Two for the Road, page 26
FOURTEEN
THAILAND
23 January – 16 February 2004
Shirley: Our hotel provides a shuttle service to the airport and the driver is happy to drop us off at the international cargo section. Before we can get out of the car, a man jumps into the front seat, says he’s from customs, takes our bill of lading for the bike and directs us to follow him. He leads us into a building teeming with people and tells us to wait. He comes back with the news that it will cost 10,000 baht to get the bike out of customs. That’s more than $300!
Brian: I immediately smell a rat. It is now clear he is a customs agent and not a customs official. I tell him 10,000 is too much so he drops the price immediately to 7000, without any argument. I still don’t agree and tell him I want to see the paperwork with costings. He then tells me I have to pay 3000 up front and the rest when we come back at 2 p.m. after his lunch break! He doesn’t want to give us a receipt so there is no way he is getting any money up front.
One of his minions ferries me to the Thai airlines freight centre, where an official tells me everything is in order: ‘Come back after 2 p.m.’
While we wait for all the airport workers to have their lunch, we check out what others have paid for the same process. The going rate seems to be 2000 baht. I resolve to pay this guy for his services and do the rest myself, or bargain a reasonable rate. Looking at the mayhem at the freight centre, Shirl is very keen on the second option and I tend to agree with her, but I’m not going to let this shyster rip us off.
At one o’clock, we head back to the airport early, and find Mr Smooth has all the customs paperwork lined up. I walk straight past him into the customs hall and then go back to him. I don’t actually talk to anyone in the customs hall, but he doesn’t know that. I start by telling him I know he is trying to rip us off and that I will not put up with it. I am prepared to pay him a reasonable fee but no more. If that is not good enough, I’ll take all my paperwork and do it myself. I tell him that I will be generous and pay him 3000 baht. We eventually settle for 3200, which is still a bit over the odds, but not much. He does not look happy, but bad luck – he knows he has been caught out.
The Bangkok cargo hall is frantic, with people running in all directions and crates of all sizes being carted around on forklifts. When we finally get to talk to a real customs official, he tells us they don’t need to sign the carnet to prove we will export the bike. We just have to fill in a form promising not to sell the bike.
Our crate appears on the forklift and we are horrified to see that there is a hole punched through the side and the left side handlebar is sticking out. I gingerly break away some ply-wood and am relieved to find no real damage, and the bike is still standing upright. A worker produces a claw hammer and proceeds to break open the crate. A crowd gathers on the other side of a fence. There’s nothing like an audience in the hustle and bustle of a freight terminal to ensure you lose vital screws or drop things in your haste.
There is very little air in the tyres and we wobble the bike through the exit gate to a petrol station just outside. We fuel up and ask for air, but we are told the nearest air pump is about 2 km away. We wobble off again and I put the hazard lights on as cars and trucks whiz past us. We pull into the next station and a nice man pumps up the now-very-hot tyres to the right pressures.
With a couple of illegal U-turns and scraping the right-hand pannier against a concrete barrier we make our way to the hotel. There is no real damage and it takes an hour or so to get the bike back in the condition it should be.
Shirley: Without Brian’s sense of direction, I wonder how far we would have got. Even when I have the map, he has a better idea of where we should be heading. With a couple of wrong turns and a major U-turn on a freeway, we finally get to Kanchanaburi and the River Kwai. The roads here are modern, well-maintained and the drivers tend to obey the road rules. It’s a huge difference from the ones we’ve travelled in recent months.
River Kwai is infamous for the Death Railway bridge, part of the Burma Railway built by the Japanese during World War II using prisoners of war, many of them Australian. What spans the river today wasn’t built by the POWs, but has been reconstructed using the original curved sections of the bridge, retrieved after the war ended. It is a narrow railway bridge, with small aisles along the edge. Its looks belie its brutal beginnings.
