The Perils of Thailand

"Honey, how would you like to spend part of our vacation in a remote, lawless, border region notorious for drug smuggling, piracy, and human trafficking?"  If the question had been put to me in those terms, I would probably have suggested we stay home and play canasta with the neighbors.

It was not.  Rather, the holiday prospects my wife was researching were presented to me as an idyllic retreat to a beautiful land of waterfalls, winter warmth, mystical temples, and splendid orchids and butterflies.

Oh!  And elephant camps!

"We can even work in the camps and ride the elephants!", she exclaimed.

"They'll let us care for and bathe them," she cooed longingly as though elephants were cute, cuddly critters.  That's where I drew the line.

"I'm not shoveling dung the size of soccer balls while on vacation," I protested.  "And I surely don't want to fall off an elephant's back.  That's a long way down.  Sounds dangerous to me."  Envisioning herds of stampeding, rogue elephants, I informed her I'd stick to sniffing orchids and photographing rare butterflies.

She tsked me and carried on with the planning.

"We should sign up for a Thai cooking class," she suggested as she gauged my reaction.  That sounded safe enough.  I've been cooking for years and still have all my fingers.

"Do we get to eat what we cook?", I queried.  She assured me that was the case.  Sign me up.  The class was a real bargain as long as it included supper to boot.

She continued to peruse the tour company's offerings on their website.

"Here's a day trip north to Chiang Rai that includes lunch," she proposed.  Now you're talking.  Food along with an opportunity to see some picturesque Thailand calendar shots in person.

"That sounds grand," I offered gleefully.  Her enthusiasm for this trip was contagious.

Our flight into Chiang Mai (not to be confused with the aforementioned Chiang Rai) arrived at 11 pm.  Our guesthouse staff had advised us to go to the airport taxi desk to secure a cab ride into town.  Simple enough.  We arrived at the airport to find the airport taxi desk shuttered for the night.  The airport closes around midnight.  I envisioned us sitting on the curb outside the terminal all night long.

That may sound dreary, but I actually relished the notion as the air temperature was about 70 degrees warmer than up in Seoul where, just a few hours earlier, we had stood curbside shivering as we awaited the bus to Seoul International Airport at Incheon.

Luckily, we discovered when we moved to Seoul that if we stand idly, looking dumb and confused, when we are indeed dumb and confused, someone will 100% of the time offer assistance.  I have no problem looking dumb and confused.  It comes naturally.  For Stacey, who is well educated, it's more of an act.

It's best to have her stand behind me so we can put our worst face forward.  It worked.  In no time, we were directed to the domestic arrival hall where, sure enough, the airport taxi booth was still open and somewhat manned by someone sleeping in its hidden depths who we rudely awakened.  We secured our taxi ticket and headed outside to the comfortably warm curb to await our ride.  We'd sleep in a bed after all.  Maybe.

We were told by guesthouse staff that, since we were arriving late, the front gate would be locked and the night security guard would let us in and direct us to our room.  Believe it or not, I've worked a few night shifts through the years, and I know the natural tendency of any sane human being is to slip away from your post and find a cozy place to curl up for a nap.  I thought, if this security guard is someone I want to deal with, he'll undoubtedly have shirked his tedious duties and sought out a comfortable nook in which to doze.  And where would that leave us?  You guessed it.  Outside looking in.  At least it was warm.  And, hopefully, a neighborhood free of banditry.

The taxi dumped us off in the wee hours of the morning, and, lo and behold, the guard was on duty and seemed a nice enough fellow.  We would be well rested for the commencement of vacation activities the ensuing day.

                                                                   *****

The evening of day one, we were booked into Thai cooking class.  A songthaew would pick us up and deliver us to the school.  The songthaew is a pickup truck with a covered bed and wooden benches running parallel along the inside of the side panels.  Eight to ten people can be packed into one, and a couple more intrepid souls can hang off the back.  It's not as uncomfortable as it sounds.  It's a little like picking multiple hunters up in the field at the end of day or, years ago, heading out in a crammed pickup bed across farm fields on the way to a high school kegger.

Before being songthaewed, we went to the front desk and signed up for the all day road trip to the northern extremities of Thailand.  It would be an early start and a late finish the following day.  Good thing we'd eat well tonight.

