Or Sawatdee Bee Mai Thai. A friend and I joined droves of others on Khao San road Saturday night, the eve of Sangkran. We had just stepped out of a taxi when a passerby initiated me by cupping my face with her plaster-covered hands. “Happy new year!” Minutes later we were lost in the throng, at the mercy of better-armed revelers with their buckets of water, spray guns and bowls of plaster. After a while of strangers smearing our faces with the white concoction, we escaped down a side street and bought a banana crepe and mango with sticky rice and coconut milk, a popular Thai dessert that will make you fall in love with this country. Oh, how I love all the street food. An article in the Bangkok Post today reported that sidewalk vendors on Khao San road could be losing millions of baht because their food is too soaked to sell. Songkran was not always such a chaotic spectacle. Even just a decade ago, so I hear, it was still limited to the gentle sprinkling of water on others to symbolically wash away the bad. Now it’s almost impossible to not participate unless you hermit yourself away for a few days. Plaster has been added to the hysteria because monks use it to mark blessings.So my opinion of Songkran now that I’ve experienced it? One day is a blast, but half a week is overkill. I met a friend for a movie yesterday. I arrived dry only because I paid for a cab door-to-door and hid behind a wall when I saw people with arsenal. He chanced the skytrain and sat in wet(tish) clothes picking at dried plaster. This morning I thought it was safe to go out for breakfast because the neighborhood was eerily quiet, but from behind a tree appeared a sweet-looking girl smiling broadly as she poured a bucketful of ice water down my shirt. My favorite coffee stand owner, Pii Tom, has poured some fine cups of java only to have them instantly diluted. But in the typical easy Thai way, he just laughs and picks up his own gun. Which is really about all you can do. Which is why in this afternoon's sweltering heat, I borrowed his gun and got some good laughs at my unsuspecting victims--and was thankful when a group of kids returned the favor.
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After thought: Sorry for not giving you more pictures. I brought my pocket camera in a plastic bag, but was too afraid to take it out around all the action. You can view more on Google images if you're curious.
