Exhaust and Exhaustion

Apropos of nothing, here's an early Louis C.K. bit that's been cracking me up for the past month.

After two weeks here, I've changed rooms - from the last room on the 3rd floor to the room next door, which the Italian and his girlfriend of the previous post vacated today. There are subtle improvements from my previous room, adding up to a 15% increase in quality of life. It's got a better layout - call it feng shui. Less creak in the bed. Fewer ants in the shower. The fixtures less dilapidated (was I living in the 'shit' room?) Most importantly, I no longer border the late-late-night whore club next door, which every 1am-to-4am has agitated my air molecules with the thumping bass of Gangam Style-style music, the clatter of dishes, the manufactured merriment of paid girlfriends, and the drunken harangues of the old men who purchase them - all not loud enough to be horrible, yet not quiet enough to go unnoticed. I knew that couple was moving out, so even though I'm ill, I jumped out of bed early today and secured their room. 

The wood doors are a bit warped, allowing outsiders a sliver of insight into my nude lounging (yes, I do) - so I taped some paper over the crevice, and now the room's pretty much perfect. I've spent most of the day laying in bed with the laptop just-so on the chair next to me, reading and watching old episodes of Northern Exposure and King of the Hill. I felt like a king.

Oh yes, I'm ill. Two trajectories - the physical and the psychical - have at last peaked, both at the same time. Mentally, I feel that I've finally overcome the sensory and cognitive overload of the beginning. I feel myself becoming calmer and more lucid, enjoying a greater number of clear, balanced, rational thoughts. I'm getting me again. Bodily, I have finally crashed from weeks of endless walking, late nights, tension, car exhaust, irregular eating, and bold food experimentation. Air-wise, Chiang Mai is full of exhaust fumes, Thai vehicles being not too clean, it seems. My eyes itch from it. I've taken to choosing back alleys over main thoroughfares just so I don't have to swallow all that dreck. Food-wise, I had conceived the idea that 1. if I eat all the spicy foods I'll get used to it, and 2. I should try every unknown dish I come across. I was 1. wrong, and 2. obviously an idiot. I'm sick now, but as soon as I regain my vigor, I will relaunch myself full-throttle into hanging out and doing nothing.

This week was the local three-day Loi Krathong festival, a massive to-do with parades, fairgrounds, quaint rituals (floating candle-heated khom loi paper balloons into the night air, and prayer-bearing crowns of leaf onto the river.) And my favorite: a ceaseless, sporadic, diarrhea-like detonation of fireworks. For three days they made Chiang Mai sound like Beirut on a bad day and smell like a deliberately saved-up fart. By they I mean retarded males of all ages who find explosions awesome. These are the same macho idiots you see in every party zone, who don't know how to drink, or have a good time, or be. But they know how to get drunk, and ruin everyone else's fun, and use lighters. And they just would not give it a rest.  From just-for-noise firecrackers, squibs, and Catherine wheels; to cheap rockets pitched haphazardly into awnings and eyeballs; to Roman candles billowing sulfurous clouds into unsuspecting crowds accustomed to oxygen; to starter pistols that shoot actual low-blasting fireworks (this is Thailand, safety isn't); to real sky-high fireworks, blown at random intervals by god-knows-who, deafening whatever else is going on with blast waves. Then, for a day or two after the festivities officially ended, they burned through the remaining ordnance, giving you late-night cracks and bombings to leaven the usual sounds of their drunk.

I know what you're thinking. Raz is a spoilsport who just doesn't like festivals. Well, you may be right. On a whole, I found the festival boring. But I did my best to find little points of interest and fun. I noticed how the paper balloons painted the night with new, ever shifting constellations in yellow. And how schoolchildren made their own simple Loy Krathong rafts to release into the river. But also how, as the crowds lined the streets on the third day watching the intricate parade floats file past from the various schools and civic organizations, a different crowd was busy working behind them. The pickpockets.

