This weekend I had the chance to travel to Lop Buri a city where monkeys have taken up residence and the last weekend in November there is a festival in their honor. The festival consists of feeding the monkeys everything from the normal, fruit, to the probably unhealthy, cotton candy and Cokes.
The whole trip went well except for Saturday night when my hotel room was broken into and my phone, money, fail proof tape recorder and camera were stolen, all while I was sleeping. Slightly disturbing.
Attempting to get any help from the hotel staff proved impossible and their only explanation was to point at a poorly written sign that could hardly pass as english stating that items left in the rooms were not their responsibility. The issue I have with this is that the items certainly weren't "left" in the room, I was there with them.
For those of you playing along at home, the score stands: Lop Buri: 4 Me: 0. But bitching and moaning now won't change anything. So it goes. Things could always be worse. Luckily I was able to get these photos that will help to illustrate the town and its residents.
I'd like to introduce my maybe, just maybe, 10 loyal readers to a new feature here on The Playground entitled Supermarket Sweep.
Every week I will tirelessly scour the corner stores, markets and of course 7-11s of Thailand to discover a food I find completely foreign and put my my taste buds as well as gastrointestinal health on the line trying it out.
For episode one of this blog love child experiment I have started off at the top with Taro Fish Snacks which have been, "Thailand's number one favourite fish snack for more than nineteen years." What a title. THE CHAMP IS HERE! More than 19, put not quite 20 years? Not trying to round up or pad the stats, I like the honesty already.
Seriously though it's nothing to laugh at the fish snack market is no fucking joke. Cuttlefish, squid, tuna, no animal of the deep blue is safe from being caught, reprocessed and churned out as a between meals snack for the Thai youth.
Let's get down to business.
The Product: Taro Fish Snack Bar-B-Q Flavoured
The Packaging: The Taro logo looks like something the Seattle Seahawks mascot would love to munch on. It has that whole Pacific Northwest vibe going that is catchy, but at the same time seems at bit out of place. I haven't seen a ton of Chinook tribesmen picking up a bag of these since I've been here.
Appearance: If the people who make Big League Chew ever go into making fish snacks I'd have to imagine it would look like this. Perfectly symmetrical, identical strips of "snack" with a bright yellow almost orange color, seems natural.
Smell: Hint of Tetrafin.
Taste: Not nearly as fisherman's wharf at low tide as I expected. Tastes almost exactly like Teriyaki beef jerky with a chewier, spongier consistency.
Overall: I wouldn't sit at home and nosh on a big bag of beef jerky by choice but in some situations it just fits. Road trips, in my mind, aren't official until a song has been sung in unison, someone has pissed in an empty 2 liter and some beef jerky has been consumed. So if I was stuck on the road for somewhere in the vicinity of 5 hours or more, I could see myself eating some BBQ fish snack, then immediately wanting to brush my teeth.
It's officially Thanksgiving Day here in Thailand, which means.....crickets.....absolutely nothing, not even a single hand turkey has been drawn.
Celebrating the holiday with Neal Page (Steve Martin) and Del Griffith (John Candy), who just want to get home for the big dinner, some huge football hits from a little person and one picture of Bob Dylan.
Director of Sales: American Light and Fixture, Shower Curtain Ring Division
People train runs out of Stubbville.
It's not Thanksgiving without gelatinous, can shaped cranberry and football.
You can't say the first kid didn't deserve it, I mean scramble or something. Check out the coaches in their matching Under Armour get-up and clip boards. Chill out Bear Bryant, you're coaching 6 year olds not calling plays on the sidelines of the fucking Rose Bowl.
The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan cover from 1963. I know there is snow on the ground and that leans a bit more towards Christmas, but for some reason this picture reminds me of Thanksgiving. Yea, that's pretty much it.
A video tribute to a rock star in every sense of the word. Best if watched on the largest screen and at the highest volume that is socially acceptable for your surroundings.
This weekend I received my first Thai massage. It was actually my first massage of any type, unless you include siting in one of those high-tech Lazy Boys in Brookstone for a few moments during middle school before my friends and I were inevitably asked to leave for being general nuisances and jackasses.