There are more Japanese here than tourists of any other nationality. This doesn’t surprise us, but we wonder what they know about the atrocities that occurred here during the war. I am sure they are here to commemorate the soldiers killed in the allied bombings, but their understanding of the rest of the history of the railway would be very different from ours.
We walk over the bridge. I’m not comfortable with heights, and the fact that I can see the river below through the railway sleepers makes this a very unnerving experience. Despite a fairly bad case of the jitters, I manage to get all the way across the river and marvel at what a feat of engineering this was, constructed by men starving to death and fighting disease. It is believed 16,000 allied POWs died building the Thai–Burma railway between 1942 and 1943, and as many as 150,000 locals were forced to work on it. It is a sobering thought. In the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery lie the thousands who died during the construction. The graves of 3000 Dutch soldiers, about 1500 Australians, 1500 Brits, unknown soldiers, a woman and the ashes of 300 men who died from disease at the one time are laid out in neat rows in manicured lawns. Like other war cemeteries we have visited, it is a moving sight. There are more Japanese tourists here and we wonder just what they think happened here during the war. Do they know of the treatment of the POWs and forced labourers?
For the Australian POWs Hellfire Pass, through which the railway was constructed, was hell on earth. The prisoners had to cut through a rock face using only pickaxes and sledge-hammers. To walk Hellfire Pass is an emotional experience. The cutting runs through rock about 15 m thick. Men cutting this using only hand tools and the odd piece of explosive is a staggering thought, especially considering they were half-starved, fighting illnesses, and had no proper medical treatment or adequate food.
This was where they had to work 24 hours a day to finish the railway line on time. It was the twinkling lights that gave it the name Hellfire Pass. At the head of the pass are Australian flags stuck into the rock and a sign saying this was where the ashes of Weary Dunlop, ‘The Surgeon of the Railway’, were scattered. It is an important place in our nation’s history and we are humbled by being here. We walk along the old railway line over the original sleepers. We feel the sharp rocks beneath our boots and imagine what it must have felt like for the men in their handmade sandals and worn-out boots. Lest we forget.
Back in the town, there is a museum displaying life-sized statues of emaciated POWs working on the railway line. A collapsed prisoner is being helped by his mates. It is a moving depiction of what happened every day on the railway. A group of young Japanese tourists clamber into the display and pose for their holiday snaps. They seem annoyed that we won’t move out of the background of the photos. What they don’t realise is that we are deeply offended by their actions. This is not a place of fun. We wonder what kind of reception we would receive if we did something so disrespectful at Peace Park in Hiroshima. Or perhaps we are too sensitive.
I am dreading riding back into Bangkok. I can only imagine how lost we will get. We cross over a bridge on the edge of the city and I can find the bridge on the map. We see the Democracy Monument, which even looks like the drawing on the map! Wonders will never cease. We work out (or should I say I work out) that if we keep going straight and then cross the smaller river and turn right, the hotel should be on our left-hand side. This seems far too simple, but we try it. Within 15 minutes we find the hotel and ride straight into the parking area. This has been the easiest entry into a major capital city to date! Brian is delighted and I am staggered by my own ability. Maybe my map reading is improving at last! (Or it could have been a fluke.)
We’ve come to Bangkok to take part in the Bike Fest. Getting around the city is amazingly easy. We have no trouble finding the start point opposite the Royal Grand Palace, and see golden rooftops and spires towering over the walls. Inside is the Emerald Buddha, but that will have to wait for another day.
Only 500 bikes are permitted in the ride the locals call a ‘caravan’, and, despite the fact that registrations have closed, we are presented with an official registration in exchange for a donation of 1200 baht. For this we get a T-shirt, patch, two stickers, membership pass and instructions. We throw on the T-shirts and become part of the crowd – everyone is wearing their official T-shirt.
We meet bikers from Bangkok and across the world. Many expats have made their homes in Thailand. There is a real sense of camaraderie among the biker community. We are given business cards for everything from tyres to resort hotels, and contacts in the north of the country, Malaysia and Singapore. We meet a bloke who knows someone who knows someone who might be able to help us with shipping the bike to Australia.
