Mundos Gone Wild

Sure the little line on the map was squiggly, but it was only 200km. My last day in Laos would also be one of the most challenging, and probably the most fun. I offer up to you a slightly tedious catch up entry to make up for my recent sloth.

When you imagine a massage and herbal sauna in Muang Sing, what do you picture? What if I told you that the facilities were constructed entirely from recycled scrap lumber and powered by the same? What if I told you that the masseurs are sixteen year olds who, considering their taste in tattoos, wouldn't look out of place perched on Suzuki rice rockets amongst a group of lightly armed Asian gangsters? What if I mentioned that the sauna was as big as your closet, yes the small one, but without the lightbulb?

Well, my masseur gingerly kicked the shit out of me. It was a cross between untelevised southern-style no holds barred wrastlin' and one of those dreams where you wake up spasmotically, pulling a string of drool off your pillow as you jerk to a sitting position. My one hour massage lasted a bit over fifteen minutes, and luckily so because I don't think my body could've recovered easily from much more punishment. Dude had me face down with his feet in my armpits and was squeezing my ankles together with his hands while he wound my hips skyward. Joints were popping like Michael Jackson in the Billie Jean video. I walked out of the massage "room" with my knuckles dragging, caveman style and got pushed into the sauna. The temperature knob is a burning log that sits underneath a small wooden shack that is the sauna. It was great. Super hot and herbal somehow. I guess the herbs were boiling in the water that was generating the steam. I spent five minutes in, two minutes out, for about thirty minutes. Next to the sauna was a large stone cistern filled with water. Next to that was a rice field full of hunched over women planting seedlings. So I'd pop out of the sauna, pores pouring sweat, sarong clinging, walk over to the cistern, wave at the stitched-browed farmer ladies and pour a few buckets of the chilly water over my mildly shocked but appreciative skin. Total cost? Two bucks.

Up and out of Adima early the next day, I planned for a quick stop at the market and a topping off of the gasoline. The market took a while because I couldn't resist a morning bowl of mystery meat noodles. Then I had to buy some of that delicious water buffalo jerky. Then the lightly sweet deep-fried rice balls called out to me - twice! Petrol turned out to be an elusive quarry. If I was driving a tractor, or more likely a half-tractor, these weird one-eyed, two wheeled pulling machines, then I wouldn't have had a problem - deisel was in long supply. But the only petrol station in town was 3km east off of the main road. And nobody seemed to know where it was. I was getting that twighlight zone grade paranoia when I accidentally drove past the two barrel supplier and his mom. The quality of the fuel was questionable, coming from a barrel that looked older than the elderly station mistress, but in the end, one tankful got me to the border.

The road to Luang Nam Tha was the same route I arrived on. I passed a couple of tourist buses, smugly offering a no-look thumbs up as I drew even around a blind curve. Super macho and stupid. Why do those two always cling together? The scenery was the same old jaw-dropping beautiful stuff that I'd been seeing for hundreds of kilometers throughout Laos.

A few kilometers past Luang Nam Tha the road changed from asphalt to dirt. It forked at one point offering up two equally shitty, craggy roads. I took the more east looking road, by this point relying unblinkingly on my honed sense of dead-reckoned direction. Besides, I had been wrong so many times in a row that statistically an incorrect choice was nearly impossible.

The scenery was lovely - emerald green, stepped rice fields sitting afoot a narrow jungled gorge and fed by a small snaking river. Thatched villages on stilts poked out atop small natural rises, decorating the geography like moss on a tree trunk. There wasn't much time to admire the surroundings however, as the road was a disaster. I was certain that I had become lost. My map had a little orange line representing the road I was supposed to be on, but the one beneath me warranted maybe a light-gray, dashed hairline at best.