I first noticed it when I cut through an alley to get home. I passed by a local professional beggar, a repugnant woman who trolls all the night spots, aggressively cornering foreigners with an overgrown toddler asleep in a sling on her back. It is clearly a toddler past his bedtime, not an infant, and she is clearly using him to guilt westerners into misappropriating their compassion. I've seen her odious face a thousand times, and have not and will not give her a cent. When I saw her in the alley, she was accompanied by another woman and a little girl, and her bearing was not the supplicating sham she uses to beg, but her real, off-hours one. The little girl walked in front of her swaying in a dreamy dance, supposedly as kids do, but as she passed me, her little hand quickly and casually patted my pants pocket. With the ugly shrew in tow, I had no doubt what it was. The little girl is trained to pick pockets. And indeed, as I stood watching the parade floats at night, another small hand checked my pocket in passing. It was an empty pocket, but I felt it. I turned my head and saw them walk away. A boy this time, his poorly-dressed parents walking to the front and back of him, signaling him where and what to check. They were not watching the parade; they were watching those who watched.

I met two Buddhist monks, a sincere young one and an older asshole. The young one was at a temple yard that I drifted into to listen to some beautiful recording of a chant. He's eighteen, and has been a monk for three years, ever since he surprised his Christian Thai parents by converting to Buddhism. He had excellent English, but spoke with a stammer, which he says started only a year ago, also when he speaks Thai. He was soft-spoken and gentle, and described himself pre-monkhood as a strange boy who kept to himself. Ironically, becoming a monk has opened up his social life. But he'd like to quit soon. He asked me a bit about Japanese girls; said he'd like to find out about girls when he becomes a layman. No pun here. He also told me he doesn't like ladyboys - "You are a man! Why are you be like a woman?" He had some in his school, and there are also ladyboy monks! This I would not imagine. Watching the parade later, I did however notice a monk that, in bearing and speech, outdid a three-dollar bill in one key regard.

On that subject, I've noticed that gayness in Thailand, while it seems to be more openly accepted, also seems to be more outwardly stereotypical. When I think of gays and lesbians in the West, I see a gamut of external behaviors, from the low-key and subtle to the flamingly obvious. You often need a person to tell you they're gay. Here, however, categories rule: the gay boys pose like teapots and smile suggestively, and the gay girls have a crew cut and dress like lumberjacks. For all the misty subtlety (i.e., fictional bullshit) of Asian culture, in Thailand, at least, it seems they prefer their identities cut and dry.

The other monk is the one I saw today, eating at this guesthouse. I've seen him before. He might be a family member. He was gabbing on his cellphone and sitting imperiously over a rice-and-whatever dish in the lobby. He reminded me of the haredi wheeler-and-dealers I see gabbing on their cellphones in Israel: his vibe was unholy and fake. I was looking for one of the staff, and asked him where she was. The monk responded disinterestedly, eyeing me with cold disdain, and I could tell at a glance that he was simply an asshole. He had a hard, arrogant, bad face - nothing at all like that young monk, who desires to translate his hard-earned lessons of monkhood to lay life. Here was the first monk I ever saw who I knew, just knew, was a putz.

Back to the parade. 

I met Iranians, in town to discuss the medical benefits of saffron. This is always a treat. So close are Iranians to Israel, and so far away, but whenever I meet them I feel a kinship, an easy familiarity. Needless to say, the opinion of Iranian citizens on their own government is not stellar, but it is in foreign lands that they can express it. I told them I love Iran's people - "We love Iran." A lady replied, "We love Israel, we love USA." I asked a guy about festivals in Iran. He said they have some, but they're sad affairs. "Muslim festivals, sad. Not like this."

As soon as the last of the parade floats vanished, the nearby girly bar cranked up the music. Back to business as usual. The first song, with dictionary-definition irony, was Roxanne by The Police. I drifted off to Tha Pae square, where late at night two ladies of the night handed out free (small Thai) condoms, I assume as part of an anti-HIV initiative among the local sex workers. Impressed with this selfless positivity, I asked if I could take a photo of them with the condom boxes.

The prostitute looked me in the face and said: "Photo, twenty baht."

Here are some images and videos.

Chang Moi road features traditional crafts,
Loi Kroh road is a whore street. The concern here
is that encroaching nightlife might turn the former
into the latter.

More foot injuries. French. Motorcycle.

At a temple, launching candle balloons

My favorite shot of the festival. 
A mythical princess with pink braces.

These two invited me to send off the Loy Krathong
together with them. I wished them success, health, etc., and
true love. The girl jumped up: "No! He's not my boyfriend!"
"So I wish you true love separately," I said.

The sky lit up by the candle balloons.