The Train! The Train!

Short Version:

Win some, win some more. Lose a few.

Long Version:

We're on a train, the snot-monster-formerly-known-as-Lovely-Wife and I, heading to Chiang Mai, gateway to Thailand's forested, mountainous north. Fukaru Kenjiju* (Hai!) has retired to her upper bunk to continue singlenosedly deforesting the planet, leaving ein soloPuppet to watch the huge variety of Bangkok neighbourhoods variously fly, meander, and grind by outside the window, depending on how fast we're going. Crazy shit everywhere, much of it neon-lit. Including the golf course.

We biked to the train, with all our touring crap loaded up for the first time. In fact, this was first ride with racks, and panniers, and way more gear than we'd had strapped directly onto the bikes as we explored Cuba. And, it turns out, somewhere between the basement in North Vancouver where rack/pannier butchery installation took place and the first pedal strokes down the slightly seedy Sukhumvit soi, some of the knobs on the panniers had moved a bit, leaving them somewhat not attached very well. We'd have picked that up during our pre-ride gear check, if we'd done one. As it was, we stopped somewhere near the snake farm for a quick adjustment, and then were back on our merry way to the train. With occasional stops to confirm with locals that we were still on the right track to actually get to the station, cos neither of us actually got around to doing more than a cursory map glance before we set out.

The locals were all really nice, and polite, and wanted to help us out... once they figured out what the heck we wanted. Pretty much every time we stopped the interaction went something like:

Puppet: “Sawadee krab”** [+ awkward one-handed attempted wai*** followed quickly by more-or-less successful attempt to catch hideously unbalanced over-laden bicycle trying to escape]

Local: [bemused face. Puppet interpretation: What on earth just happened? Was that farang talking to me? What language was it speaking? Why is it lying on top of that bicycle in the middle of the sidewalk?]

Puppet: “Hua Luamphong?****”

Local: [bemused face. Puppet interpretation: What the hell did it say? Seriously, does it think I speak Romanian, or Hebrew, or whatever it's speaking?]

Puppet: “Hua Luamphong. Train.” [train noises + movement]

Local: [bemused face. Puppet interpretation: Now it's doing a dance! And some kind of weird ethnic singing thing. Maybe this is that Tuvan throat-singing stuff***** I've heard about]

Puppet: “Hua Luamphong? Hua Luamphong?” [repeat several times]

Local: [bemused face followed by incredulous face. Puppet interpretation: Perhaps this is that new type of autism that all the Westerners seem to think they have nowdays, from all that organic food they started eating a while back... hey, hang on a sec, that almost sounded like... no, couldn't be... holy catfish testicles, it WAS!!! It's trying to say Hua Luamphong!!!! Haaaaaaa ha ha ha ha!!! What a tard! And omigod the noises, and the dance – it's TRYING TO BE A TRAIN!!! I gotta film this! [gets cellphone, starts filming]]

Eventually the 1-baht piece dropped, and we were pointed onwards in the direction we'd been heading. Navigation win! Communication win! Style points fail.

* = Hideous Snow Beast. It's a long story. Remind me to tell it to you some time.

** = “Hello” (said by male) in Thai

*** = Hands together in front of chest, fingertips point up, head ducks towards hands.

**** = Bangkok Rail Station

***** = One of those legendary cultural oddities that became way less cool once it became easily obtained. Check it out, for sure, but spend more time on Javanese gamelan music or Balinese kecak. Not Balinese gamelan though, that's a little bit frenzied for this time of night, don't you think?