Cooking class was all it was billed to be.  We were given a short, outdoor food market tour where we were introduced to kaffir limes, pea eggplant, and mouse shit chillies (I shit you not).  Then, it was back to the kitchens.

I never fail to impress myself.  My knife handling skills while chopping and dicing were exemplary.  A modern day Jim Bowie of sorts.  I became a master of the mortar and pestle.  It was pure wizardry as I poured a quarter rounded spatula of oyster sauce while reaching for a teaspoon of sugar.  I thought I heard murmurs of  "how does he do that?"

A dash of this, a pinch of that.  It was fast action.  We had four courses to crank out during our allotted time.  I glanced up and down the row of gas burners at my toiling classmates.  I became a bit concerned for the mere mortals alongside me.

A sauce pan in which I concocted a frothy, rapidly boiling, hot and sour prawn soup was somewhat warped and wobbly and unsafe.  Not a highly litigious society, I thought to myself.  I clung tightly to the pan's handle as flames from the gas burner lapped at my knuckles.  Turning the control knob and reducing the flame, I declared my soup finished although the lemongrass had a little crunch left in it.

It was during the third course when things went sadly awry.  I was in a kitchen making papaya salad with others who had opted for that course.  Stacey was with a group in another kitchen working on fried spring rolls.  A third kitchen group was cooking up deep fried fish cakes.

A student cooks in close proximity to the next pupil in line.  We had become acquainted with a couple cheerful young women from Amsterdam who had accompanied us to class in our songthaew.  In Asia, it is customary to leave your shoes at the door.  A youngster, who was deep frying food alongside one of the Dutch girls, tossed a fish cake into boiling grease which splattered all over the unfortunate girl's hands and bare feet.  You and I have either experienced or can imagine the pain.  A doctor in the class administered to her burns.

Needless to say, this mishap put a damper on festivities.  Alongside the dining table there stood a small fridge where a diner could help oneself to beer or soda throughout the evening, keeping a mental tab to pay at night's end.  When the time came, Stacey and I owed for four beers (me three, her one).  Curry and chillies have a kick best moderated by drink.  The Dutch girls owed for five, consumed largely after the mishap.  The perfect anesthetic -- beer.

                                                                  *****

Early the next morning, we were in a van headed north out of Chiang Mai.  There was a driver, a tour guide, and several of us tourists.  Out of the city, we entered big hill country.  The road is good, but steep and curvy in places.

I think our driver wanted to make time.  He could have whipped Richard Petty's ass.  The steering wheel's on the right and you drive on the left.  You pass anything moving slower than you -- anytime, anywhere.  Crown of a hill.  No problem.  Blind curve.  No problem.

Here's how it works.  There's a vehicle moving slower than us ahead (in our case, this was just about every vehicle on the road).  Petty bears down on its rear end and gives a slight tap on the horn.  Mind you, only a slight tap.  Drivers in northern Thailand don't use the prolonged, annoyed honk.  The incessant honking in snarled traffic of cities elsewhere is deafening.  Throughout urban and rural areas alike, silence reigns in the north of Thailand.

So, Petty taps his horn so lightly it's nearly inaudlble.  The slower driver ahead moves one meter left.  Petty pulls out, guns the engine, and straddles the centerline zooming past the slowpoke.  Oncoming traffic, usually coming very fast, moves to their left, quite often at the last instant.  Remember, we're talking hills and curves here.  A head-on collision is narrowly averted, allowing Petty clear passage down the middle of the road.

This can all be quite unnerving to a passenger seated behind Petty with a clear view of the windshield.  Not to Petty.  He has nerves of steel.  I learned I could trust him with my life.  As a matter of fact, I did.

And it's not just Petty.  This is the way of the road.  In America, road rage would abound.  There'd be screaming red faces, cussing, people flipping people off.  Maybe even bullets flying.  As one tour guide told us, "People in Lanna country (northern Thailand) are relaxed.  Not so in Bangkok."  I can honestly attest, I've never been anywhere that I've witnessed "relaxation" carried to such an extreme.

                                                                 *****

Our first potty stop en route north to Chiang Rai (not to be confused with our point of departure, Chiang Mai) was billed by our tour guide as "hot springs".  Now, I wasn't expecting Yellowstone Park, but I did visualize an acre or two of bubbly, steaming water.  Turned out, it was pretty much a pipe coming out of the ground spouting warm water about eight feet into the air.  I think after a couple beers, a man could lie on his back and piss an equivalent geyser.

