$2,000 and 10 inches

I just came back from another trip to Bangkok yesterday. I had bought some new plate ware as what we bought originally was from when Linga Bar opened four years ago. I was a bit distressed when I walked into the kitchen recently and saw that we had very little left after four years of use, breakage etc. So, as I was bumping along in the taxi from Poipet to Siem Reap praying that our new plates would not arrive in broken pieces, I remembered a funny story from the opening of The One Hotel.

The story goes that several months before we opened I was given the opportunity to get a flat screen TV delivered locally, at 42" plasma TV. I jumped on the chance realizing that it would be much easier to get it that way. When the TV arrived earlier I brought it to my house and used it in the interim. We measured the area at The One Hotel where the TV would go, built a really cool bracket that would mount on the wall flat and then swing out to be viewed from the bed. A day before we were to install the TV I had to come to the house with our architect Ivan to take some final measurements. He commented that the TV was not very secured (it was being held upright in a base). Nothing to do at that point as it was going to the hotel the next day. That night I went to bed and at about 5am I heard the loudest and worst shattering noise. Somehow the TV had tipped over and landed on the floor. When I leapt from my bed and found it face down on the floor of the living room I kept repeating to myself, "It is ok, it will be fine, it will still work." When I turned the TV over you could see the shattered insides. I then went to my computer and logged on to do a Google search about how to repair broken plasma screens. The results were unanimous: You are out of luck, just scrap it and buy a new TV as the replacement cost is the same as buying new.

It was a tough blow. Later I went to Bangkok and bought a new 32" LCD tv. It was through this process I learned the difference between LCD and plasma. LCD is crisper and cleared and good for smaller rooms (perfect for The One Hotel) while plasma was better in bigger spaces. The new TV cost $2,000 so my joke was that I lost $2,000 and 10" and I don't know which hurt more.

Even though I got the new TV I was determined to get the broken plasma screen fixed. I took the TV back to Bangkok and asked everywhere. The problem was that it was not a name brand TV but a knock off. No one knew what to do with it. I looked everywhere but to no avail. Finally, I found one store that would come to look at it. They said, no way. At this point I was not about to let this TV go (that I had spent more than $2,000 on) so I brought the broken TV back and asked my friend Loven to turn it into an art piece. It now hangs in Linga Bar's dance area and certainly does not receive the proper recognition it should. Someday I will turn it into a coffee table. The interesting thing is that the exact same TV we bought for The One Hotel to replace the broken one was $2,000. For Hotel Be I bought nearly identical TV's for only $700 which shows you the direction of pricing for flat screen TVs. But, word to the wise, keep them secure!