It's been quite the day. After my pre-dawn wake up and morning temple tour (see previous post), I hopped a propelor (help me with the spelling on that one, will ya?) plane to Bangkok, split a cab with some Jersey kids, and bam - traffic city!
There was a huge festival in town today, and the roads were super clogged. After finally reaching my (awesome) guesthouse, I went for a stroll that turned into a 3-hour charicture of my time in Asia.
I felt a bit like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day meets Jim Carey in the Truman Show.
Like, "Hmmm, is this really familiar dealio for real?!"
Thousands and thousands of people were in the streets. I was the only white person besides one couple I saw for 10 seconds.
It was extraordinarily loud. I think us Westerners somehow eveolved more sensitive ears, or some shit.
Anyway, I experienced:
* so much street food, of course
* bumper cars - so fun to bash the little Thai kids! They liked bashing me too.
* EVERYTHING for sale and people blaring into megaphones to sell it
* lots and lots of raffles
* I don't know maybe 200,000 people?!
A welcome change - I did not experience:
* being hassled
* people pointing at me and laughing
* searing stomach pains
Folks there's so much more to it, but I'm at my limit.
Love you,
Roni
ps - OK, a little more. Once I hit my limit at the fest, getting home was virtually impossible. I got pretty lost and with lots of roads closed, it was a real challenge getting home. It all felt quite surreal in its intensity, and just as I thought, "Shit, I might just curl up here on this sidewalk and go to sleep," I came across a huge Thai political rally, featuring those red-shirted peeps I protested with 2 months ago clapping elatedly to a stocky man giving an impassioned speach. Full circle in a really strange, "Is this happening?" sort of way.
Home
14 years ago
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