I'm back in Bangkok for 2 days before my flight home.
I finally got some consecutive hours of sleep last night on the train, (5 hrs) and the night before in my spendy hotel room (6 hrs). However, I'm still having fitful sleep due to the mental strain of the bed bugs incident. Even now I can feel things crawling on me--that aren't there. Last night and today I have been thinking things are crawling into my ears. It's like a bad acid trip.
Beth, (my travel companion for the next 2 days) has rightly suggested we don't talk about them and if we must we have to call it the "BB incident" so as not to conjure images of creepy crawly mites. I posted something on facebook about it and got a slew of comments & messages from fellow travelers who had a BB experience to share. Although commiserating was nice it also fueled my anxiety and ultimately it was better for me to just step away from Facebook & Dr. Google to get back to real life.
Yesterday and the day before in ChiangMai was crazy with the Songkran festival in full swing. People crowded around the mote with buckets and water guns soaking each other in celebration of new year. There were some tourists that wrapped their cameras in plastic so they could get photos but I was not motivated or confident enough to do this. I only have a couple of poor quality photos from the cab ride to the train station. It was full on. The streets were absolutely chaotic, lined with people participating in the festival. The bed of trucks were full of people with buckets to splash on the fellow festival participants and friends. You cannot avoid getting wet. It is not an option. Children, teens, adults, old people, Thai's, tourists, tuk-tuk drivers, shop owners and anyone else you can think of has some water vessel that they are using to soak with. I was squirted with a hose, several water guns, a bucket of water, and had a small bowl of water poured down my back. Everyone looked like they were having a blast but bar my 1 trip to 711 I avoided the mote as much as possible. I know, I'm a party pooper, in my defense just walking around my neighborhood I was soaked 4 times. So, it's not like I was spared.
Look up the festival photos from ChiangMai if you want to see the crazy that is Songkran.
*edited to add some photos* They aren't great but you can get the idea at least.
I finally got some consecutive hours of sleep last night on the train, (5 hrs) and the night before in my spendy hotel room (6 hrs). However, I'm still having fitful sleep due to the mental strain of the bed bugs incident. Even now I can feel things crawling on me--that aren't there. Last night and today I have been thinking things are crawling into my ears. It's like a bad acid trip.
Beth, (my travel companion for the next 2 days) has rightly suggested we don't talk about them and if we must we have to call it the "BB incident" so as not to conjure images of creepy crawly mites. I posted something on facebook about it and got a slew of comments & messages from fellow travelers who had a BB experience to share. Although commiserating was nice it also fueled my anxiety and ultimately it was better for me to just step away from Facebook & Dr. Google to get back to real life.
Yesterday and the day before in ChiangMai was crazy with the Songkran festival in full swing. People crowded around the mote with buckets and water guns soaking each other in celebration of new year. There were some tourists that wrapped their cameras in plastic so they could get photos but I was not motivated or confident enough to do this. I only have a couple of poor quality photos from the cab ride to the train station. It was full on. The streets were absolutely chaotic, lined with people participating in the festival. The bed of trucks were full of people with buckets to splash on the fellow festival participants and friends. You cannot avoid getting wet. It is not an option. Children, teens, adults, old people, Thai's, tourists, tuk-tuk drivers, shop owners and anyone else you can think of has some water vessel that they are using to soak with. I was squirted with a hose, several water guns, a bucket of water, and had a small bowl of water poured down my back. Everyone looked like they were having a blast but bar my 1 trip to 711 I avoided the mote as much as possible. I know, I'm a party pooper, in my defense just walking around my neighborhood I was soaked 4 times. So, it's not like I was spared.
Look up the festival photos from ChiangMai if you want to see the crazy that is Songkran.
*edited to add some photos* They aren't great but you can get the idea at least.
So much like the annual Festival De Agua I remember in Venezuela..a week of throwing, spraying, dumping, dousing everyone, in celebration of water. So, have a great trip back and thanks you for providing a look at your adventure through your eyes.
ReplyDeleteThanks you for reading Boyd!
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