Snippets from Abroad 016

The futile quest for silence:

One thing (besides the heat) that always bugs me in Southeast Asia is the simple fact that it is never silent anywhere. Walls are thin and if there are no people talking loudly to be noisy in inhabited areas, then there certainly is traffic, car horns or an old air-conditioning-unit rattling away. You never get a moment of quiet and to me, who grew up as an only-child in Europe in houses with concrete and/or brick walls, this is a small but steady kind of stress. So I decided to set out to find some quiet, riding the motorbike out of the city, which is no small feat as the highways draw inhabitants to themselves around here, making it feel like you never leave the suburbs of any given city, always driving past houses, shops and snack-bars until you're in the next large center of population. Leaving Chiang Mai and going for about 15 kilometers one gets to Mae Rim, where, going left onto a more rural road, the way leads on to the Mae Sa valley. Besides several waterfalls and a holy cave, the valley holds a few villages clinging to the sides, apparently growing fruit or vegetables in greenhouses along terraces dug into the hillsides. Beyond the valley, settlement stops. The road snakes along a mountainrange overlooking a breath-taking series of jungle valleys and hills. Then there is the view platform. As I pull up next to it I realize that I won't find quiet here. The jungle is too close, up the hill across the street and right below the platform. It is not as noisy as in the city but the electrical-disturbance-sounds the crickets make are present. There is no quiet to be found around here, I realize, but the view is well worth anything...
...aaand incopatibility between Opera and blogger.com prevents me from showing it to you... I shall rectify that later when I'm at another computer...

Snippets from Abroad 015

Exploring a waterfall:

At the entrance to this area I was appalled at the 100 baht that I as a foreigner had to shill out in order to see something as simple as a waterfall, but I have underestimated the size of the thing. Not like it's this majestic monstrosity, roaring very high or wide but it's a rather nicely made path through the jungle along ten numbered steps that the water allegedly takes from some higher point to some lower point I have already left behind me. I am the only person I have seen so far and the sign said that this was step six, counting upwards with me climbing up the mountainside while the water has been descending to my right. Now the path ends. I have brought no water and haven't drank in ages, something that is always dangerous in tropical environments. I may or may not be hungry too, but that is hard to tell with the Doxycyclin in my bloodstream. The onward path is blocked by a bamboo barrier and a sign in Thai telling me it's out of order and, being a good German, I respect the signs authority without anyone being here to enforce it. I stand in the water of one of the pools, the current dragging on me up to my knees, where I have rolled up my pants. Five meters away from me on one side, the water goes down about three meters, five meters to my left it comes cascading down some rocks. The path on the other side goes on up, I can see that, but without going deeper into the water, which I have spent the past ten minutes testing by walking around in it, I cannot get across. I could go back two steps of the waterfall to a bridge but I would have to wait for my feet to dry in order to get into my shoes again because I have seen what kind of little horrors (and ants) crawl around on that jungle-floor. A decision is made and I wade through, having all things water-damageable in my carrypurse, I nearly slip twice but I make it to the other side. I feel great but I need to take off my pants and remove my underpants because those won't dry on my body and I hate getting a cold in hot weather. I sit down on the rocks in the sun to dry my pants and my shirt. Then, fearing a sun-stroke, I tie my soaked underpants around my head like a bandana. In fact, people I later meet along the trail don't even notice that they are talking to a guy who is wearing his underwear on his head. Whether the joke's on them or on the guy who has seen too much Bear Grills I don't dare to decide. But After an hour of hiking through the hot and wet jungle air, I reach the last of the waterfall steps and feel like a king.

Snippets from Abroad 014

Hiring a scooter to get around and then realizing that This Is Asia:

I have to admit that I do not have the correct license to drive the motorscooter I am currently manning, but the irregular rides on my fathers electroscooter (a nice import from China) have given me enough practice to fake it to the guy who rents these things out (not that he would care) and I drive out of the Soi my guesthouse is situated in. When I get out onto the main road, part of me starts to scream incomprehensibly, while the rest of me is busy spreading my spatial awareness to 360 degrees around me, hopefully far enough to notice anything on a collision course; on a scooter, you are the weakest thing on the road (if you discount bycicles, which are rare around here) and probably the third slowest to boot (TukTuks, the carrion-eaters of traffic, and motorcycles converted to mobile food-stalls can't keep up with you; Songthaeuws, pickup-trucks, SUVs, family cars and the ever-crazed motorcyclists of these parts out/overrun you). The speedometer is broken (which I see often around here. Not having ever seen a broken speedometer in Europe, I must assume it's on purpose, to cloud the true age of a vehicle upon reselling it) and I have no clue whether the fuel-gauge will rise if I fill the tank, which I most definitely must soon. But right now I just try to stay in the general flow of traffic, following stronger vehicles closely, using them for protection, always expecting something to hit me from the side, ending the healthier part of my existence. I somehow get onto what the locals call a highway, which by my standards doesn't fit the definition, what with the stores and parking-lane, the cross-lights and the fucking pedestrians and all, and start looking out for a gas-station. There is one, but it's on the other side and I am not insane enough to do a U-turn on a highway in a left-handed traffic system (which would be perfectly legal and normal here) so I drift on with the traffic. As I start to calm down and get used to the traffic and its unwritten rules, I see a gas-station up ahead. I knew that all it would take was getting used to and here I am, pulling up like it's the most normal thing in the world...

