Wednesday, February 27, 2013

barrel of monkeys

The past weekend was one for the books. Due to our dwindling number of weekends left, we've tried to make them as eventful as possible, and this one did not disappoint. Luckily, we had three days off thanks to a Buddhist holiday, so we used 24 hours for adventure and the next 48 to recover.

Thailand has done wonders for my sleep schedule. In the past, I've always jam packed my schedule leaving just a few hours for sleep each night. Going to bed at 1am due to practice or homework of some sort, and then waking up at 4am to get ready to open Java Jolt--what I can remember from my sleep deprived haze of those years was fantastic! But living the simple life here has been enormously beneficial. Like I told you in my earlier posts, I've fallen into a bit of a routine (at least with my bedtime schedule). In bed by 10:30pm at the latest, wake up at 7am at the earliest. Of course there are nights we designate to dancing and night life (especially on our vacations!), but for the majority of our time here, I've stayed on schedule. A couple of the other farang teachers here and I have had this discussion a few times--we aren't mad about settling into our elderly ways! Ok, but on to the story...

We decided that Lop Buri would be our destination of choice for the weekend. However, after some research, we discovered that there was only really one attraction: the monkey-infested temple. This was enough to motivate me to ride the next 6 hour bus journey, but I hesitated because there were no good places to spend the night there. I always keep the phrase "go big or go home" in my mind, so we decided to apply it to our Saturday journey. We'd just get on the bus, drive 6 hours, explore the monkey temple for a while, and then meander back to Uttaradit on the night bus...which is precisely what we'd have done had we actually caught it. More on that later.

I won't give details on the bus ride there. But I will tell you this: there are some bus rides (and drivers) with which (whom) no amount of Dramamine can compete. No matter the country, I always find myself asking why I have to seek out the ones that make me all but reenact the dress shopping scene from the movie Bridesmaids. God help that bus had I not taken the motion sickness medicine. I have to practice meditation and constant concentration and composure in order to not share my lunch menu with the other riders. Should I continue? Did you...I can...no? You grasp the situation with which we're dealing? Ok great. Just let me know. I can come back to it.

After our arrival (around 3pm), I stumbled off the bus and took a few minutes to compose myself as Meredith checked about departure times. She came to discover that the only bus back to our home sweet home was at 10pm. I made peace with the fact that I wouldn't make it back before my 10:30 bed time (we're more lenient on weekends anyway--sometimes we're crazy enough to stay awake until...wait for it...11pm if you can believe it!), and we planned to return to the bus station before then to be there when our ride showed up, as we couldn't buy tickets in advance. We exited the station to look for a taxi, and were herded by a fragile looking older gentleman (who couldn't have been in his right mind) towards his one person bike-buggy. Held together by rubber bands, this little "carriage that could" had an unintentional sun roof due to what looked like centuries of wear and tear on the canvas roof. I asked repeatedly, "Are you sure?" while pointing to the size of our derrieres combined. Thankfully, he wasn't deterred, and the monkey temple was only a few kilometers away.

We made it to our destination, and a handsome young gentleman of no older than 8 years was waiting to greet us. "Bodyguard!" he offered repeatedly. We hired him and his bamboo stick, not knowing that we'd actually need them both. We pulled out a bag of cereal to show him what we'd brought to feed the monkeys, and he proceeded to chow down himself while waving his bamboo to traffic as we crossed the road to the temple. We hadn't even approached the gate before the monkeys swarmed around us, interested in nothing but food. Far from shy, they didn't hesitate for one second to jump on our legs, back, shoulders, or head, sometimes several at a time. It took a little getting used to (and by that I mean several panic attacks were had). We finally made our way into the temple, exploring the ancient ruins while watching several groups of monkeys picking bugs out of others' fur and whatnot. I had finally gotten used to the little jokers and started welcoming them onto my shoulder until one of them got too comfortable. Deciding that the cereal wasn't good enough, he went for my bling and stole one of my earrings right out of my dadgum ear. After pillaging through my backpack and any other belongings he could get his little fingers on, we decided to empty what was left of the cereal (which was not much due to "bodyguard") and move along.

The Monkey Temple


 Already feeling the monkey love before even entering the temple gates!


 No interest in me whatsoever. Food is the priority. I can't say I don't understand...


 Bodyguard going to town on our cereal


 This is a terrible yet hilarious picture of me with 4 monkeys chillin' on my back, and one doing a backflip off of me. I couldn't resist sharing it with you. 


"Show me the goods and we'll talk..."

We went to find lunch, and along the way found monkeys crawling all over the rest of the town (almost creepily). Since we didn't know the town very well and had trouble finding a decent place to eat, when we saw KFC, we settled for it. It just so happened that two kind-hearted Belgian gentleman (both professional orchestra musicians, and now also in law school) had the same plan, so they joined us for the meal. We exchanged travel stories, admired their French accent, and decided to make a day of it. We left the navigating to Bernard and Adrian, who led us to the wat ruins. We stopped there for a while to just enjoy the sunset and conversation. Surrounded by ancient pillars and the most intriguing company, we watched the moon take the sun's place.



The gentlemen bid us goodbye, and they departed on their train back to Bangkok. Little did we know the two of us would be back several hours later. The bike-buggy was nowhere in sight, so we decided to be frugal and walk despite our less than journey-appropriate shoes. We explored some of the night markets around the bus station in attempt to pass the time before our night bus arrived, but to no avail. We still ended up having nearly a couple of hours of bench-sitting at the station. We hadn't found a bathroom all day long, so it was imperative that we did so before our bus ride home. We ran to the 7-Eleven to beg for use of their loo, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand I'm guessing that's when Thailand's first EVER bus to arrive early made its appearance. Yes. We missed it. We missed our one chance of getting home in even the slightest of comfortable ways. One more bus came afterwards, and they turned us down, not even letting us sit in the floor. At the height of our frustration, our guardian angel in the form of a sweet 18 year old boy named Nye approached us and asked, "Where you go?" Relieved to hear English, we quickly explained our problem. He made a quick call and discovered our option to get home was by train. We thanked him, but he insisted on giving us a ride. You'll think us crazy to have accepted such an offer, but we trusted our instincts. He and his father drove us (in style, I might add--he drove a 2013 BMW with flat screens in the back of the headrests) back to the train station where we'd left our Belgian gentleman friends earlier and bought us a ticket. By a stroke of luck, the train was pulling up just as we were handed our tickets. I had enough time to pull Nye into a giant hug of gratitude and be on my merry way.

The next 6 hours were filled with the most interesting of seat partners. Thankfully, there were a couple of gentlemen who offered their seats up to us. We graciously accepted, and then found the price to be their staring at us for the remainder of the ride. 47 stops, nostrils full of pollution (due to rickety old open windows) and many cases of whiplash later, we arrived in our sweet Uttaradit in the wee small hours of the morning, and proceeded to sleep for the next 12 hours. This threw us terribly off of our elderly sleep schedule. Wooooooorth it.

I just wanted to share this with you, Fab Five, because I realized I usually share the big picture rather than the little adventures in between. And the little adventures always seem to make for the best memories. Excuse me while I go make as many more as possible before I leave (and also leave time to mourn over my stolen earring--it was such a good one!). I don't have much time left here, and I can't even go into detail about it now because I will surely break down in tears. For now, I'm going to do my best to try not to blink...