It is amazing how quiet Bangkok gets over Thai New Year. The streets are deserted - just the occasional car that passes by. Even the ubiquitous motorcycles seem to have vanished. It is quiet and peaceful. This does not seem like the Bangkok we know. The occasion pickup passes by, filled with water drums and people gaily throwing water at anyone within range.
The morning is spent relaxing in the apartment and we venture out for lunch. It is back to the Hyatt Erawan for some local food at You and Mee. Then, what else to do but head back to the shopping centers. Jacqui still has a number of purchases that she wants to make, so we try to fulfill the outstanding items on the shopping list. We pretty much find everything that we are looking for and Lars, once again, feels like a Sherpa lugging all the stuff back to the apartment. In the later afternoon, Lars goes out to take some pictures of the action (or lack of it) on the streets.
After we have done some packing of our bags, we will be leaving tomorrow, we get ready for another night out on the town in the massive water fight. Our clothes have pretty much dried (not that it matters as they will get wet very soon), except for our sandals so we squeak and squish our way down to the street to find a taxi. We decide to head back down to Patpong.
Once at Patpong, we brave the onslaught of the many ambushes set up alongside the narrow soi and make it to Noi's bar, safe but very wet. Once again, we set up camp here for the evening. After one quick drink and the drenching of a few passersby, we decide to go and get some dinner. We pick a restaurant serving local food one soi over. While it is indoors, good so that we do not get wet while eating, it is freezing in there. The air conditioning is turned up high and we are drenched, so we quickly get a chill. We order our food and eat it quickly, in order to leave the ice box behind. But it has been a nice quiet spot in the storm that rages outside.
You cannot walk a step with out be sprayed or drenched with water. The worst is when they use ice water. Oh, that causes shivers down your back. After roaming around awhile and emptying out our water reservoirs, we head back to Noi's bar to settling in and set up our own ambush.
It is one big street party. There is dancing in the streets. Pick-up trucks drive down the narrow soi and a huge running battle erupts with the people jammed into the tail bed of the truck. It is amazing how much water they seem to have in those old drums (just hope that they did not contain any hazardous materials before they were drafted into this fight).
A trio has even rented a tuk-tuk, placed a drum of water in it and get the driver to cruise the streets as they throw water at everyone they can. But they are very exposed in the open-sided little three-wheeled vehicle and they get soaked in return. As they pass in front of us, a couple of people stand in front, blocking the tuk-tuk from carrying on. Those poor passengers and driver - they must have felt like they were in a massive monsoon.
We stay for the evening until about 2 AM, and then decide to call it a night. We make our way down the soi to the main street to catch a taxi. A long queue is waiting to pick up passengers, but we hail one of the street. The ones standing there never go by the meter and they want to charge an outrageous sum for a 5 minute ride. We would rather pay extra to the guy that uses his meter. We get back to the apartment and head straight into the shower where we undress and take a warm shower to warm ourselves up and to wash away all the powder that has been pasted on us.