Yak Hat
Operation Yak Hat
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Operation Yak Hat was our first overseas mission under the Thundercat Events banner. Team Yak Hat made our way to Thailand where we prepared for our overland trip to Cambodia and Vietnam. With help from the “Thundercat 1: Frankie Says Relax” party, we were able to visit 5 orphanages and 2 special needs schools bringing them food, clothing, school items and toys. The entire adventure lasted a month, here are the stories.
Man who walk sideways out of plane…
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.” – Mark Twain
Khao San Road, Bangkok, Thailand. 10:30am. Ten hours of planes, two temazepam, one stop over, two taxis, three beers and thirty four degrees. Welcome to sleep deprivation hell. The first tout to approach us never knew how close to being punched in the liver he got as we stood like a poster ad for stupid foreigners that radiate cash; backpacks on, Lonely Planet open, scratching our heads and expressions on our faces like the one you have when you get hit in the temple by a flying bottle at a rock concert.
Somehow, some way, I managed to check my steaming cow-pat of a mood and spoke to the tout. He asked where we were from, a question we would learn to embrace with the utmost patience for the next month, and I replied “Australia”. The man replied with yet another gem we would now need to accept with a smile and faux-chuckle in generous quantities, “Ah, Australia! GEDAY METE!” “Yes, g’day mate” we said. “HA HA HA HA YES! GEDAY METE!” I guess it’s better than “Ah, Australia! A DINGOW ATE CHYA BAYBEY!”
Then the tout did something that still perplexes me to this day… he helped us. He told us that the police station was just to our right and if we go in there, they will show us the better places to stay. We did, expecting “the catch” to severely violate our pockets at any second. The police lady inside the station could see the Watership Down-esque expressions on our faces and took pity upon us; she politely walked us outside, pointed across the road and 30 meters down from the entrance to Khao San Road to a little alley.
She was right; the Sawasdee Guest House was an oasis in a cesspool of smelly Pepsi Max adventurers with ZZ Top beards and dreads, touts, hawkers, pickpockets, drunk 17 year old Australians wearing SAME SAME shirts, drunk 50 year old Poms wearing polo’s, drunk 60 year old Frenchmen wearing 17 year old Thai girls, all trying to talk to you or push past you at the same time. We checked in, ordered a large tiger, Redbull bucket and a hookah full of apple shisha and started planning our month-long adventure.
Wat?
You herd.
I’ve always loved the concept of Buddha. Big chubby fella with a huge grin on his face and a bald head you can rub when you are feeling down. Even if it isn’t magic, the thought you are rubbing his bald head and that silly grin on his face is highly infectious on a scale somewhere between chicken pox and Japanese cartoon franchises, and you can’t help but feel silly too, the fallout of which is an upside-down frown on your face. Wat Pho and the Reclining Buddha are different. He seems happy, and he’s lazing about like a proper Buddha should, and does with the utmost efficiency.
Considering he’s been almost 200 years in the same spot, and has the oldest Thai massage university at his feet, I would say he has mastered the art of lazing about. But he’s not fat, or silly, or bald, and if you touched his head… Well, let’s say he would be the lesser holy one of the two of you. You would not even get a chance to savour the bitter-sweet taste of wisdom from retrospect. For the perspicaciously absent, it means you would be shot on the spot, if the locals don’t get you first.
But what he lacks in lumpy stature and silly baldy luckiness, he makes up with pure superlative-inducing majesty. If one were asked to describe it in one word that word would be “don’t ask me such a stupid question”. And the Big Fella isn’t the only thing oozing visual supremacy, either. The entire complex of Wat Pho (or for the Thai-savvy and correct-o-wankers among us; Wat Phra Chetuphon) is astonishing, and quite rightly a UNESCO listed site.
As we walked into the complex, we removed our flip-flops/jandals/thongs/pluggers depending on where you come from, let’s call them “flajandaluggongs” to keep everyone happy… As we removed our flajandaluggongs and placed them in the “Thais Only” section of the flajandaluggong storage area, along with a wink and a thumbs up to the suspicious securiwat Buddha guard, I had a thought; What would happen if I just ran past this guy with my flajandaluggongs still attached firmly and flailing, flailing flajandaluggongs that is to say, all the way to the other end while singing “Karma Chameleon” and around the building as fast as I could back to the spot where you take off your flajandaluggongs and give the securiwat Buddha guard your ticket stub where I would be waiting, flajandaluggongless, ticket afore?
