Musical cents

Finally had a chance to visit Siam Paragon, the newest and apparently biggest department complex in Bangkok... it surprises me how complex and financially diverse Bangkok must be to have showrooms for Lamborgini, Ferrari and Bentley. Not to mention a resident string quartet, plus a lounge pianist playing on a 6-foot Steinway. Hallmark and the bookshops are about all I dare set foot in, which seem quite nice, but nothing like those in KL...

Mobile phone conversation in MPH
Me: Oi, where are you?
Friend: In Ancient Literature.
Me: Where's that? Next to Philosophy?
Friend: No, no, that's in the South Wing. Go to the East Wing.
Me: Near Neo-Economics?
Friend: Yeah, take a left at the fountain.

...which I hear occasionally have quartets of their own as well.

In other news, I heard that the concertmaster of the New York Phil earns US$500,000 and so the concertmaster of the Cleaveland Symphony negotiated his contract to US$500,000 and 50 cents, just so that he could be known as the highest paid orchestral musician in the United States.