Snippets from Abroad 013

Sitting in a boxing stadium, which sounds more grand than its den-like structure would justify:

After the Gathoey/Ladyboy/Transvestite (pick your immersion on Thai culture yourself) at the entrance has led me to my seat, which belongs to one of the seven or eight bars surrounding the fighting ring, I order myself a beer and enjoy the first match of the evening. It still feels a little weird to have paid money in order to watch two eight-year-olds kick the crap out of each other but this is just the opening match, the matches of the evening ascending in age and skill towards the main event and the fights of locals vs. foreigners. Giving a young fighter the chance to fight in front of a crowd early and often leaves to situations where a Muay Thai fighter reaching the age of twenty usually has hundreds of actual matches under his belt, something most Western boxers can only dream of. The kids fight far less controlled than their older colleagues but despite being very forward, throwing kicks more often than punches (which is the other way around with more experienced fighters), they never get carried away, there is always gestures of sportsmanship and a smile after the fight. I like that, myself finding the thing most US Heavyweights do ridiculous and WWF-worthy at best. No "I'll rape your wife and eat your children!" here. There are two main events this night, one fight between a French man named Mehdi, who has drawn quite a crowd of French fans (who will, after his surprising victory in the fifth and last round of the match, break out the Marseillaise) and a local fighter, and then two experienced and skilled Thai fighters. The last fight ends with the guy who was being beat up all fight starting to fight back in the fourth round and defeating his opponent by knockout despite his bruised and swollen face. A spectacular night. As I leave the stadium, it's raining so I decide to take a Tuk Tuk. I tell the driver, where I want to go and on the way he asks me, having noticed my Thai, if he shall take me to a place with nice ladies. I point out my ring and politely tell him off. Next time I'll just bring an umbrella.

Snippets from Abroad 012

A small rural guesthouse, somewhere in the backwaters of Cambodia:

I return to the guesthouse after spending the entire day in the sun up on the mountain. I am thirsty and hungry and tired and my arms are itching from a light sunburn. There is a minibus in front of the place, having spewed its cargo of about fifty Cambodian tourists into the premise. I step over a field of flip-flops by the door and into the noise. The hallway is crowded with children playing and their parents eating snacks, while the washing-area is overflowing with people cleaning themselves. An old woman gives me an evil look while I push my way into my room, which is right next to the washing-area. I close the door behind me, open the window. When I close my eyes it sounds like the noise of the mass of people now filling the guesthouse is right in the room with me. I do not care, crash after the strains of the day and fall asleep for an hour or so. Then my hunger wakes me up, the only thing I have eaten this day being a baguette I had bought early in the morning at the local market. Time to check out the only restaurant in this town that I have read about on the internet: Pkay Prek. I am hungry and thirsty and I have reached the main goal of my trip. I feel just fine, as I make my way through the noisy crowd in the hallway, down the stairs and into the dusky glow of the setting sun.

Snippets from Abroad 011

Contemplating environmental hazards to your health:

Having spent the last four hours climbing up and down the mountaintop-temple that has been the destination of this trip, having taken hundreds of pictures, I am exhausted from the tropical mountain-sun and sit down on a wall at the stairs that twelve hundred or-so years ago were built for pilgrims to climb. Behind me, maybe two dozen meters into the bushes, there is red tape and several signs warning of mines. Further up the slope is a blue sign about a cleared minefield. The Cambodians put up those blue signs everywhere. Every party-member has one at their house. Everywhere where there has been foreign aid there is one, usually proclaiming with a flag who did what for them. Korea built this school. The European Disaster Relief Fund dug this well. ZOA provided this medicare-center. The Hodgess-Family from New York built this family home. The German government financed this provincial police station. And then this: This minefield was cleared with funds from the French government. The cleared area encompasses 4313 square meters of steeply sloped jungle. 612 mines were disarmed, as were 7 unexploded pieces of ordinance. I sit next to it and do the math. Back in my army days I learned that a clearing-quote of 95% in land mines is decent enough. That would mean that there are still around 30 land mines in that patch of jungle. 15 for an area as big as my family-yard in Hamburg used to be. Yet, the mines are a very abstract danger to me. I sit there, contemplating them. Guess I just shouldn't go off the paths and roads then, huh?

Snippets from Abroad: 010

Last stages of a long journey:

The road is terrifying. Not that it's in a bad state, it isn't clearly, it's just that where I'm from nobody would build a road like this. I sometimes have nightmares where I have to follow someone along a road or a path on foot and the way gets steeper and steeper until I am climbing and then finally, it's all wall and I can no longer follow. This is that road. The slope must in places be more than 110% and while I have no idea how we're getting up there on this little motorbike and whether or not the driver has calculated my immense weight correctly so we won't fall over backwards, it does explain why the temple visitors must take drivers working here, and here only to go the last five kilometers of ascending the mountain. I had intended to take some pictures on the ride up but now all I can do is hold on for dear life, trying not to slip off the back of the bike while the incredible view goes by largely unnoticed. We pass troops, first a few at road-posts, then an entire village of them, with their families around too. Some kids are playing volleyball, something that the Khmer seem to really love as I have seen dozens of volleyball-fields in front of even the poorest-looking peasant shacks in the countryside. Up on top I start walking towards the temple. An army officer calls to me and asks me for my nationality. I tell him and he says "Okay!" and gestures for me to go on. I do and wonder, what answer would have been the wrong one...