I can't remember if what happens next happened after seeing Tron or if it was the next day. I'm writing this almost 2 months later now; I feel so awkardly pathetic that I have waited so long to conjour my memories into a literary spell. I am without excuse. All I can do is try my best. If an experience doesn't stick out like a gopher, then it probably isn't so much of a loss, as the most memorable parts will also be the most exciting to transcribe with my wizard powers.
The only reason I think the following events didn't happen after Tron is because if the soon to be explained events connected to everything else in that day--well--that is one insane day, and I don't remember going to bed thinking how packed full of craziness my day was. The counter argument is that I can't recall what I would have done during the next day, leading up to the events that I keep teasing.
Ok. So we came back to Khaosan road, me, Luke, Jo, and Maria, after probably having seen the movie Tron 2.0. I thought that was going to be it for the night, but it was hardly 10:30; this was Bangkok afterall--it is so hot during the day that most people, rather than hiding from the sun inside, hide from the sun from behind the Earth. We thought it would be nice to get a beer at one of the roadside bars. We chose one with a Thai guy playing indie music who was dressed like a hipster. The beers were cheap. I ordered a Tiger and made everyone else try it because I felt like it had maple syrup in it--this was new to me, but my allergies were subsiding which means I had super-taste (and smell). Maple syrup beer should be created if it hasn't already.
After a bit of chatting and chilling, I busted out my little black moleskin book for some Telephone Pictionary. We had already played a round before the movie so everyone knew how to play and was without doubt of the enjoyment they would have. For some reason most people, even myself, don't think it will be a fun game. Our first round had something to do with Batman crashing a party and drinking with a turtle. We made friends with two girls sitting near us and attempted to teach them how to play. One of them was from Korea; she was in Bangkok as an exchange student and she was curious but kept explaining that she couldn't draw. The other girl was Emily and she was a local. She snatched my book and wrote, across five pages, a short biography about herself. In the penmenship of a 1st grader, it read: "I'm Emily. Once, a long time ago I in China. Thanks for the [illegible]". We had tried to explain the game to her but she kept doing scribbles. Then she drew a scribble of herself. Obviously it wasn't working. But we were happy to have made some new friends so we invited them over and hung out for a while. They were both musicians and were friends with the guy who was playing the music. After a bit Jo and Maria got antsy to go dancing, so they asked Emily if she would take us to a club. She took us to a place, West End [something, maybe Bar] that was just down the street. It looked like a frat-boy bar. It had a bunch those super long tables that you can stand at. They didn't really have a dance floor, but people were just dancing near their tables--sort of. It was like a bunch of giant marionette puppets were dangling from ceiling fans. We stayed there for about an hour until Jo had to go back to pack. She and Maria were leaving on a bus for the south in a few hours. Their plan was to stay up all night. So that just left me, Maria, and Emily. It turned out that Emily was born with a little bit of crazy in her. It was just one of those things we could tell. Not that we felt afraid for our lives, but it was something that Maria and I were having call to eachother's attention and having secret conversations about. As we left a random drunk guy sort of bumped into Emily and she made a sound that was the vocal equivalent of unsheathing a katana. But I dragged her away before she would start slashing. We went to the club at the end of the road that we had gone to the previous night that seemed to be a popula place for the ladyboys to trick drunk foreigners. As we went in the bouncer informed us that they were playing the last song of the night. Maria didn't care. She had enough enthusiasm to convince both Emily and I, so we jumped in and boogied for about 25 seconds, then ran out.
We thought that our night would be over since the bars were all starting to close, so we started dragging ourselves back towards our disgusting hostels. On the way we found a crowd partying on side of the street. It was literally just a 2 guys with a cooler on wheels and a boombox. They were selling cans of beer for practically nothing. The tunes were great, so we jumped into the swarm. It was the best gathering of the night. The energy was awesome; it was a great mix of foreigners and locals, and it was outisde. There was a french girl dancing on a plastic stool who started getting everyone to do the same. These are the least sturdy plastic stools I have ever seen, but somehow nobody fell and nothing cracked, as likely as it seemed. There was an Indian guy wearing a robe who jumped in and performed some spiritual break dancing. People started cheering, and they called him Yoda.
