Rain Man

Remember in Forrest Gump when Forrest is over in Nam writing letters to Jenny and telling her about all the types of rain they have over there? Well, I can now say I know exactly what Forrest was talking about. This was my third weekend in Thailand, and as some of you know June starts the rainy season over here. I knew that coming over and so I made sure to pack an umbrella and a poncho but my first few weeks here were bone dry. I think it drizzled one night for a minute but other than that nothing to really speak of. Well yesterday the rain showed up.

But now that I’ve teased the ending, I should go back to the beginning to give some depth to the weekend. Friday night our office was invited to join the 10^th annual Tiers and Beers party and so we all decided to go. T&B is a gathering of the various non-profits in Bangkok who deal in human rights work and it’s a two pronged party. The first day of the event is held on the same day that the US releases its annual TIP report where it grades countries for their human trafficking efforts. We all get together at a restaurant (which actually had great Thai food) and drink a lot and then fill out our picks for the South East Asia rankings. The person who gets the closest to correct wins a fantastic trophy. I love me a trophy so I spent an inordinate amount of time at work on Friday researching the whole deal and coming up with a great bracket, so CAMSA could proudly showcase the trophy to everyone. Sadly it was not to be. Not even kinda. I was so miserably off on my bracket that I’m embarrassed I even showed up. I’ve got a lot to learn in the human trafficking field it seems.

I’m not actually sure who won the trophy though as that is part 2 of the event. The first night we all got together and drunk a lot and watched John Kerry make the announcement via livestream. It was a blast. The whole thing had a very tongue in cheek feel to it because really, what makes America the arbiter of human trafficking in the first place, all our experience with it? And, as I would come to find out, any semblance of real legitimacy was basically destroyed early on by politics. The rankings are equal parts public shaming in the global sphere and private political coercion and are frequently a sham since certain countries should have considerably worse rankings but since they are our buddies we look away. So everyone involved makes a gag out of it and that’s how I ended up drinking every time John Kerry said “modern-slavery” in his speech. (They had a whole set of rules for the drinking game which were based on well-worn tropes of the field. If everyone had actually played by the rules, we’d have all been hammered instead of just me.)

The main leader of this whole shebang was a guy named Pete who has been living in Bangkok for 20 years and apparently wins the trophy more years than not. He was again the favorite for this year and a lot of the older hands around the table were very vocal in their desire to unseat his dynastic grip on the big prize. He was the one who sort of started the party and he picked out the place. When we got there he told us it was the best Thai food in the city and afterwards I believed him. (I probably should seeing as he’s been here for 20 years.)  I’m pretty worn out on Thai cuisine at this point but this stuff was just a delight. There was a some form of crab curry that I was particularly fond of and chicken grilled in fig leaves which was the noodles (that is not a typo it means “good” or “excellent”). I ate a ton and ended up drinking even more because I was playing the drinking game to the most exact specifications unlike everyone else and because our waiter seemed to have a particular interest in me. He never let my drink get empty whereas everyone around me had to ask for more beer.

Sidebar: On the beer note. I have now sampled several local beers and they are all boring…which is exactly how I like it because once a beer goes past “dirty dishwater” in flavor that’s when I’m out. So I can’t comment on anything else but the basic beer you can buy at the 7-11 and what not tastes mostly just like Bud Light and that is A-OK with me.

Sidebar to the Sidebar: How Anheuser-Busch hasn’t marketed a beer for Asia called “Buddha Lite” is beyond me. That’s what I call Bud Light at home and I couldn’t care anything at all aout the Buddha. Put China’s fat Buddha on the bottle (not Jimmy’s Buddha!) and corner the Asian beer market. I mean honestly, why won’t people pay me to be an idea person and just think of great things all day? End both sidebars.

After the stream we all sat around and drank and talked some more. I had a rousing conversation about the World Cup and how Qatar, being downgraded to a 3 (worst score) would effect them and their bid to host and everyone just kinda chatted and had a good time. It appears Pete probably won again but that will be determined for sure this week and then we will all get back together for the trophy ceremony and more frivolities. I went into this event thinking it would a total checkerboard (a conglomeration of squares) but left thoroughly excited for the wrap-up party. Maybe it’s just because I was drunk or maybe it’s because they all spoke English and that is a rarity round these parts but I had a thorough hoot Friday.

