Restaurant gets festive with a condom Santa
December 4, 2009
The Bangkok restaurant Cabbages & Condoms was packed Friday night, as usual, with tourists and locals, drawn by what tourist reviews call the romantic ambience and very good food.
Also known for lavish decorations made with "condoms from around the world," the restaurant is celebrating the festive season with a Santa Claus carefully created from hundreds of multicoloured condoms.
The restaurant – its motto is "our food is guaranteed not to cause pregnancy" – with the next door to a family-planning clinic is the inspiration of Mechai Viravaidya, a former Thai health minister whose mission is to promote family planning and birth control.
Santa isn't the only condom decoration, just the most seasonal one. Restaurant staffer Sanan Sanguansabaya told the Star that condom designs festoon the two-storey restaurant, but there are also "hundreds and hundreds" of crafts made by villagers for sale in the gift shop.
The proceeds from the restaurant – the flagship of six Cabbages & Condoms restaurant run by the non-profit Population and Community Development Association across Thailand – go to family-planning projects.
Viravaidya won a 2007 prize from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for his work. He's been known to bring condoms to World Bank talks and offer free vasectomies at his restaurants to push his message. Most days, though, patrons just get a free condom instead of a mint on their way out.
thestar.com