Massages have been something I've avoided to be honest. When people get too close during a conversation or sit next to you on the bus or subway or push up against you in a line everyone complains. People spend a lot of time avoiding these types of contact, railing against invasions into personal space. So not only inviting a stranger into mine, but paying them to do so, seemed a little backwards.
There is also something about the massage parlor themselves. The tables that an uncountable number of people have laid on, fake flowers, pale shades of pink paint, the pillows far too may heads have rested on. Even the name, parlor, has some vulgarity, an unsanitary feeling to it that I find incredibly uncomfortable.
Nonetheless, a visiting fellow teacher talked to me about how great it was, so eventually I caved to the glowing reviews and we found a respectable looking place to go get one done.
Entering , the smell was unavoidable. It was though someone has slathered Vick's Vapor Rub over my face, I imagine if I ever took up residency in an over sized breath mint or menthol cough drop the experience would be somewhat similar.
Immediately I was given a pair of thin cotton pants to change into that looked like something a new age yoga instructor or David Carradine in his pre auto erotic asphyxiation Kung Fu days would have been comfortable wearing.
At first, for some unknown reason, I thought I should wear these without any boxers and had no idea how to tell the front from the back. This lead to me standing in the dressing room and trying to tie them around my waist in a way that wouldn't lead to me completely exposing myself to some unsuspecting Thais.
Eventually I opted to put my boxers back on and emerged from the changing room with the capris haphazardly tied but staying up for the most part.
I took a seat at the end of one of the low beds where an attendant took to washing my feet in a bucket filled with warm water and some floating flowers. Anyone who has ever been put through the visual torture of seeing my feet knows what a horrific task this must have been. They are far too large for anyone not playing basketball at a highly competitive level and bony to the point of looking like a geriatrics frail hand. My toes are longer than the fingers of most carnies and have a simian dexterity that is frightening, coupled with toenails that I'm almost positive the US Army could develop into sometime of bomb-proof armor. The fact that I don't own flip flops means they haven't seen the light of day for months, giving them a shockingly pale almost translucent complexion similar to that of Gollum's skin.
My own mother won't touch them. Hell, I avoid touching them at all costs, but there my Thai masseuse was scrubbing them with a brush and soap, even rubbing between my toes.
She toweled off my feet and I was told to lay on my back. This was easy enough, except my ankles and feet hung off the bed. After some quick rearranging by the masseuse I was fitting on the bed better and she got down to work, starting on my legs where I found the sensation of my thighs being squeezed far more tension inducing then relaxing.
As she moved up my body I was pulled, shoved, twisted and stretched into a number of positions by this petite Thai lady who struggled to push my wildly inflexible limbs into contortions they refused and at times acted like I was engaged in more of a wrestling match than a massage, a fact highlighted by the back popping full nelson she held me in as she made her way towards my head and neck. It took and hour and the entire time I found myself nervously dreading the ending.
Yes, the part everyone is waiting for, where all the stories of the Asian massage parlor come true and I'm treated to infamous, well lubed "Happy Ending," complete with a sensual crooning of "Me love you long time," in my ear. I'm sorry to disappoint but none of this happened, not even a hint of it. Just a tap on the shoulder and a "Thank you."
I must say I don't think I'm good at getting massages if that is at all possible. I may have the look of Stretch Armstrong or Gumby, but flexibility is not something I pride myself on. My awkwardly lanky frame seemed a bit, well, just that, too fucking lanky for the whole thing. Maybe I need to go to Sweden and see how they do it there.
Living in Los Angeles for the past few years I've gotten used to the response people give me when I tell them that I'm from Baltimore.
"Oh shit, The Wire, right?"
Yes, right and in making that statement LA's collective knowledge of not only the city of Baltimore but the entire state of Maryland is exhausted.
I think this arises from two things. To begin with, the people who call Los Angeles home occupy an augmented reality where LA is the center of the universe. Yes, you may have missed that day in science class but it is true, the sun revolves around the sprawling metropolis and anything outside its borders are of little or no importance. This works out quite well because the city goes on forever, so actually getting outside of it can prove difficult.
