, lest they be frightened away by the awful silence.
The battle goes on. Like the decisive Battles of the Somme, Okinawa, or the Siege of Leningrad, the battle field is at the heart of a war, in this case a war against noise. The issues at stake are the right to quiet and the massive passive acceptance of noise as a way of life. We can continue to leave the noisy places to the patronage of those who enjoy decibels with their meal, to request politely, to plead, to protest etc.. One tactic I use is to insist on speaking to waiters at a distance of one metre in a normal voice.
Quiet Bangkok is always happy to learn the name and location of quiet restaurants. We promise to publish a list of such honoured eating places to be cherished and patronised by quiet Bangkokians.
ps my lunch time restaurant today had a sound level of 72 dB, moderate by Bangkok standards.