ERAWAN BLISS

We walk down the dusty road, pothole marred and lined with vegetation beaten down by the dry season. The village is small, rural and dominated by the monastery and minions of Buddha placed throughout the hills. The bulk of the population seems to be either canine or monk. Near the temple a tree stands by itself, providing shade for the temple guardian, a small monkey who watches over the grounds and fends off evil spirits. In the tree a monkey-house has been constructed to provide sanctuary from either blazing heat or pouring rain. The monkey has the most important job in the village.

We are going to a soccer match. Not to watch, but to start it up. We had acquired a ball during the trip from Bangkok, something to keep ourselves busy and active during various stops along the way for food or toilet breaks. It was now the most shiny, new and fun-creating item in the village. We kicked it along the road as we moved towards the school, attracting stares and interest. Soon the village knew where we were going and word spread like wildfire.

The school is the center of activity and the villagers have gone to great lengths to maintain a quarter sized soccer field out front. Upon arrival we had to jockey for dominance with the local cow herd which had meandered onto the field to help “mow.” Unfortunately they had also left behind steaming bovine paddies which were scattered across the field like land mines. After clearing the mowers we began to kick the ball around and weave between the dangers with tender attention. Many of our players went barefoot, and many a player got a squishy surprise between their toes or slide tackled into a smear of excrement.

The game slowly starts, first only us foreigners (know as Ferangs) were stupid enough to brave the late afternoon heat, but soon the eyes which had tracked us down the road began to materialize into able and excited bodies, ready to get involved in the game. Before long we have a full on soccer match raging, our smallest player coming in at 4 years old and the oldest one probably being myself at 27. People zipping by on scooters or bikerx stop and before long the whole village knows of the crazy Ferangs playing soccer in the heat and cow shit.

The game battles on and we all end sweaty and laughing at our predicaments. I come away bloody from sliding into a gravel patch, my buddy comes away covered in yellow, green cow excrement highlighted by half digested grass fibers and everyone leaves happy.

Erawan National Park is an amazing place, just outside of Kanchanaburi, Thailand it includes a number of impressive cave systems and an incredible multi tiered water fall. We spent a few days basking in sheer Thailand bliss. Food cooked fresh and bursting with flavor and spice good times with the generosity and conditionless compassion of the locals. We bushwhacked through the jungle to the top of a mountain, dodged giant bat-eating cave snakes, fended off mosquitoes and scorpions and helped out our friends with crops and landscaping. We guarded our vitals against marauding thieving monkeys who tried to steal our lunches, mucked through murky swamps that smelt of carcass and re-discovered the elusive “Joe Banky Shit Cave” of IVS lore. Nowhere inundates you more quickly into Thailand than this part of the country. We would be traveling far and wide, into some regions far from comfortable, but as a microcosm, Erawan is the Thai’s Thailand. Village life is largely simple, healthy life. It is an amazing pace of life.

BRAIN OVERLOAD AND IMPENDING DOOM

Bangkok, Thailand

Sitting looking out my window over the roof-scape of the structures below, I am reminded of youth. I remember distinctly the same view 10 years ago when I was fresh and scared, excited and full of wonder. That view was one of my first in Thailand and was one of my first international moments. Now I look over the same roofs and wonder how I got here? How has this world turned 365 x10 times, 3650 revolutions since I last saw this? What has changed? What is the same? Are the differences going to be within me or within Asia? I think both.

I feel strong. Good. Ready to be in a position of responsibility, ready to approach this job with correctness and draw the distinction between work and vacation. It is interesting to feel comfortable here because frankly I do now know this place well anymore. The last time I was here I was 17, however I do feel able to travel with confidence. Who knew that aimlessly rambling and popping out the other side still alive could be turned into a salable asset, that travel hours logged can make you marketable? I don’t feel confident about Thailand, but I do feel comfortable in Thailand. I feel ready to take it on without crippling nervousness in a position of semi-authority.

This entrée already deserves a borage of knocking on wood. Ultimately writing about my current optimism will of course guarantee hard times to come. That is the way of the world, the world of my luck. I know down the road there will be troubles, hard times, confusing situations and moments when I feel inadequate. Those entrees will also have to be written and when I look back on the rosy writing of today I will surely laugh. Well hopefully.

I love the bright and wide eyes of the students. It is incredible and empowering to see their mentality and outlook change right in front of me. I see connections made, assumptions shattered, questions formed and questions resolved. In many ways it feels like watching a child develop. Never is a brain as busy as when it is subjected to new environments and surroundings. Traveling is literally the fastest way to make new connections within the brain, it is a biological fact that not since infancy when the human brain is truly like a sponge, can the brain develop as rapidly as when abroad and stimulated. There is no other way to learn so much so quickly. The standard and formal paradigms of education fall to the wayside as a traveler begins to learn with all senses at once . No longer is information transmitted solely through words on a page interpreted through eyesight and translated for the brain to process. Instead holistic over-stimulation smashes into the cerebral as sounds, smell, touch, sight, taste and emotion transmit new information simultaneously.

It is excitement. It is the greatest hit. It is what all travelers ultimately come back for. I can watch it in my students and I can feel in brewing within myself. Bring on the confusion!!!!

Bangkok

The beginning of this adventure has come and gone. Only now, nearly a month into my travels have I had the time and quietness of mind to sit down and write. The old struggle between committing time to stop, breath, slow down and reflect on my experiences and continuing to go out and accumulate new stories is once again playing tug –o-war with my conscious. It is times like these that I usually cut and run, leave the weeks old adventure in the dust and move on to relate the more visceral, the more tangible adventure of yesterday and today. But I will try to rewind, simply because there is too much to tell and maybe, with luck I can cover enough to get me back to the present.