I maneuvered carefully, avoiding large rocks and deep puddles when possible and slowing down to first gear at the gravel filled hairpin turns at every corner. I ventured that if I was on the wrong road, then eventually I would run into the road I was supposed to be on. Some concentrated sky watching in an attempt to determine my compass direction proved fruitless. Duh. Perhaps the fact that the road was so damn fun to drive delayed any drastic decision making on my part. Two hours into my trip the first sign of hope passed before my eyes - it was a bus. Older than me by far and full beyond capacity, it met me where I least expected it - at a water crossing. We stood mano a mano at either side in true spaghetti-western style, wincing and daring the other to make the first move. Finally I gunned it, spitting gravel behind me and dropping knee deep into the muddy stream. I didn't falter. Keeping the accelerator twisted, my head down and my eyes closed, sheer momentum and Honda bitchin-ness carried me through. I stopped next to the bus to catch my breath and bowed to a round of happy thumbs up from the bus riders. The bus then grumbled forward, carefully not taking the path I chose.

Water crossings. Basically small rivers or streams that happen to go across the road. Roads with water crossings aren't important enough to justify the building of bridges. They always sneak up on me. Bouncing downhill on loose dirt, my fingers and toes delicately working the brakes, my shoulders hunched and strained from taking the slack where my shocks give up, the water crossing appears as a sort of oasis. I used to imagine them as punishment, but once I learned how to forge them my opinion flipped. With enough speed and a dedicated grip on the handlebars, the water crossing becomes a post-dirt wrangling climax, akin to the final drop at Splash Mountain. The mud is cleaned off my brakes and engine and my shoes, clean mountain water cools my sunburned ankles and refreshingly soaks my pants. But more than anything else, it's just fun as heck. Scrambling through the dirt, straining and jostling and jolting, and then SPLASH - baptism - rebirth. Ready for another stretch of dirt.

That road went on and on and on. Then I got to the quarry. Way out in the middle of nowhere was a huge quarry, complete with a big manmade lake of unnaturally blue water. Running to and from the facility were huge Chinese-made dump trucks - scaring the holy shit out of me when I encountered them at horribly frequent intervals. This road was barely traversible by me on my motorbike. Imagine a row of ten-ton dump trucks convoying it. Naturally I was forced to the edge of the road and usually stopped entirely when they appeared. The good thing was that their wheels made two solid tracks where the gravel had been compressed and a narrow but easily negotiable path was formed.

Almost had to stay a night in Huay Xai, the border town just across the river from Thailand, but a nice old boat driver offered to give me and my bike a ride for a bit over ten bucks. I accepted and did not fret when I saw the size of his boat. If he says my bike will fit, then it will fit. Four men hoisted it aboard with a bit of elbow grease and some non-directed yelling. A round of Beer Lao and a pack of Chinese cigarettes sufficed for a tip. We sipped and they smoked and then we crossed the river.

Customs and immigration in Thailand was a breeze. Dude told me that Chiang Rai was only 100km away so I filled my tank and sped off. After two hours of bumpy riding my ass no longer has feeling. After four hours I forget I ever had an ass (and that ain't no small feat). So at that point I was good for 300km. The roads in Thailand are first-world quality - best I've been on so far. Thailand in general is so much more developed than anything I'd seen in months that it was a bit shocking. But it was a nice clean line too. Crossing the river, entering Thailand, I was reminded of how special Laos is. After several weeks I had become accustomed to an overflowing cup of natural beauty. My mission in Thailand was the beach, and with my hand squeezing the gas, I stared straight ahead and firmly resloved to get there as quickly as possible.

Then I got sick in Chaing Rai and had to hole up for an extra day. Shoot! Got half-way through War and Peace and hung out with Mr Sam who makes killer grilled cheese sandwiches in a very Alice from The Brady Bunch way.

Chaing Rai to Sukkothai. Looked at some unspectacular ruins. Gotta say though - they got the Buddha image dialed. Standing Buddha. Reclining Buddha. Walking Buddha. Meditating Buddha. Smiling Buddha. Non-smiling Buddha. And then, en masse Buddha. These particular ruins were a Buddha blowout and each and every image was enchanting.

Sukkothai to Bangkok. That makes 1000km in two days.

