So Much For Not Drinking The Water

I'm sitting here on the rooftop deck of my hotel overlooking the Royal Palace. It's not even ten o'clock yet and it's already 96 degrees. Add that to the 82 percent humidity, and you've got yourself the makings of a debilitatingly hot day.

Of course, as most of you know, we landed in the middle of Song Kran, the Thai water festival. I wasn't really sure what to expect - I'd heard a lot of stories about it, but seeing it firsthand is something to be reckoned with. The entire city of 6 million people seems to have taken a week off to have a gigantic water fight.

At 10 AM I'm looking down over streets crammed with people. Each of them is carrying some sort of water gun. Some people are toting small little water pistols, some have those huge super-soakers, and quite a few are packing enormous water cannons that incorporate a backpack reservoir. There are pickup trucks driving slowly down the glistening streets with about 10 people in the back. Whenever they pass each other, both songtaos (as they're called here) erupt in a back-and-forth water fight as they roll down the road.

One thing that nobody seemed to mention in my readings about Song Kran is that it's actually more than a water fight. It's also a mud fight. People can buy little pails of white mud for 2 Baht (5 cents), and they walk down the street with these buckets smearing mud on everyone they pass. And they're really funny about it. One lady I bought noodles from came up to me as I was standing there eating and said "Sorry!" with a mischievous smile on her face. I didn't know what she was talking about until she started pouring ice cold water down the back of my shirt. Then one of her friends ran up and smeared white mud all over my face and in my mouth.

And the best part of it all is that you're not allowed to get pissed off about anything. That would be breaking the number one rule in Thailand which is "don't ever stop smiling." You just have to take it like a bitch.

Posted by flow Frazao on April 14, 2005 at 11:05 PM in Southeast Asia | Permalink