I know that time is suppose to fly when you are having fun but the past two weeks seem more like a month. As we return to Bangkok early Friday morning, the Baptist hospitality house seems distant. John Mark and I travel with Dui, Gift, and Dift for our day of tourism and shopping while Granddaddy goes with Preecha and his wife to spend the day with Agan Wan, the former pastor of the Baptist Church in Bangkla who is currently serving as the pastor of the largest church in the country.
The situation in Bangkok over the past several months has been a little dicey. Without going into to much detail, there is a revolutionary group, mostly made up of a rural population, know as the Red Shirts. The two months leading up to our trip riots in the shopping district lead to several people dyeing and several more people being injured. The mood calmed before we left, but we knew there was a slight risk on an incident occurring while we were in the country. We had planned to spend two nights in Bangkok, but on Sunday Red Shirts placed bombs in a shopping building close to where we were when we went to Herbalife our first full day in the country. After one of the bombs went off, killing at least one man, our plans were changed and our time in Bangkok limited. Our first stop of the day will be to the Royal Palace, which is in the safe zone, but to drive there we passed by some of the locations the Red Shirts had been at the months before.
In a country with an excess of Asian architecture displayed in their temples and monuments, the palace is still the most impressive thing I have seen. Dui stays with the car and Gift, Dift, John Mark and I pass the guardhouse filled with armed guards and enter the palace gates. As a student who studies history I want to know the details behind everything, but our time does not permit and my on site study of the limited. Instead I spend my time taking pictures. (By the way I think I have decided to never take a picture of myself in front of something with major historic significance. I may take a picture of the thing that has historical significance, but why would I want ruin good history by putting my fat head in the picture. You all should ascribe to my philosophy as well.) We travel the grounds of the royal palace and I thoroughly enjoy my time there.
When our tour is over we leave the palace and hop on an express boat that takes us to the silk shopping area where John Mark purchases the Thai silk his mother requested. We take a break for lunch (FYI Do not eat steaks in Bangkok) and go to a few more places to by souvenirs for our friends and family. The most entertaining thing about our shopping experience is Gift, who is the master of the price haggle. She goes to work and gets us our souvenirs for cheap. The greatest item purchased was the giant chang (elephant) head that John Mark was able to purchase for 500 BAHT ($15). We take all of our purchases and head to the hotel where we pick up our grandfather and leave our shopping bags and luggage.
For dinner we make the short drive to Dui and Gifts where we enjoy our last Thai meal with the people who have been our best friends on the trip. I have some important information for anyone who thought it was funny that I haphazardly burned my mouth the first full day in Bangkla when I ate the piki nu pepper…I have become master of the piki nu. Yes it is true, over the past two weeks I have conditioned my mouth, stomach, and body to handle the heat of the pepper previously describes as, “A jalapeño, soaked overnight in gasoline, lit on fire, with battery acid poured on top of the entire spicy flame drenched concoction.” To prove to my friends and family sitting at the table that I have mastered the pepper, I take a long red pepper and eat it without a tear, a sinful, or a sip of water. I stared the Satan pepper in the eye and said, “Sure I’ll have another,” without flinching. Everyone laughs as I tell them how impressed they should be of me and Dui is proud of how I handled the spicy food. Before long the night has to come to an end. Dui and Gift drive us back to the hotel and we convince them to let the shuttle take us to the airport in the morning. We all hug and say our goodbyes. I try to hold back my tears but a few fall when no is looking. I will truly miss my friends and count the days until I can see them again. We set the alarm for 3:45am so we can make our 4:30am shuttle. The lights are turned off and we go to sleep in Thailand for the last time.
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