No, I didn’t do it, and no I don’t want tuk-tuk.
Purchasing the Dragon.
Beer and Clothing in South Asia
Shopping in Bangkok is the closest any shopaholic will come to the feeling of having an orgasm on heroin in a Golden Fleece cloud held by care bears while sipping bubble tea and singing “kumbayah” in an air-conditioned room made from marshmallows and pixy burps on a long weekend in summer. A man tells you the price of a t-shirt you fancy, you quickly pull out your calculator and convert the sheep-noise currency to your native shrapnel and come up with 20 cents. “Half that” you say, “20c is ridiculous for this Versace shirt made of cotton more durable than the genuine article!” “No, no!” he says, “You pay my price that good price see nice shirt” Then you tell him he’s dreaming and walk off. “OK, OK, no problem!” and you have yourself a new 10 cent Versace shirt. Then you walk past a pad thai cart and the smell pulls you back like a dog leash tied to a tree, it smells like two coconuts had a baby with a spice factory and in the process got tangled in a web of noodles while having a fight with a cooked chicken. It is, to put it into one word, divine. Whoever invented this dish was a saucy individual in more ways than one.
After paying 30 Versace shirts worth of sheep cash for your mouthgasm you saunter toward a bar while your forehead drips like a leaky faucet made of sponge in heat that only ozone can defy. You sit, light a Marlborough light, and order a big Tiger. Tiger beer, as we discovered in Singapore later, was created by some thirsty gentlemen in South East Asia, one hundred thousand years ago, who convinced Heineken and F&N soft drinks to create a beer that not only got you drunk, but refreshed you, like water can for example. To this day the logo retains the “e” in the Heineken font as a tribute to its heritage, and the “i” is printed as a “1” to, well, say they are #1 I guess. I believe the “g” is also made to look like the lucky number 8 as well, but I could go on about beer all day, and I’m digressing. 1 Tiger, 2 ciggies and 3 touts later the guy across the street who I gave $100 baht deposit has returned with the copy of Windows XP Plus that I am currently using to write this to you, as we all know Windows Vista sucks badly, especially when your laptop sucks badly which makes Vista suck even more badly because the two implode on each other fighting over the resources neither of them have to offer.
Today was much like this, exactly like this to be more precise. The t-shirt selection in Bangkok is like someone went through all the t-shirts in the world, threw out the popped-collar salmon coloured ones first then all the other rubbish ones, then put the rest in Khao San Road, Bangkok. You pretty much laugh from one end of the street to the other. There is a really funny guy sitting in a dungeon somewhere in Thailand being fed fairy bread and marijuana cookies, alco-pop drinks and Vietnamese coffee (don’t get me started) with a pencil and five 4 foot tall men with fake Gucci underwear and AK-47s surrounding him, creating these diamonds. I’m positive of this. I have bought my friend one of Bruce Lee doing the thing he does before he is all over you like a spider monkey, with the caption “Fuck you round eyes”. It’s comically perfect. I’m also surprised my new copy of Microsoft Word has spelling-underlined “round eyes”, considering its source.
Tomorrow morning, Shorty and I leave for Siam Reap, Cambodia. We have not booked any tour busses or flights, we have decided to do it Pepsi Max style, and attempt one of the world’s trickiest (yet less violent of late) border crossings. Tonight will be packing, and planning.
Wild Wild East, Part 1.
Or “How to not have a relaxing, carefree holiday. Now, get in and shut up.”
If there is a place in the world you have ever been, where you wish you never had, and would never go again, but god damn it you were so high on adrenalin that it was worth every second, then crossing the border from Aranya Prathet, Thailand through to Poipet, Cambodia would be it. It started with Shorty’s mobile phone playing Justin Timberlake’s “Sexy Back” in my ear at 4am on Friday. I had drunk a little the night before, as you do in Bangkok, and JT’s jingle wasn’t on my list of things to experience at that time, nor was being awake. I switched it off, kissed Shorty good morning and hit the shower. We had a tuk-tuk to grab to Morchit Bus Station by 5:30am. Today we were going to Siam Reap, Cambodia. The planning that went into this leg of the trip was immense, no detail was left out. We researched, re-researched, and re-re-researched the crossing until we had it in point form on a piece of paper and in our heads.