…..So much so that I slept in incredibly late on Saturday and was too hungover to functionally do anything. I had previously made grand plans to go to Erawan falls which is a scenic little spot a few hours north of Bangkok but that plan got shot in the foot by Friday. Saturday I spent most of the day recovering and doing laundry. Let’s talk about laundry for a moment. This being my first trip to the 3^rd world, I’m unaccustomed to how doing laundry here works, namely, the drying portion of this ordeal. When I left the States I basically packed every bit of clothing I have since I was to be gone all summer and I don’t actually own a lot of clothes. However, since it is 90 degrees on a cool day over here I have been changing costumes multiple times a day so as to not lounge about in sweat-soaked t-shirts and the like. As a result of this I’m doing laundry much more frequently than I normally would which wouldn’t be an issue except that we do not have a dryer at my place of residence. We have a washing machine (though it’s all in Thai and took me at least 3 attempts to figure it out) but for drying we just hang our clothes up on hangers or a line. I’ve never done this before and I’m now convinced that the smartest man who ever lived is the guy who invented the dryer. When you leave clothes out to dry the aren’t fluffy and soft and fun like new clothes are. They are kinda stiff and loose and stretched out. They smell clean and are clean, but hand drying is the pits and makes me unhappy. Also, this is a city in which a third of the population won’t walk outside without a medical mask covering their face from the pollution and foul odor yet everyone leaves their clothes outside on a line to absorb said smells and pollution? There is some incongruity there. As soon as I find a nearby dry-cleaners I’m taking them everything and never washing my own stuff again here.

Anyway, so after my uneventful Saturday I decided that Sunday I should wake up and go do the Grand Palace and the remaining tourists attractions I had not yet been to. This meant being ready to slog through the hot Bangkok day in long pants because the Palace requires you be very respectful. It was unappealing but it had to be done. So I embarked from my residence and set forth towards the palace. I caught a cab in which the driver and I spent an hour not speaking to each other while he tried to maneuver through BKK traffic and I tried to only look out the window instead of at the GIGANTIC goiter on his neck. It was a battle I lost but not without trying.

When I finally got to the Palace and made my way inside I was met with another fun surprise, entry to the Palace and Wat Phra Kaew  is 500 baht (~$18) promptly making it the most expensive thing  I’ve done in Bangkok. This was again unappealing but had to be done so I ponied up the cash and headed inside. I’m going to post a whole bunch of pictures with this so for the most part I’ll let them do the talking but a few fun facts. The Palace is where the King used to live but is now a collection of museums and tourist attractions. The Ministry of Finance is still housed in the  compound but I think that is the only official building inside. The outside of the Palace area is a big white wall that is over a mile around and it contains the Palace, Wat PHra Kaew, and several temples. Wat Phra Kaew is reportedly the holiest place in Thailand and thus the extra measures for tourists like covered shoulders, tattoos, and long pants. The Wat is also known as the Temple of the Emerald Buddha which it houses. The Emerald Buddha itself is very fancy and miniscule. He sits on top of a giant altar and there are piles and piles of people trying to get a glimpse of him. I have no pictures of him because there are several guards militantly walking around to make sure no one takes any photos. I have snuck photos in the Sisteen Chapel but (maybe it’s just coup fear talking) I didn’t dare risk a shot of this little guy. He wasn’t that special anyway.

The Emerald Buddha is not actually emerald but made from one whole piece of jade and has some particular historical/religious significance I’m unclear on. Apparently, the Buddha was captured when the Thai’s captured Angor Wat in Cambodia and then hidden in Chiang Rai by being covered in plaster. In the 1400’s, it got lost/forgotten and some monks found it and put it in their temple but it was covered in plaster so they didn’t know it was jade. When the plaster began to flake, they noticed the inside and removed the plaster discovering the statue inside. They thought it was emerald (which makes no sense as emerald and jade are not very similar) and the King in Chiang Mai demanded it be brought to him. Three times they tried to send it via elephant and 3 times it got lost and ended up in Lampang so the King considered this divine intervention and built a temple there. Some other things happened and the Burmese had it for a while before the Thai’s conquered it back and then they built the special temple for it and Bangkok. It’s apparently so sacred that the King is the only person allowed to touch it so thrice a year he comes in and during a ceremony changes the clothes it is wearing. Not gonna lie, being the only living person who has ever done something has got to be pretty damn cool. That’s makes me want to be King alone. Like how if I’m ever elected President the first thing I’m doing is reading The Big Book of National Secrets that every President gets to read about alien’s and JFK and what-not, if I was ever made King the first thing I’d do would be to go to the Wat and toss the statue up in the air.