And Bangkok? The sign said BANGKOK 50km. That's right about when I hit Bangkok. The city is huge. And the highway system is crazy. And the drivers! Like when you hit city limit, a little indicator bulb in your car lights up notifying you to turn on your loco. Taxi drivers wedge between lanes to create a third where there is only two. This is in bumper to bumper gridlock. Oh, and they drive on the left in Thailand, like in England. That kind of throws a pipe wrench in the gearbox. Seeing the option for the elevated toll-road I took it. Merging into the separated far-left lane, fully commited to the toll-road on ramp, I noticed a parenthetic reminder in 6pt type at the bottom of the sign - FOUR-WHEELED VEHICLES ONLY. But of course my Asia training told me that rules were meant to be broken. Besides, it was too late to turn around. At the toll booth the money taker was clearly unhappy with my turn of events. She motioned for me to turn around. Imagine busting a U from the middle lane of the Bay Bridge and driving, against traffic and across several lanes for 500 meters. That's what I did. I had to stop at the end of that little trip and take some time to let my hands stop trembling. Then I went two kilometers further and fucking did it again. Of course this time it was no big deal - this time I hugged the shoulder on my feeble David vs. the Expressway victory lap.

Signage is pretty good. My problem is that I didn't know where I was going. So naturally, and with an undeniable precident, I got lost. I started going in circles on the highway. You know The Maze in Oakland, just before reaching the toll gates at the Bay Bridge? It's like that, times, well, infinity. Finally I saw a sign for Asok. I knew that was near where I was going and figured I could ask for directions wherever I landed. Which I did. The first guy scoffed at me. He repeated my request to an older woman staring straight ahead and sitting across from him on a bus bench. She removed the cigarette from her lips, exhaled, opened her eyes, leisurely looked my way and sized me up. Then she returned to her original fixed gaze and almost imperceptibly shook her head, clearly conveying a sarcastic "good luck, farang."

An hour later I found my hotel. It was about 5 blocks from where I exited the highway. Heh. Sometime during my little jaunt, they changed the lanes around. At certain times they change which lanes can go in which directions. It's clearly indicated in Thai on the roads themselves and there are also some very handy cryptic lights which flash red and green. Very helpful. So I spent some time driving in the wrong lanes and ignoring whistling white-gloved traffic cops who, annoyingly, were trying to pull me over. Like I don't have enough problems.

First things first. Went to JAL (like it was that easy) and secured a reservation home. I'll be in Oakland around 3pm on June 1st. Can't wait!

Made a reservation on Ko Mak (because I'm the mack) for a week on the idle beaches of the best island in Thailand you've never heard of. Oh but the rainy season just started. Dude at the resort says it rains for either two days a week or two hours a day every day. Depends on your luck and your personal relationship with Jesus. Guess we'll find out how tight we are in a week.

Went to Rajah's to buy some suits. It was recommended on Lonely Planet's message board. I made a deal with myself that I would get a good suit for 250 bucks. Now, it's possible to buy a suit here for 50 bucks, but apparently those are polyester and when you go for your fitting they slip a mickey in your tea and steal your kidney while you're out.

Rajah's was a busy but low pressure affair. Mr Rajah himself, a Sikh, patiently helped me pick a material and a style. His son works by his side and a portrait of his father patiently oversees all. He offered me a 'package.' Three suits and six custom shirts and several ties for so much money. I said that I only needed one suit. Maybe two. Then I looked at the fabrics. Oh, there were so many nice fabrics. And how can you just have one suit? And then don't you want one fun suit and one serious suit? But what about a light colored suit? And a black suit of course - you need that. And then there was the young Spanish guy who was getting his final fitting and looking really good in his suit (not in a gay way, but probably in a gay way too) which happened to be in the same fabric that I had picked out. And then there was the guy moving to Moscow who got a little teary eyed because he was leaving Mr. Rajah. So I talked myself into four suits. What the fuck am I going to do with four suits? I know what you're thinking - he's gonna come back looking like an NBA point guard on Letterman. No. I'm getting four totally killer, custom-made, fancy-silk lined, nicely pinstriped, perfect suits. Well I know what I'll do with one of them - after throwing away all of my belongings, before boarding my plane home, I will don one of my Tiffany-blue-lined suits, put on shmoozy face, and cross my fingers in hope of an upgrade.