Leaving the puny hot springs behind, we pressed on destined for the infamous Golden Triangle where poppy fields once dotted the hillsides.  To the drug trade, this land, where the Ruak River flows into the mighty Mekong River, and the countries of Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar converge, was the late 1970's version of contemporary Afghanistan and the remote, tribal areas of Pakistan.

During the heyday of the Golden Triangle, drug lords operated in the region with impunity, and opium brought gold to a remote, lawless area.  And we were about to go for a boat ride on the Mekong, smack dab in the middle of it all, armed with our cell phones and Canon SureShots.

No need to worry though.  Through a joint effort of Thailand and the United Nations, the opium poppy fields were, by and large, eradicated some years ago.  Hill tribe villagers who tended poppies were encouraged to grow cash crops such as cabbage and potatoes.  Markets were established where tourists could browse tribal handicraft stands.

In one Hmong village we visited, a male tribal member demonstrated the usage of a homemade crossbow.  Tourists were allowed to try out the weapon for a ten baht fee (about 33 American cents).  I couldn't help but think the guy probably longed for the good old days of harvesting poppies.

Our boat ride was uneventful but exhilarating.  The Mekong is a large, brawny river.  It's the tenth longest river in the world.  Its headwaters arise in southern China and it flows south forming the border of Myanmar and Laos, then Thailand and Laos, down through Cambodia and Vietnam, eventually emptying into the South China Sea.  It serves as a corridor of commerce and transportation.  Barges and riverboats ply its surging waters.

Where Thailand, Myanmar, and Laos meet in the heart of the Golden Triangle, there's been a building boom.  A huge Buddha looms over the Mekong river on the Thai side, there's a casino upstream across the Ruak in Myanmar, and a new Chinese operated casino called Kings Romans sprawls along the opposite bank of the Mekong in Laos.  The Laotian government granted the Chinese a 99 year lease and created a special economic zone to allow construction of the casino.  Chinese gamblers can access it via the Mekong River by riverboat.

Our tour boat made a stop at a Laotian village where more handicrafts were offered for sale.  The natives were friendly.  Attribute it to the power of the purse.

The only danger the tour guide presented was running the boat aground on a shoal, but the boat's navigator was much too savvy to make such a rookie error.

Upon arriving home, I thought to do a little research into the area to heighten our travel experience.  Good grief!  As recently as October of 2011, thirteen Chinese sailors were murdered on our visited stretch of river by drug runners and corrupt Thai border soldiers working in cahoots.  I'm not sure if all the messy details of the brazen attack have been sorted out or brought to the light of day.  Supposedly, all the miscreants and evildoers have been brought to justice.

A mother lode of methamphetamines was found on the Chinese vessel.  According to news reports I've read, meth has replaced opium in the area as the drug of choice.  The drug trade is reported to be robust.

Since the murders, which have come to be known as the "Mekong River Massacre", river patrols through a joint effort of China, Myanmar, Thailand, and Laos have been stepped up.  That maybe contributed to the calm on the river the day we visited.

I haven't read of any tourists encountering difficulties in the Golden Triangle.  Tourists come armed with their pocketbooks which are definitely welcomed by all in the area.  In a new twist on gold for opium, tourists can pose alongside poppy heads which are a remnant of a bygone age.

                                                                       *****

On days following our Golden Triangle outing, we visited the Maesa Elephant Camp where there really was no peril other than an elephant stepping on your toes.

Then came the pilgrimage to the must see Wat Phrathat Doi Suthep, a renowned Buddhist temple set on the side of Suthep Mountain, overlooking Chiang Mai.  About the only danger there would be if you took a tumble down the 306 stairs leading to the temple.  I held tightly onto the handrail.

On a visit to an orchid and butterfly farm, butterflies were flitting about all around me.  Thank goodness they're not elephants.

And then there was the lady with the British accent at the guesthouse breakfast our first morning.  I overheard her complaining to her meal companion that she was still recovering from the pummeling she had received at her Thai massage the preceding day.  Every other storefront in Chiang Mai is a massage parlor.  I knew to give them wide berth.