The rest of the place is just like any other Wat in BKK; a lot of very pretty architecture, no wearing your shoes inside, and a bunch of monks and tourists walking around. You know wat they say, You’ve seen one Wat you’ve seen them all. After the Wat I headed to the Giant Swing which is another Wat with a Watty name that escapes me and isn’t memorable. The Wat itself isn’t anything to write home about (which is literally what I’m doing right now) other than the fact that it has a massive swing outside of it. Well, it used to anyway. Now it just has the arch where the swing used to be. In 2006 some people died in a swing related accident and now it is sans seat and chains. On my way there I saw some lost Americans and, being such an old hat at the Bangkok scene, I approached them and offered to help. They too were looking for the swing so I told them to follow me and we set off together. They had just arrived in Bangkok so I gave them a rundown of things they should do and then after we arrived at The Swing, we parted ways.

It was getting pretty late at this point as I had spent several hours in the Palace and walking about so I decided to grab a late-lunch early dinner and there was a McDonald’s right next to me so yeah. I went there. I ate a Big Mac and it was delicious. I’ve since come to find out that there is such thing as a Double Big Mac here which I will now have to sample in all its coronary inducing delight.

Sidebar: McDonald’s has to love their overseas department. Minimum wage here is $10 a day but the food is still roughly the same price. My meal cost me $5. So for they are paying workers here 1/5 what they pay in the US but their prices are only 20% lower. That is a huge uncreas on the margins there for them. This is why McDonald’s can bite me about not paying a living wage back home. Y’all are exploiting the crap out of everyone. Quit being greedy buttholes.

After my meal I started walking bout to the SkyTrain to go home when I noticed the darkness massing on the horizon. The temperature dropped 15 degrees and it started gusting like a hurricane. Fortunately I had been wise enough to pack my trusty bumbershoot for just such an occurrence as this so I got it out and began my 3 mile march back to the metro. For a brief moment I considered getting a motorcycle taxi but that soon was ruled a non-option when all the motorcyclists pulled off the road and started camping out under awnings. At first I thought that was an extreme reaction when it hadn’t even started raining yet but I should’ve known better than to question the locals. The rain came on suddenly and it dropped in buckets. I think I only just know have a concept for what the phrase “monsoon” actually means. It friggin poured. The wind blew the rain every which way and the sheer volume of it outstripped my poor little umbrella’s protective capabilities. Whoever invented umbrella’s must not have thought that pants were important and clearly didn’t have the foresight to consider that pants pockets is where we in the future would carry most of our expensive, water-fearing, electronics because for all the good my umbrella did, my pants looked like I’d been wading through the marsh. My face and shoulders were kept dry by the nylon canopy but the rest of me got soaked through. OH! Did I mention I was wearing white pants? Oh yeah that was just great. Trudging through downtown Bangkok looking like a half-drowned cat desperately clutching a baby umbrella with purple underwear just all up in everyone’s face. And to cap things all off, since it was so windy and Bangkok is the dirtiest place on Earth, I had to wear my sunglasses the whole time to keep debris from flying into my eyeballs even though it was getting really dark at this point. I already stick out like the sorest of thumbs and this little walkabout I looked like the biggest Munson on the planet.

One other little issue with umbrellas I found out about, they don’t operate well in confined spaces…like the streets of Bangkok. As I’ve mentioned before every sidewalk is cram-packed with street vendors and the monsoons don’t drive them off. All their carts have tarps attached that they just throw up like a teepee and keep on selling. This has a two-pronged effect of misery. First, since the carts are on the sidewalk taking up the already limited walking space, it takes some serious calculus to fit 2 people with umbrellas and a food cart all side by side, much less piles of them. And secondly, these tarps either a) accrue water in pools on top of them which get periodically dumped out essentially throwing bucketfuls of water on pedestrian’s feet, or b) they are better constructed and have a constant stream of water funneled off the top, onto pedestrian’s feet. It was total misery walking back and if I didn’t have an iphone in my breast pocket I was trying desperately not to destroy, I would have just abandoned the umbrella all together and have embraced my onset of pneumonia.

When I finally got on the train and shivered my way home, the other people at the office wanted to go get dinner. Eff that. I was tired and freezing and wanted nothing to do with walking so I decided to skip dinner altogether since I had a late McDonald’s. I almost ordered delivery from Micky D’s (which is a thing you can do here) or Pizza Hut (which has basically none of the pizza’s you’re used to. One day I’ll get some so I can blog about it) but decided I should be less fat so I just ate some cookies instead and went to bed early, hoping to sleep for a bit and then wake up in time for the US Men’s World Cup game. I woke up in time but when I woke up my computer decided it would be the coolest and up and exploded. Brand new computer less than 2 months old and it’s fried. Fortunately it is under warranty but not sure I can get that taken care of over here. Oh well. Life goes on and so does the blog.

Thanks for putting up with me. You keep reading and I’ll keep posting.

Jed