Spring 2007 > Thailand > Part IV

REMAINS TO BE SEEN

After a long day of animal magic, our last day in Chiang Mai was for relaxational purposes only. Our time had come to end at our current hotel, so we moved into a smaller one closer into town. It was just a short trip from there to a little massage place where we could spend the afternoon getting our bodies attended to in various ways. While some of our party went for the traditional Thai massage (involving the kinds of contortion and pressure one would expect from a boa constrictor's embrace), my sun-sizzled flaky flesh was still a nuisance, so I decided to opt for the body-scrub. I lay down on the table/bed and my masseuse began to apply the warm sesame paste all over my skin, leaving me smelling like a baker's oven. At first, it felt quite nice, but as the paste began to cool, it felt really slimy and gooey. After I'd been coated, I washed it all off in the shower, then returned for the customary oil-rubbing session. It wasn't perhaps as relaxing as last time though, mainly because Ilan in the adjacent partition was giggling throughout, and when I lay face down the second time, I got my knackers in a twist, so to speak.

Moving swiftly on, we retired to our new lodgings to put our feet up, and I flicked on the television just as Back to the Future: Part II was getting underway (Marty was looking at the futuristic Texaco). And I watched it right through to the end. Man, that's a good movie, and it's even better when you stumble across it and just watch it then and there. Plus, you get to visit the past, the (then) present, an alternate present and the future! All in one film! Wonderful. It finished just in time for us to go to a Thai style yakiniku (meat grilling) place, which was a vast open-walled hall packed to the rafters. It was hot, noisy and smoky, but lots of fun. A lot got sizzled, but there were plenty of other ready-cooked dishes to keep us occupied (and full). Afterwards, we hit a bar for drinks and a little bit of bopping (though the R'n'B and the rather bland live band weren't especially compelling). We got a few supplies in readiness for our early drive the next day and called it a night.

And a long drive it was to. Utenshu-san had been a very useful asset to our team, even if she was a little lonely sometimes. One thing that was made clear was that she was a lesbian, and quite a butch one at that, and she did sometimes feel a little stigmatised about it, particularly regarding the relationship she had with Ilan in that they had to share rooms all the time, but this wasn't really the case. We were just never sure how much to involve her in our activities, as I'm not really used to having a driver in my everyday life. And as it was essentially a holiday with friends, it seemed a bit weird accomodating someone else you didn't really know, and also couldn't really communicate with due to the language barrier. But we tried, and by the end of the trip, I think we were all quite chummy. However, this drive did end up with us getting pulled over for speeding on the motorway and her getting fined a measly amount of change. It was a little bit of excitement on an otherwise unenventful journey.

Our destination was within an area that used to be the home to Thailand's original ancient capital. We waited for Parn's father outside the restaurant we'd be eating at, observing a pair of gibbons in a cage swinging about and playing. Gotta love them apes and monkeys. We were eating with various members of the local police constabulary, as we'd gotten used to on our Thai travels, and it was a rather delcious lunch if I recall. It wasn't the nicest thing there, but I got to eat some rather spiky, crispy fried little fish, caught in the river the restuarant overlooked, whole. Parn's pater took over driving duty now, and we made brief stops at some of the ruins at Si Satchanalai and Sukhothai, which were pretty ruined indeed, but I was surprised at the freedom we had to walk around them and climb their stairs. It would have made a perfect location for another stop-motion fight sequence as we had snapped back in the rocky valley and the reservoir, but time was short and the sun was blazing above. Back in the car, we continued our rather epic drive back to Bangkok, and although we got a little lost on the way (and passed some incredibly gaudy coaches that would make even Elton John blush), we managed to get back in time for a slap-up meal at The Sizzler. Tsssss.


JOURNEY'S END

The rest of our time in Bangkok (and Thailand, for that matter) is a little bit of a blur, having not documented it particularly well. And I'm sure there was one day we went to a mall which we had to leave because of a blackout, though beforehand I had scored a personal best at Point Blank (come to think of it, this was surely in Chiang Mai, but when and where, I can't remember). We spent much of the next day souvenir-hunting, eating and packing. One evening, we met up with Parn's old school friends and headed to a hip-hop club in town. We got their pretty early so we could bag ourselves some seats, and sat their drinking endless whiskey-cokes for serveral hours. The venue filled up but we stayed put, save for the odd necessary lavvy trip, and drunk more and more. By the time the driver came to pick us up, we were all already starting to regret the excesses we had reached, and by the time we got home, my head was pounding and spinning at the same time. I knew I didn't want to go to sleep in that state, so I tried to wake myself up before I drifted off. So I took a cold shower. Twice. It sort of worked a bit, but I felt so rotten. The most drunk I'd been before was the night out with the Johars in July last year, which culminated in us crashing a 30th birthday party for someone we didn't know. At all. But this time round, I didn't feel happy drunk but ill drunk instead. The next morning, we all stayed in bed and watched the DVD Baptiste bought in China of one of those 'funny adverts from around the world' style shows. Other than that, much of it was spent packing and getting everything in order for our return trip to Japan.


We left early in the morning of March 11th. We got into Beijing's aiport around breakfast time, and the officials yet again impressed with their incompetence. Knowing full well a flight was coming in, the staff at the transfer desk did their level best to be as unprepared as could be. We were perhaps second in line, and the desk jockey took our passes and began making phone calls and such. We waited and waited and waited - it soon became clear that they were all processing the passes of a large group of Japanese tourists behind us, who had all buggered off and moved to the next step. And they pretty much processed everyone else behind us before us too. They unceremoniously slapped stickers on us for reasons I can't imagine, other than to perhaps remind them we were indeed passengers and customers of the airline. At last we were cleared to get on the next flight and we lined up at the back of the queue to jump through another hoop, with yet another x-ray/metal detector jobbie. It all made little administrative sense. As we waited for our next departure, I went to get a little brekkie with my remaining currency. In front were a couple of Japanese businessmen after some coffee from the two Chinese vendors. And how did they communicate with each other? With broken English of course! Okay, so it's not too surprising when you think about it, but it still was an interesting spectacle, how members of two nations with such close ties resort to some cockamaney derivative limey-speak to say what they want to say.

We finally arrived home at about 1pm, and went our separate ways. Just before I hopped onto the train back into Kyoto, I stopped at a little vending stand for a drink and some bite-size Snickers snacks. As I ordered in Japanese, the nice lady who worked there was surprised to hear me speak Japanese and I told her about how I was studying the language at university in Kyoto. She smiled and gave me a "Ganbate!" ("Go for it!"). It was like I had just arrived at the start of my year. Ah, Japan! How I've missed your Kentucky Fried Chicken and your sparkling whale-free seas.

And that's that! Remember to check out more pics at Parn's facebook, Baptiste's Chiang Mai and Sukhothai sets and my Ancient Ruins and Miscellaneous Thailand sets.

And next comes the small task of giving you a rundown of everything that's happened in the past three months or so! And I'm going to try and do it all in one post, and keep it brief. I hope!