The bus to Aranya Prathet on the Thai border was pretty uneventful and we slept most of it. It cost around 207 baht each, which is about $8, for a first class coach with no stops and a plastic wrapped piece of bread with sugar and butter on it. Bargain. In 4 and a bit hours we made it. This is where the fun started. There are a few scams you have to get past when going from Thailand to Cambodia via this route. The first one is when you get off the bus and 70 people want to carry your backpack to the tuk-tuk 5 meters away. Then the tuk-tuk driver takes you not to the border, but to his mates who are waiting near the Cambodian Consulate which is about 4 clicks from the actual border crossing. They tell you they can organize your visa from the Consulate and after a few hours hanging out with them while one runs to the consulate to get it, and a few thousand baht later, you have a visa. If you’re lucky.
Our driver pulled over and I knew what was up thanks to our heavy research. A little guy came over and asked for our passports and said we won’t get through otherwise. I said no, we’ll walk from here as I’ve crossed the border 6 times before (calling his bluff and lying through my teeth). The dumbarse then said “Well if you have crossed 6 times then you know that isn’t the border, it is consulate.” Zing, he knew he fucked up. I looked at the tuk-tuk driver and he knew exactly what to do; drive us to the border like we asked or don’t get paid. At the real border we were swarmed by people, we put our heads down and walked into the Thai departure office. I had planned also for this swarming. The swarm mostly consists of extremely cute kids who are highly trained experts at parting you with the contents of your pocket. My pocket contained three pieces of paper about the size of a US dollar note, each with the word “naughty” written on it. When we reached the departure office they were all missing. Bless. We joined the “Foreigners” line like the sign told us and were through in no time. There is a funny little no-man’s land between both borders. An expanse of Wild Western style dusty streets with wilder and dustier people walking around in it, with two massive casinos on each side. This is where Thais come to squander all the hard earned baht away.
On the other side we walked up to the Cambodian immigration window, to the left were about 50 seats all full of people with disgruntled looks on their faces. Shorty was told to stand outside as she, obviously being a woman, was incapable of handing a passport to a man who is incapable of fathoming Shorty being capable of handling his incapabilities. So I stepped forward with hers and my own passports in hand. A Cambodian Police officer on the outside of the window said to me “2000 baht” which translates roughly to US$40. Above him in English that is easier to read than a Dick & Jane book is a sign saying “Tourist Visa = US$20, Business Visa = US$30”. I looked at the sign, then back at the officer and with my brain trying to tell my mouth he had a Glock 17 pistol holstered to his waist said in a (completely fake) confident and clear voice “It says US$20 up there, not 2000 baht.” He replied, a little more firmly “No, no accept US dollar here, only baht, 2000 baht.” This was absolute rubbish. The Cambodian Riel has dived so deeply into invaluability that the Cambodians have literally adopted the US dollar as a currency and use the Riel for change when something (rarely) drops under US$1. They have contempt for Thailand and do not accept baht anywhere in the country. I pulled out the single US$50 note I had stashed in my Pacsafe bumpack, held it up and said “Well that’s unfortunate as all I have is this and I need 2 visas.” He waved me through to the window.
At the window the high ranking officer sat with a coffee, a cigarette burning away in an ashtray, and a pile of passports sitting next to his gun on a table. He leaned close and took our passports then said “100 baht and I will make fast for you.” I had pushed things far enough at this point, so I handed him 100 baht with a look on my face that explained quite clearly to him how much distaste I have for the current situation and his actions within it. He put my passports on the pile and waved me off. I stood back, lit a cigarette and watched. He finished his smoke and coffee in a relaxed way, laughing with the other officers in the small dinky little office. They occasionally looked outside, then continued their humorous banter. After about 5 minutes he turned to the passports, opened Shorty and mine, licked a stamp and stuck them in. He waived me back and passed them to me, then waived me off, all while continuing his fantastically funny recountings to his comrades. We walked past the disgruntled non-100 baht-paying 50 and jumped into an association (nice word for taxi mafia) taxi.