Last Oswegonian Column

The Oswegonian, my campus paper, is going on break until next semester. Here's the last column I wrote for them.

Getting Around in Thailand

There’s a reason why Thai taxi drivers have shrines on their dashboards. The Buddha figurines and lotus flowers are believed to protect against the drivers’ death-defying maneuvers. Two lane highways are turned into three due to chaotic stream of aggressive traffic. It’s not even that rare to get in a soup-ed up cab, complete with a turbo and custom designed steering wheels. It seems like The Fast and the Furious was a hit here. One particularly ballsy driver would rub an amulet whenever he’d make a move. In a half hour taxi ride, he rubbed the amulet at least a dozen times.

Taking a taxi is the quickest way to get around Thailand, barring horrendous traffic jams, but taxis can be found anywhere in the world. The Kingdom of Thailand has several unique modes of transportation that prove much more exciting, although not as practical.

The most prevalent vehicles in tourist areas are the tuk tuks. These hellish contraptions are essentially three-wheeled rickshaws with no windows. They spew out black smoke and the roofs make it impossible to see all the surroundings. Still, this is the transport of choice for most tourists and the drivers do their best to take advantage of the naïve farangs (foreigners). Any price that the driver says should immediately be cut in half through the art of haggling. Don’t stop at his “friend’s” shop, which pay the driver a commission for tourists being carted to their business. One trademark of the tuk tuk driver is the questionable things he offers. He (I have yet to see a woman driver) begins asking a passerby if they want a tuk tuk ride, and the answer is usually no. Next, he asks if they want to go to a massage parlor. When that fails, he casually offers “boom boom.” I wonder how many people go for that offer.

A relaxing way to get around Bangkok is the express boats floating on the Chao Praya. About 50 cents can get a person from the northern end of town to the Sky Train connection in the south. The temples along the ride are breathtaking. The dirty brown water and the river-front shacks are not.

Outside of Bangkok, taxis and public buses are almost impossible to find. Instead, songtaews take their place. Think of these as redneck taxis. Two benches are set up behind a covered pick-up truck, and anybody can hop on. The most intimidating aspect is the fares. You don’t pay until you reach the destination, but the fare depends on how many people get on the songtaew during the trip. If several people get on, the fare reduced. It’s an interesting approach, but it makes getting to the proper destination require some luck and patience.

Finally, there are the motorcycle taxis, which might as well be called kamikazes. Stick your knees in while riding on the back of the motorbike because the drivers come inches from other cars. The motorcycle lane is pretty much in-between all the other cars, and so far I’ve seen one casualty, in addition to some minor accidents. Still, the thrill of the ride and the cheap price makes it my main way of getting around. The only time I feel Asian is when I’m sitting on a motorcycle in my school uniform. At all other times I’m just another farang.

Top of the World

An insect larva tastes as horrid as it sounds. Matt and I were in Chiang Mai (in the far north) and signed up for a 2 day, 1 night jungle trek. The first thing our group of eight did was stop at a market. I stocked up on delicious sticky rice with custard and then I saw the insect food stall. There were crickets, beetles and the larvae. I picked the larvae because it looked the least disgusting and it didn’t have creepy eyes like the other choices.

When I first put it in my mouth after much hesitation it wasn’t that bad. When I bit it, the goo burst all over the inside of my mouth. The only way to describe the flavor was that it tasted as bad as insect larvae looks. I ate another just to confirm its vileness, and it wasn’t any better. The sweet sticky rice got rid of the taste. Nobody in my trekking group wanted the rest of the larvae. Even the tour guide, Rony, said they were disgusting and refused my offer.

We rode from the city of Chiang Mai to Doi Inthanon National Park in a songthaew. If you’re not familiar with these contraptions, think of them as redneck taxis. Two rows of benches are lined up in the back of a covered pickup truck. These serve as the main mode of public transportation in most of Thailand. Our tour guide’s truck had a Bob Marley banner on the front, which summed up his pleasantly insane personality quite nicely (more on that later).

We arrived at an elephant camp where we were greeted by several pachyderms managed by members of the Karen hill tribe. Matt rode with a cool British guy, two Spanish guys rode on another, while a nice German couple rode a third elephant. The elephants had small benches for two people strapped on their back, and a Dutch couple rode on the biggest elephant. That means I didn’t get to seat and had to sit on this huge elephant’s neck. It was a terrifying experience due to the sudden jolts and the disobedient nature of the male elephant, but I quickly grew to love it. I felt a unique connection as my legs rested behind his neck and we walked on narrow ledges overlooking deadly cliffs.

After, all of us rode a crazy zip-line-carrying-a-cage device over the river and began what constituting the bulk of the trip: ol’ fashioned hiking. This is where Rony’s quirky personality came through. He was a hilarious guy that was always telling jokes, usually involving Thailand’s famous ladyboys. He also boasted to Matt about his many sexual conquests, which I won’t get into now. Matt will probably talk about that in his blog. We hiked for a good several hours and the landscape was breathtaking. Bangkok is mostly flat, but this region was full of untamed wilderness and misty mountains. In the distance, some hill tribe villages were visible. After the exhausting amount of foreigners in Chiang Mai, this unspoiled beauty was one of my favorite sights I’ve seen in Thailand.

Eventually we reached the top, where the village and our home (a bamboo hut) were. We were all worn out after a somewhat arduous trek and felt great to be done hiking for the day. The villagers weren’t exactly cut off from the world. Despite their meager bamboo homes, they have some TV access thanks to new solar energy panels. A lot of the kids had Pokemon t-shirts. Still, their access to the outside world is limited. Most didn’t even speak Thai, let alone English.

I played a pick-up game of soccer with a bunch of hill tribe children. These small kids were fast, and I got the feeling that the only TV they watch is soccer. They could speak English when it came to penalties and shouting out the score. Running around and dribbling the ball with these kids was amazing, especially considering the beautiful atmosphere. We were surrounded by mountains and the sun shined down on us. I’m convinced that soccer can unite the world. So many people I’ve met, no matter what nationality, ask me what teams I like. If only Americans can watch more soccer. World peace would be achieved in no time.

Sleeping in the bamboo hut on the floor wasn’t as pleasant as the soccer game. We had mosquito nets and a bunch of blankets to combat the surprising cold, but the floor was hard and creaky. At 2 a.m., the entire rooster population of the village decided to perform in a chorus of ear-splitting shrieks. They didn’t stop all night. Fortunately, the breakfast was good and I was plenty excited to continue the trek.

The conditions in the morning were horrid. Hard rain plus a steep downward muddy path isn’t exactly ideal, and the rushing stream/river that we had to cross at least ten times makes things even more difficult. I came dangerously close to falling in and Wadleigh busted his knee up after falling on a rock. The best part was an enormous waterfall that we all waded in. The water was fierce and cold, but we all swam around for 30 minutes. After more hiking (in Wadleigh’s case it was more of hobbling), we did some whitewater rafting, floating down a lazy bamboo raft and then came back to Chiang Mai in an crowded and freezing songthaew. The conditions weren’t ever luxurious, but it was the best $40 I’ve spent in a long time.