There are a few exceptions, places that are deemed worthy of existence by Angelinos. Las Vegas, Palm Springs, Malibu, a few more here and there. The list is short and the rules governing it are complicated. For one, only specific parts of these places exist but others do not.
The strip in Vegas for example exists to them, however downtown Las Vegas certainly does not. Who would ever venture there? The seasons can effect these places existence as well.
Palm Springs in the winter is definitely on the radar screen, in the summer not a chance, with the exception of Coachella weekend. The map of the world according to the LA resident is a strange, funny looking place.
Baltimore certainly does not exist, just doesn't make the cut. Well, it does, but only through the eyes of David Simon and the HBO network, not in actuality but only as an idea, an hour long weekly TV series that may as well be detailing a foreign country. If only he could get a movie deal,well, they'd probably just end up filming in LA anyway.
The second part of this curse arises from the fact that Maryland, let's face it, isn't exactly the most recognizable state. Seriously, grab a pen and draw your best outline of the state. I bet it isn't pretty. Certainly doesn't have that trademark look of say Texas or Florida.
It may very well be one of the least identifiable states in the US, so small and thoroughly filled by the Chesapeake that on almost every map the initials MD are printed somewhere out in the blue of the Atlantic with a little black line connecting them to Maryland itself.
The Wire apparently hasn't reached Thailand yet because the only look I get from telling people I'm from Baltimore is a blank stare that makes Pluto seem like a more valid answer. To combat this I must admit that I've sold out to a city I really haven't spent much time in other than for school field trips and one disastrous trip to the national Christmas tree.
Here I tell people I'm from Washington, DC which is met with an "Ahhh" and an occasional "Obama" that comforts me into believing they know where it is.
I've become a bit of a fraud. An English major from Baltimore posing as a literature major from Washington, DC. Not huge changes, I'm not trying to pass myself off as an MLB all-star or Nobel Laureate, this isn't Frank Abagnale shit here but it's enough for me to feel a bit weird.
To make up for this lack of loyalty and sordid affair I've begun to carry on with D.C. I've compiled my first ever, super official list of totally noteworthy Baltimore related people and things.
The Deathset
For a long time The Deathset were my favorite band and they are still sitting somewhere in my top five. The first time I saw them was with my little brother 2 years ago at a Christmas show. Neither of us knew who they were but halfway through their set amps had been scaled, stage lights had been torn down and I was completely sold.
They are pure energy and played along side Matt and Kim for what very well maybe my favorite concert of all time, where the only negative of the night was my glasses being unceremoniously stomped in a pool of Colt 45 under the jumping feet of the what seemed to be the entire crowd and the ensuing, incredibly ill advised drive home.
RIP B.V.
Dan Deacon
The "I-seriously-don't- give-a-fuck-what-you-think-about-me" sweatsuit rocking, balding man behind the best dance parties in the world. Johnny Sierra of the previously mentioned Deathset was quoted once as saying that, "Nerds are the people who aren't afraid to spaz out." There is no better embodiment of this quotation than Deacon. A nerd, a weirdo and 100% cool with it all. Now everyone seems to want to join the outsider.
Charles Bukowski
Bukowski was certainly a dark horse for this list. Poe is always everyone's front runner for Baltimore poet and it is not without good reason. Bukowski lived in Charm City for 7 years and I knew he had to be included. He could drink you under the table, kick the shit out of you, steal your girlfriend and then write about the entire experience in a brilliant poem.
Vintage Orioles Jersey
I'm not going to try and pass myself off as an Orioles fan. Honestly, at this point, who would ever want to do that? But the old Orioles jerseys are some of the best in athletic aesthetics not just in baseball but across the board. It is a triple threat they are dealing here. The jerseys rep the hometown and say "Baltimore" a look the team just decided to resurrect this year. The orange stirrups are a baseball classic, none of those over sized, ill fitting pajama pants that are popular with players today and finally the cherry on top. A sweaty, wool cherry in the form of the famous tri-color hat with the cartoon bird. Bring it back already.
Is there something written on the bottom of his bat?