The ride itself goes over the city’s elevated roadways, usually off limits to motorbikes. The views are incredible and we really get an idea of the vastness of this city of 19 million people, if you believe the authorities, or up to 30 million, if you believe the cynics.
The marshals keep the whole thing moving smoothly. When we stop for lunch, we are given cold water and cold towels. At the end of a queue is the most delectable Thai meal of chicken curry and rice – all included in the registration fee.
Brian: Chiang Mai and northern Thailand are said to be biker heaven. At a service station on our way there, we meet an Englishman who gives us the name of a bar in the city where expat bikers meet.
Even the road to Chiang Mai is good. Long sweepers and a few hills get the lean angles happening. I maintain 120 km/h and overtake the throttle jockeys in their souped-up utilities and cars that can only go fast in a straight line. It is good fun. Despite the weight, the bike is performing flawlessly today and the better fuel – 95 Ron – is having a positive effect.
Shirley: About 70 km out of Chiang Mai is the Elephant Conservation Centre. Here elephants are bred, old elephants are cared for in comfort, and young ones are trained. Each day they put on a show of work and tricks combined. While some might think the elephants have been turned into performing animals, they seem very happy with their lot and without shows like this at the conservation centre they would be dying off, their natural habitat eroded by human habitation. The elephants bow, run up the flag, drag wood, roll wood with their trunks, pick up wood with their trunks and tusks, play musical instruments and paint. You can buy a painting for 500 baht. We decline.
The temples in Chiang Mai feature golden Buddhas in all shapes and sizes. Here they have a Buddha for each day of the week. The day you are born is your special Buddha. Brian is convinced the reclining Buddha will be mine because of the amount of time I like to sleep, given the chance. He is surprised to learn that we are both ‘Thursday children’ – reclining Buddhas!
At many of the temples, visitors are encouraged to speak to the monks and learn more about Buddhism. Judging by the length of the queues, it is a very popular offer and we can understand why; we have nothing but praise for the Buddhists we have met.
Chiang Mai’s Sax Music Pub is where expats hang out and there’s a group of them there when Brian and I arrive. This place serves cold beer and is packed with friendly people. They all offer good advice on the roads we should take and the places we should stay at. Dave, an Australian who has lived here for years, even produces a map of the Mae Hong Son Loop, a must for all bikers due to its twisting roads and striking scenery.
The road to Mae Hong Son takes us through forested national parks high in the hills on very twisty roads. The road surface is extremely rough in places, but nowhere near as bad as those we travelled on in India and Pakistan. We stop in the town of Pai for an early lunch. This is a backpackers’ town, with cheap food, cheap shopping and dreadlocks and tie-dyed clothes everywhere you look.
In Mae Hong Son, we find the guesthouse recommended by the guys at the Sax Music Pub. It’s right on the lake and next door to a most magnificent wat. Add to this a pub and restaurant within walking distance, and we’ve got it made.
We unload, change into jeans and head back to Nai Soi, a ‘long-neck’ village inhabited by the Karin people from Burma. For centuries the men have placed golden rings around the women’s necks to make them unattractive to marauding tribesmen. The tribe had to flee Burma because they were mistreated by the Myanmar people and still refers to Burma as its home. These people are refugees in their new homeland and are virtually made prisoners in their houses by the Thai army.
The road passes small villages with blue signs depicting a woman with rings around her neck tacked on posts and trees. The soldier on duty at the military base just raises the barrier and waves us through. We get to a river crossing and we remember the advice we received at the Sax Pub: ‘There is a water crossing that’s so deep I had to leave the bike and get a lift with some locals in a truck,’ said Marcus.
‘You should have turned left,’ said Mark. ‘The water is only a few inches deep there.’
Poor Marcus looked very embarrassed.
