The following was written 7-14, in the attic of an old lady in Sukhothai
8:30PM
The bus left Chiang Mai at noon and arrived upon Sukhothai at 5:30PM. From the station, I caught a tuk-tuk to the Baan Thai Guest House. They were full, but I was told there would be a room for me tomorrow night and another solution for tonight. A home stay, she said.
And so tonight I bed down in the attic of an old lady (she must be 80) who speaks no English. The bed is quite hard, but will do.
1:45PM
Before I left for Thailand, I heard from a few people that, by the end of their trips, the Thai language got to annoy them – it’s so tonal and can sound very much like whining. That hasn’t happened to me.
But the French!
I’ve discovered that if you see another white person in Thailand, there’s something like a 97% chance that they’re French. As such, you hear the language all the time around guest houses and the tourist strips. I have no idea why, but it’s really begun to annoy me.
And it’s nothing else about the people. Sure, they’re a quirky bunch, with their attention to manners and being so proper, but it’s only the language that has grown to annoy me.
The following was written 7-12 in an alley in Chiang Rai.
6:04PM
Chiang Rai is one of the few cities in which the bus station is actually near the center of town. Within walking distance, even with a huge pack.
I didn’t have anything to do this evening, and ate dinner just a block away, so I decided to wander on over and buy a ticket to Chiang Mai for tomorrow.
The bus station is a noisy place, already hard to hear each other speak. As I was talking to the guy at the ticket window, this loud music started blasting. I thought to myself “Cut this horrible racket! I can barely understand this guy as it is.” The music stopped as soon as I finished at the window, and I turned around in time to see the whole station sit back down and return to business.
Oops. It was the National Anthem. Hey, at least I was standing.
The following was written 7-12, in the garden of my Chiang Rai guest house.
3:45PM
Ralph Blum’s The Book of Runes I found faded and worn, buried deep in a used book store in Chiang Mai. It is “a handbook for the use of an ancient Oracle: the Viking Runes”. It tells of their meaning and ways of their use. They are not so much a form of divination, of future telling or fairy-tale magic, but a challenge to look into yourself. By using the runes in search of an answer, you find your own interpretation and project what you already know, but perhaps do not wish to express, onto the stones. Their symbols, sounds, and arrangements seem almost arbitrary. Still, I must question it.
In The Spell of the Sensuous (which I will have to comment more on later), David Abram spends a great deal of ink on the impact of writing, particularly phonetic, with our experience of the world. He proposes that systems such as ours, where the sounds and the symbols themselves bear little to no resemblance to anything of the sensuous world, serves to cut us off from the that world – he assaults (with the alphabet, of course) this the same way Daniel Quinn assaults agriculture. Seeing the runes through these animist eyes, one wonder why they’re to be used as an oracle. Question their validity. Their symbols have no reference to the natural world, nor do their sounds. This unlike, for instance, the Hebrew aleph-beth, the first letter of which meant ox and looked like an ox. Indeed, Odin happened upon the runes one day while torturing his own body – attempting to transcend the sensuous, and thus the whole of the natural world. From my limited understanding of the runes and their origins, I must be skeptic of their use, even if it is unimportant. I would prefer a more natural gateway within.
Still, a good read. Recommended for those who are interested in a Western version of the I Ching or Tarot cards.
The following was written 7-11, homeless in Tha Ton, not so in Chiang Rai.
6:14AM
The van dropped me off in Tha Ton at about 4AM. I walked around town a little – not a challenging feat in this place – but all was closed. So I found a small little park, perhaps 20ft x 20ft, right next to the Tourist Police station. It had a couple trees that looked like they could provide rain cover, and a bench to lay on. I was able to get a little sleep before the sun came up.
Now I’m sitting on a pile of dirt across the street from the guest house I want to try, ants crawling all over me. The gate to the guest house is still closed, despite the sun being up and the city being awake.