Kevin Clash
The voice and more importantly the hand up the ass of some of the most memorable puppets of all time. Puppets? Yes, puppets and damn well known ones at that. Try Master Splinter from TMNT, Elmo from Sesame Street and most of the cast from the incredibly fucking strange mid-nineties sitcom Dinosaurs. Revisit that one sometime if your in the mood to be thoroughly creeped out.
Had the chance to travel to Kanchanaburi in west Thailand on the banks of the River Kwai this weekend. Inside the Erawan National Park is the 7 tiered Erawan Waterfall which snakes its way through the park, a visually delicious 7 layer dip for the eyes.
That's all until Monday. Sending you into the weekend with a video double header.
First, the guys from No-Mas NYC along with cartoonist James Blagden put together an artistic retelling of Doc Ellis and his LSD aided 1970 no hitter of the San Diego Padres. Deserves something better than an asterisk in the record books.
Second, a jam off a little experiment called the Ace Frehley KISS solo album and one of the greatest karaoke tracks every laid down.
I mentioned earlier the door chimes of 7-11 and how they have become part of my soundtrack of Thailand, but they are a small part. The triangle maybe. Right now the soundtrack is completely dominated by one song, "I Got a Feeling" by the Black Eyed Peas.
Not just at clubs or bars, but at malls and supermarkets, hotels and hostels. It is like you are constantly trying to flee Fergie's voice but she some how keeps catching up with you. The stuff nightmares are made of. I can no longer hear someone express how they feel without interjecting the lyrics.
Below a video shot in one take that once amazed me and has now forever been ruined.
I'd like to take a rare moment of seriousness to give a sincere thank you to all United States veterans and those currently serving the US wherever they may be.
The article below details the shocking number of veterans who currently live in poverty in the United States and outlines a plan of action that will hopefully help to reverse these disturbing statistics. People who have given so much deserve far better.
VA secretary promises help for homeless veterans by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON November 3, 2009, 02:57 pm ET
Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki on Tuesday unveiled a plan to end veterans' homelessness in five years, saying that without action the improvements of recent years could be lost because of the bad economy.
Shinseki said the VA will spend $3.2 billion next year to reduce homelessness among veterans and is working to strengthen partnerships with other government agencies and service organizations. He said he recognizes that a goal of zero homeless veterans is ambitious but that he wants a high target so that everyone puts in their best efforts.
"My name is Shinseki and I'm here to end veteran homelessness," he said at the beginning of a speech to 1,200 service providers at a VA summit.
In the past, the VA focused largely on getting homeless veterans off the streets, but Shinseki said he wants to prevent them from ever going homeless. One area for potential improvement, he said, is finding jobs and homes for the estimated 56,000 veterans who leave prisons each year.
About one-third of all adult homeless men and nearly one-fifth of all homeless adults served in the military.
About 3 percent of the overall homeless population served in Iraq or Afghanistan. About 3,700 from the recent wars have been seen in VA homeless outreach programs and more than 550 have been treated in a VA-connected residential program.
It is estimated that 130,000 veterans are homeless on a typical night in the U.S. Shinseki said that is down from 195,000 six years ago. But, because of the poor economy, he said up to 15 percent more veterans could be on the streets in five years.
"That's not going to happen. We're going to go the other way," Shinseki said. "You all didn't work for the past six years to see things reversed."
Shinseki added: "Even in tough economic times this is still the wealthiest, most powerful nation in the world and no veteran should be living on the streets without care and without hope."
Dead Fly + Dare - 'A' Grade = Angry Student Teen Shocked When Teacher's Promise Ends In "Fail"
Laura Cole EL DORADO HILLS, Calif. (CBS13) ―
A local student says he ate a dead fly on a dare from his teacher when he was promised a good grade, but was angered when he said the teacher went back on his word.
Stephen Zeldag, a student at Oak Ridge High School in El Dorado Hills, said his Algebra II teacher crushed a fly between his hands during class last month and dared any of his students to eat it.
"He said, 'If anybody eats this fly then I will give them an A on this test,'" Stephen said. He volunteered and swallowed the fly, sealing the deal with a handshake with his teacher.
"I didn't think he was joking at all," he said.
Stephen didn't get an A on his test: He got an F, with a score of nine out of 46.
"He said that I told you I'd give you an A on your test, so here's your A, but it's not going in the gradebook," Stephen said.