Sure enough, the water looks pretty deep and there is a lot of algae on the bottom. We remember Mark’s words and turn left to the spillway. It has only a couple of centimetres or so of water on it and we have no problems at all getting across.
The soldiers man the checkpoint outside the village. We have to sign in the visitors’ book before we are permitted to enter the village. Just inside there is a ticket booth – we pay 250 baht and hope that all the money goes to the villagers and not the soldiers.
As we walk through the narrow dirt streets, we look at everyone, wondering when we will see the women and their long necks. When we turn a bend in the road we see many stalls selling handwoven cloth, jewellery and other trinkets. Each one is looked after by a woman with a long neck. We feel very uncomfortable looking at them. It is as though they are exhibits rather than people and we are voyeurs. But we realise that without visitors to the village, they would probably have no income at all. This is their industry.
We get talking to Ma-Nang, a 48-year-old long-neck woman, who looks much older (or am I kidding myself, as I am a year older than her?). She speaks pretty good English and tells us she has four children and is the only one working, selling her fabric and jewellery to visitors like us.
Ma-Nang tells us the rings around her neck weigh six kilos and she wears three kilos of rings on each of her legs. They are never taken off. She also lets us into a secret: the long neck is actually an illusion. The rings force their shoulders down, not stretch their necks. Ma-Nang tells us about her father forcing the rings down onto her shoulders when she was small. It seems brutal.
Life can’t be easy here, where the locals live under 24-hour army guard. The tourists come and go but the big tour groups don’t visit. They go to see tribes further north. Knowing that eking out a living must be difficult, we are happy to buy some of their trinkets.
Brian: As the map suggests, the road south is straighter and the corners are more open than the tight mountain roads yesterday. This feels good. The bike is going very well, the camber of the corners just right. It’s not long before I start scraping my toes on the tarmac. When we turn east, we immediately start a steep climb back into the mountains. Slow trucks and cars are merely a nuisance to us as the bike grunts up the hills. Following a ridge in the mountains the road is mainly good, but we have to beware: sometimes there are landslides that have left very loose dirt right across the road. Hitting one of these on the lean could be disastrous.
Shirley: Homesickness is a problem, so we are like excited kids when we wait at the airport for Frank and Phil to arrive from Melbourne. We met them a few years ago on a bike ride and have become firm friends. Brian says we should hide, but I can’t. As soon as they are close I run to the barrier and wave my arms like a mad thing. We exchange hugs, kisses and tears.
We booked an apartment at Pattaya for a week before we realised the beachside town is famous for its sleazy sex industry. Walking Street is where all the tourists go. It is a sea of neon lights and certainly different from Thailand’s temples. The seafood is great and the cocktails affordable, but it is people watching that makes it interesting.
Pattaya has between 30,000 and 50,000 prostitutes, depending on the time of the season. There are young female and male prostitutes and endless bars. We come across ‘Boys A Go Go’, ‘Amazon Girls A Go Go’, ‘Lucky Girls’ – the list goes on and on. Outside many of the bars, groups of girls are sitting and waiting. There are dancers trying to entice men into the bars and touts trying to haul men off the street. Add to this kick-boxing bouts between local fighters and tourists – just like the old ‘tent shows’ in Australia in the 50s and 60s – in several of the bars and you have the picture. It is an amazing sight.
The saddest part, however, is the number of older men with very young Thai women. They may not be prostitutes in the strict sense of the word, but they are clearly after all they can get from these men. We get the distinct impression that the men think the women love or like them, rather than perceiving them as cash cows. It is depressing and somewhat sordid. And there are young men who seem to come here just for the sex trade. Little wonder HIV-AIDS is a major problem in this area – it’s sad, but it is the way of the world.
The temperature is in the high thirties every day and humidity is high. We manage to fit in a fair amount of shopping in Pattaya between making the big decisions of the day, such as do we go to the beach or spend the day by the pool? Over drinks we must work out which restaurant to eat in. As they say in Thailand: ‘Same, same.’