We were at the outdoor party for almost 2 hours. Once it hit 5 Am Maria had to leave for her bus, but she kept putting it off till the next song. All of a sudden it was 5:30. It was like the clock striking midnight for Cinderella; Maria suddenly took off, because she knew she was super late. She did not want the wrath of Jo (Which would be a thunderstorm of pink pubbles). I didn't really stay much longer either. I stumbled back to my hostel and buzzed the door, which they lock after midnight. Somebody was getting woken up to let me in, and they didn't seem to happy, so I thanked them and trotted up to my bed. I had left my window open and could hear the music throughout the city as it was slowly dissipating while the sun was beginning to make its ascent. It was sound making way for sight, and I was unbelievably tired.
So the next few days it was just Luke and I. I always tried to get up early, but it never happened, and Luke was even worse. Our routine usually involved me emailing after I got up where I would be, within a time window, but sometimes that time window was too early and Luke wasn't up for it, so we would try again. Sometimes we would just bump into eachother. I can't recall the details in the most accurate chronological order, but I will try.
Our first day togethor we joined up with Femke (Sanna had gone to Cambodia) and found this cafe in a hostel that had a sign advertising home-made bagels. It was impressive, especially for Thailand. Luke and I were considering taking a trek to Chiang-Mai or a day trip to this temple we had read about in a bookstore, but we would have to change our sleeping routine if we were going to manage. Femke was going to move to another hostel that was closer to downtown. I was really wanting to move location too--not that I disliked the adventures I was having in the backpacker district, but it was just touristy--I wanted the raw Bangkok. So after lunch I took a taxi with Femke to her new hostel. She kept getting worried that the taxi driver was going the wrong way, or didn't understand the directions, so she kept repeating them. It perturbed him a bit. Then he missed the turn and had to loop back around, which she thought he did on purpose to jack up the fare. But in the end the fare was like 5 dollars.
The hostel was nice. It had a super comfortable lobby that felt sort of tropical. They had a good selection of rooms, from dorms to triples, and they had wifi. The price of the dorms wasn't too bad either, but it was still more expensive than the single rooms on KhaoSan road, although the quality was probably nicer. They were also close to the Skytrain, which is the best way to get around Bangkok (but it doesn't go near Khaosan road). Femke checked in and I left to walk around the area and find some food.
It only took a few blocks and I ran into a little food street with a ton of restaurants that shared a common seating area. I chose a soup place and got whatever the business ladies, in powersuits, next to me were having. It was like Vietnamese Pho but I liked it a lot better--more sour with thicker noodles. The noodles in Pho were slimy like worms, which is not well enjoyed, where these are dry and well enjoyed.
I walked up through the downtown area and then headed towards the malls. It was a really long walk. It was also way too hot out and I kept having to pop into 7-11 for water pit stops; luckily they are everywhere. Once I got to the mall area I thought I would walk around and check out some stores but I was so exhausted that I instead caught a magenta colored taxi back to Khaosan road. I found Luke and we went to another street bar. We were sitting next to a Brittish guy who was with one obvious ladyboy and another suspect ladyboy. We noticed that he kept talking about himself alot. He looked like a mountain troll that was wearing a latex mask of a human, but he had a ring on his troll nose, which protruded through the latex. Luke and I had some beers and talked videogames and watched the night go by. I was so exhausted that I had to go to bed after this. I had switched rooms to be in the same hostel as Luke and when I woke up I found a note from him, explaining that he had met up with some friends he had made in China and ended up having a crazy night and that I probably shouldn't look for him until late in the afternoon. Oh Bangkok. You are too much!
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