The teacher even wrote, "Here is your A on your test," when he returned the paper to the student.
Stephen claims he realized what he thought was a deal was really just a joke at his expense.
When we contacted the principal at Oak Ridge High School to get their side of the story, the principal said it was the first time he heard about it. Stephen said he was afraid to tell his principal because his teacher would punish him.
"I usually study, but not this one," Stephen said. "I thought it would be an easy way out."
Stephen said he did ask to retake the test but the teacher refused.
We did try to talk to the teacher in question, but the principal said he would not be able to comment. The principal said he is launching an investigation into the incident.
Well I can tell you one thing for sure, I'm not making any bets like this while teaching in Thailand for the simple fact that the entire class would be getting straight A's. I mean there is a stand no more than 2 minutes from the gates of school selling everything from deep fried giant grasshoppers to roasted, garlic mealworms. Same consistency as a Dove bar, crispy on the outside, creamy on the in. One fucking fly? Come on. What is this amateur hour? I could find kindergartners here who could put away a baker's dozen, easy. Toughen up kid, you got hustled.
Thai. Written it is an extremely beautiful language that looks caught somewhere between Cambodian and Tolkien's elvish. When I see students or teachers writing in Thai I always stop to watch, fascinated by the how completely foreign the script being produced looks.
Spoken it can at times flow together as well as the written word and at others sound jarring and quite whiny, a bit Fran Drescher like.
In either form I understand close to nothing. Hello, goodbye, a few more simple phrases but really nothing, which reduces me at times to getting help from 12 year olds to order simple meals but also makes small feats seem like huge accomplishments. Finally finding the right bus seems like cause for a raucous party and getting home from a new part of the city might as well have been summiting Mt. Everest. All be it a much hotter and incredibly fucking humid Everest.
The great David Foster Wallace sums up the feeling perfectly as he did most anything he went about describing. The title genius has become a fairly watered down term in recent years, haphazardly thrown around and used to describe everyone from paunchy, egomaniacal football coaches to mediocre musicians with a frightening regularity but Wallace was truly more than deserving of being called one. Gone way too soon.
The two most important numbers to know in Thailand are quite simple. 7-11. Yes the glowing yellow, orange and green of the convenience store chain are practically national colors. That all to familiar florescent glow people so often associated with America spills onto streets all across the country.
You are never too far from a 7-11 in Thailand. I've seen more than a few streets with 2 or 3 on them, and not on some never ending cross city road, but on small roads, just a couple blocks apart.
People make a point of telling you where the nearest 7-11 is located. When asking for directions 7-11 is used like some sort of common man's longitude and latitude. My first day at school the head of the secondary division took me out, our destination was 7-11.
By the end of 2009 there will be roughly 5,250 7-11 stores in Thailand, ranking it fourth behind the U.S., Japan and Taiwan. But Thailand is only about double the size of Wyoming. Ubiquitous, omnipresent, simply put, they are everywhere.
The door chime has has quickly made its way onto my soundtrack of Thailand, along with the greeting from the cashiers, which at times seems as though it is being yelled at you.
The well known staples are all there. Big Gulp, although in slightly less glutenous sizes, no sighting yet of the 64 oz Double Gulp, grayish hot dogs spinning on metal heaters, looking as irresistible on a late night home from the bar to Thai university students as they do to their American counterparts across the globe and the Slurpee.
Of course there are also things that just wouldn't take off in the states. Seaweed sheets, cuttle fish chips and the delicious but unfortunately named Spicky.
That's all until Monday was apparently a lie. One last feel good news article for a day that was unfortunately filled with too many bad news ones. Has absolutely nothing to do with Thailand, just thought it was a good read.
What exactly happens to all those Phillies World Series Championship t-shirts? Something good.
I check channel 59 on my TV before I go to sleep. I check it again when I wake up. If I'm heading out to dinner, I flip it on quickly before I leave. My first few days here, when I couldn't sleep, I checked channel 59 at all sorts of odd hours. I've had a few friends stop by my apartment, one of the attractions I make a point of showing them is channel 59.