As I said, the “mini bus” was a van. Packed with rows of seats, we were able to squeeze in 11 people, with one sitting on the stick shift. (Remember when I said I was the 15th to sign up?) Thais love to overbook. And let’s not even start on how they attempted to fit all the luggage. I think that a normal bus to Chiang Mai and then back north would have been a better deal, and more comfortable.
The guest house isn’t showing signs of waking, and a rooster felt the urge to walk up to me and start making loud, annoying noises, so I think I’ll wander around and find breakfast.
8:18AM
The idea of me coming here was to spend the night and then jump on the river boat to Chiang Rai tomorrow, where from I could bus back to Chiang Mai at some point. Now I’m of the mind just to leave on the boat today – there isn’t much to hold me here. I look forward to a 3 hour float down the river.
4:14PM
I’ve arrived in Chiang Rai!
Whether or not there would be a boat today was questionable. Because of gas prices, they only leave if there are 6 people. I was the first, and until just 30 minutes before the scheduled departure, there were only 5.
I seem to be getting used to sleeping on park benches, which I did all morning. The locals weren’t able to get used to seeing a scruffy, long-haired, white guy taking a nap in their park, though. I might be starting to smell… Perhaps I should bite the bullet and pay to get real laundry done?
As I was lying on the bench, three hill tribe women came up, selling their wares. Though none of us spoke a common language, we carried out a conversation for a bit. It was fun.
Today turned out to be Buddhist Lent, which meant the banks are all closed. A Swiss and her Thai boyfriend were all out of Baht, and needed to get to Chiang Rai so that the Swiss could reach her flight home. They asked me to spot them the 600 Baht for two boat tickets, which I did, and promised to pay me back when we docked at Chiang Rai – they would have a friend waiting at the pier who could pay me. To be honest, I didn’t really care if they could pay me back or not. I happened to have the Baht on me, and they needed to get to Chiang Rai. And that’s it.
In a Buddhist country, it doesn’t matter whether you believe in Karma or not. It just is.
I enjoyed the ride in the long tail boat. They sit so low that it feels like you’re skimming on water. The views (of the parts I didn’t sleep through) were wonderful. Not a road in site. Just green, green hills.
When we got to Chiang Rai, the Thai-Swiss couple’s friend was there with the money. He was a fat old man, whom I was told was a “medicine man”. I named him Bullfrog.
The couple had previously offered to drive me to any guest house I wanted, which I took them up on – a good thing, as there were no taxis waiting at the boats. We jumped in Bullfrog’s little car and zipped through town, defying every traffic law one could. Not even the Buddhist Lent Parade stopped us – we pulled right in, weaving through the monks and nuns.
They were driving down to Nan tomorrow, and offered me a free ride, but I declined. I want a couple nights in Chiang Rai before I bus south to Chiang Mai.
Now I sit in the guest house. It’s nothing much to look at, but has two strong fans and screen doors on the opposite sides of the room for bug-free ventilation.
It’s been exceptionally hot today. I look forward to a cool night in a bed – certainly superior to a night stuck in the back corner of a van, swerving to miss bumps, but still hitting them, in a sit leaning forward from the pressure of the bags behind it.
5:46PM
Uh oh. Found another ice cream shop. They have something called a “chocolate trio”. That’s like, chocolate 3 times. Must be good. We’ll see.
The ice cream was bad. My stomach regrets it. They call themselves America’s Favorite Ice Cream Parlor, too. I’ve never even heard of the guys before today…
I’m in a funky little internet cafe across the street now. They have tasty looking smoothies – I should have come here before the ice cream place and gotten one of those instead.
Somebody is taking a bunch of pictures of the place. Maybe I’ll end up in an ad somewhere.
Speakeasy says 612k down, 515k up.
I was exploring Chiang Rai earlier. Found the night market, but they were just setting up, so I wandered down here to kill a little time.
I’ve been online a lot lately. Updating daily, it seems.
12:01PM
There are ads for the Camel Trophy all over town. A strange spot on the globe for them.
I found a used book shop earlier. Some ex-pat’s attic, with stacks and stacks of old, dusty books. Cobwebs covering the Tao section. All it needed was a large, old leather chair, and it could be home.