It is fair to say that I have a fascination with channel 59, perhaps a slight obsession with the ridiculousness of it.
I have a fascination with channel 59 because 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with practically no commercial breaks it shows American wrestling.
WWE, WCW, even pre lawsuit WWF the wrestling never stops. Ladder matches, royal rumbles, rage in the cage, tag team, female wrestlers, buried alive, hell in a cell; it is a constant barrage of sculpted burnt orange bodies slathered with oil, locked in fake battles with bogus plot lines, all atrociously dubbed for a Thai viewing audience.
The heyday of many of these stars has certainly passed in the United States. The days of widespread popularity, days of bestselling books have come and gone. Only the most rabid of fans have stayed loyal, the others moving on to the next fad, perhaps the truly brutal UFC.
But here in Thailand Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock and Diamond Dallas Page, Kurt Angle, The Big Show and Triple H, Ric Flair, Sting and Hulk Hogan still rule the airwaves of at least one channel. I even had a student last week request to be called John Cena. It is an American product I had no idea we were exporting.
I've tried to figure out the popularity. The national sport of Thailand is Muay Thai, so the whole watching two people kick the crap out of each other thing is nothing new here.
I think it must be the characters. The spandex, the neon, the face paint, the flying suplexes and over the top antics. In a non confrontational culture of extreme politeness this must be the ultimate outlet.
In Thai or English the conversation between teen males must follow the same script.
"No way it's fake, did you see the blood? They can't fake that."
Two greats to take you into Friday, Hacksaw Jim Duggan's badass, 2 by 4 swinging entrance and Hulk Hogan vs. Andre The Giant at WrestleMania III.
One of the first things I learned about Thai culture was the importance of nicknames. Most Thai names are comically long to foreigners. A few names on my roster look as though they were produced by Stevie Wonder tapping on the computer keyboard. To eliminate confusion and make life simpler, everyone goes by a nickname. When people introduce themselves they say their full name followed by "Nickname:...."
The nickname system is great. Makes things easier, provides entertainment when people explain what their particular nickname means. Chicken, apple, all acceptable nicknames.
In honor of the Thai nickname, I compiled this short list of some the all time American best.
Timothy "Dildo" Dunphy
So it may not be the most endearing of nicknames, but Alec Baldwn's delivery is spot on the entire movie. If you've never seen Outside Providence don't even bother renting it, just go buy. I guess you could list "assbag" as a nickname for Dunphy too, but it comes in a distant second.
"The Hammer of God" Mariano Rivera
Love the Yankees or hate them Rivera is a force. Anytime you nickname involves the big man upstairs you better be incredibly awful or incredibly good. Luckily for Rivera he is the latter. His cut fastball has buzzed through more bats than a fucking Black and Decker table saw. Dirty, filthy, nasty, no adjective for uncleanliness is strong enough to describe what he has going on. It is also quite possible that he has the best job on the planet. Toss 20 pitches, smile, shake hands and he's out. I bet he doesn't even have to shower after games.
"The Chairman of the Board" Frank Sinatra
Without a doubt my personal favorite. Sinatra's got other nicknames but none can touch the coolness of The Chairman. It's the kind of nickname you get after spending years hanging with mobsters, sipping stiff drinks and mingling with actresses, models and any woman in between. Check out one of the greatest magazine pieces ever published, "Frank Sinatra Has a Cold" by Gay Talese which ran in the April 1966 issue of Esquire if you need to remind yourself just how class Frank was.
The Cast of Goodfellas
Pete "The Killer", "Fat Andy", Jimmy "Two Times" the entire introduction is full of gems, criminals always get the best ones. The nicknames alone are enough to make people want to get into illegal activities.
"The Mailman" Karl Malone
Athletes get some of the greatest monikers and Malone is no exception. He may come off as an ass backwards redneck with a painfully slow speech rate, but his play in the NBA was stellar and you can't argue with such an original title.
After receiving the WGH (World's Greatest Haircut) on Sunday I was feeling ultra confident going into my first day teaching on Monday. Got dressed up, checked the football scores and was pleasantly surprised by the Ravens performance, the sun was shinning and I was starting to think that 10 baht good luck charm was really paying off.
Kicked off the first class off by assigning student's English names and I was off to a solid start, cruising through the first few minutes with no problems. In the word's of the great Randolph Dupree I was throwing seven different types of smoke, too good to last. When I finished with the names I introduced myself and wrote my name in big block letters on the board, which got a surprising amount of laughs. Too many laughs, it seemed, for a simple name but I pressed on undeterred.
A few minutes later another teacher walked into the class room and pointed at the marker I was holding in my hand. "No, use this marker." She said. It was then that I realized I has scrawled my name on the white board in permanent marker, not dry erase. Smooth. Suddenly the temperature in the classroom seemed to skyrocket as I tried to apologize through the roar of 50 hysterical students.
It's safe to say now that no matter how my teaching goes my mark has been left on the school forever, literally.
Super Cuts, Great Clips, a haircut is a haircut. This was the mentality I had until yesterday afternoon when I received what was undoubtedly the greatest haircut of my entire life. To call it just a haircut is a complete and utter injustice, it was an experience.
I walked down my street looking for a place to get lined up before my first day teaching and also because the heat here has caused me to despise my hair. I stumbled upon a barbershop and the second I saw the place I knew it was a keeper. Red leather chairs and a strictly male clientele, a real NGA (no girls allowed) establishment where I'd like to think the only acceptable topics of discussion were ladies and the past weekend's Muay Thai matches. The He-Man Woman Haters would have been proud of this place.
The translation was a bit rough, but I pointed out a number 4 on the buzzer and my guy got to work with meticulous precision but only after powdering up my neck and hair. To call him just a barber is to sell him short, he was a sculptor of hair, an artist wielding clippers as his tool, a real master of his craft. When he finished the haircut itself I went to get up, but realized the process had only just started. The chair went back, a pillow was brought out and the buzzers were switched for a razor. Before I knew it he was mixing up a cocktail of lotion and shaving cream, there was more lubrication invovled in this shave then there was on the set of Ron Jeremy's last film.
Having a man that speaks not a word of your language hold a razor to your throat is a bit shocking at first, but the guy was a pro. After checking his work on my hair for a second, third and fourth time, I got some dabs of aftershave and a quick massage, all for the staggering price of 60 whole baht.
Saturday I departed for my first excursion out of Phitsanulok to Sukhothai to celebrate the Loy Krathong Festival, illustrated above by the friendly people at Google.
The day started with an hour ride to Sukhothai on a bus that looked shockingly similar to the one in which Chris McCandless met his untimely demise. Arriving just before the bus left the station I found myself shuffling past multiple sets of suspecting eyes towards the very back seat. On the way down the aisle I slammed my head into a low hanging overhead light. The moment brought about a flurry of giggles from a few Thai girls, I guess suave is an international language.
The back seat of the bus was much like final seat on any Southwest flight. Cramped and more or less inside the bathroom, with the added bonus of the searing heat from the engine compartment.
I quickly forgot the conditions though, when I realized I was sitting next to a child monk who fascinated me. He turned and stared at me, I'd like to say I responded with something, anything, but I simply diverted my eyes like a nervous school girl and stared at my shoes. His feet barely touched the floor and he intimidated the shit out of me.
The festival took place later that night inside the Sukhothai Historic Park. The ruins in the park were lit up with colored lights and a performance was put on reenacting what appeared to be an ancient battle.
The entire thing looked like something out of a high budget Disney production, but I'm assuming here due to my lack of Disney theme park exposure (I'm pretty sure this constitutes as child negligence these days).
Undoubtedly the highlight of the night was placing the Krathongs into the river. These are small elaborate floats made of banana leaves with candles and incense that are set adrift to give thanks to the water goddess and bring good luck.
The Krathong I purchased cost 10 baht, roughly 29 cents so I'm not sure how much good luck I'm going to get, but hey better than nothing.
The entire night was capped off by a huge fireworks display, a real Amurican fireworks display, where I learned that the "OOOHHS" and "AAAAHHS" of July 4th translate perfectly into Thai.
"Lady fingers, fuzz buttles, snicker bombs, church burners, finger blasters, gut busters, zippity do das, or crap flappers" Yeh, they had those