Arrival into Thailand was like finding myself in a reoccurring dream, a place familiar but fleeting, a place that I knew well but was unable to decipherer the legend in my own mind from the true experiences of years gone by. The feeling of deep déjà vu ran through me like a train, everything so similar but just different enough to question whether it was Thailand myself that had changed over the past 10 years. Ultimately it has been little of both.

The Shanti Lodge is a place of refuge. Quietly tucked away in the Tewet district of Bangkok it constantly bustles while remaining homely. The open aired hallways hang thick with vegetation, the kitchen is constantly emitting delectable smells of gingery, garlic, Thai-succulance and Thai massage is gloriously relaxing the inhabitants. It was there that I rediscovered into the depth of my connection to Asia for the again, there that I ran into old friends for the first time and there I realized that not only did I remembered Asia, but Asia remembered me.

The staff at the Shanti Lodge became good friends of mine during my first tour of Thailand in 2000 and now, more than ten years down the road many of the same smiling faces greeted me. One of the most striking things about Thailand is the apparent health of the people both mentally and physically. Immediately upon arrival our students reported feeling healthier than ever, that a weight have been lifted from their shoulders and that even in smoggy Bangkok an aura of good living was contagious. Indeed many of my acquaintances here look exactly the same if not younger. The resilience of the Thai’s is amazing; aging with grace is a inspiring thing to behold first hand.

Bangkok is a fascinating city. We started with a temple tour, heading from the Shanti Lodge through the bustle of the riverside market which crawls with live fish, meter long eels, snails, toads, chickens, spices, drying meet, stray dogs and peddlers of every variety. We made our way slowly, swimming through the smells until we finally arrived at the Chao Phraya river. Bangkok has been called the Venice of Asia and its intricate system of waterways provided the original public transportation for the city. River Taxi’s have operated efficiently and reliably for centuries as the city has grown around them into a tangled mass of traffic jams and high rises. There is no way quicker, more interesting nor more direct than utilizing the carp infested canal systems to get where you are going. And it is not secret: the river itself is jammed with all manner of boats and random rigs. Barges pushed massive piles of trash to unknown destination, “rooster tail” boats with their converted four cylinder car engine outboards zip around in chaos and near collisions and the ferries diligently bump and grind their way from stop to stop. The biggest danger is getting your arm caught between the boat and the tire lined piers as the taxi snaps into place off the lassoed spring lines.

First stop the grand and majestic Wat Po, home to the largest reclining Buddha in Thailand. As always the magnitude of the Buddha is breathtaking and I was immediately reminded of the significance of religion to art throughout the ages. Regardless of creed it is impossible to dismiss the resources put into art by faith worldwide. Throughout the time it has been through the lens of religion (or narcissism disguised as piety) that has prompted humanities most precious works of art and architecture. Whether at the Vatican, the Taj Mahal, Angor Wat, Manchu Pichu, Chichen Itzá, the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Acropolis or a native village on the west side of Vancouver Island, religion is the original benefactor of artistic expression. Nowhere is this more apparent than Bangkok which houses at least one elaborate temple in every neighborhood and contains a total of 450 Buddhist temples city wide.

After a tour of Wat Po and the intricacies of the temple complex we crossed the river again to visit the historically significant temple of Wat Arun. Built in Khmer style and constructed when the center of power was moved from Ayuthia to Bangkok by Rama I, Wat Arun was originally created to house the Emerald Buddha, on of the most sacred relics of early Thai/Khmer history. It is said that whoever controls the Emerald Buddha controls power over the Thai Kingdome. The effigy now rests safely at the Royal Palace in Bangkok after a long and adventuresome tour of the world via pirates, marauders and traders.

Although no longer housing the Buddha, Wat Arun still stands tall, a testament to the initial push towards Thai nationalism and the consolidation of governmental power in Bangkok.

After a day in the sweltering heat it was all about street food and Bananan Lassi’s whipped to a cool refreshing froth. The first day is the craziest day, simply in the fact that time becomes so relative. In new and stimulating surroundings your brain can process more information in one day than it does in a week in your comfortable abode back home. The brain is literally creating twice the connections as normal and “growing” at twice the normal rate. It is for this reason that when my head finally hit the pillow that first night it felt that I had been going for a week.

In the far Northeast of Portland lies a derelict, rundown and forgotten warehouse. Although it is just one of the many abandoned industrial complexes which line the industrial zones of Portland's riverbanks, this one draws a special crowd.  Aptly named Pirate Town,  the building has drawn Portland's illicit citizens to its grounds, offering a haven of lawlessness. Just as buccaneers of old were outcast renegades, Portland's underbelly have flocked to this derelict paradise for counterculture expression. No police presence is to be found and anyone who want to do their business away from the public eye has found Pirate town's shelter. Underage drinkers, crack smokers, vandals, artists, skateboarders and the homeless all take their piece, sharing the autonomy of its removedness. 

A decaying fortress of concrete, every inch from the  dingy, haunted basement to the burned out roof are covered in graffiti, displaying work from some of the city' most prominent street artists. Along with the painting, another type of art is thriving. That of the renegade skate ramp, illegal missions of forming and pouring, of creating skateable space out of our concrete covered world. Renegade projects are blossoming around Portland, a tradition started with the grass roots skatepark project under the burnside bridge in the early 1990's and continuing daily. Portland's skaters have never shied away from mudding up some impromptu tranny and Pirate town provided the perfect canvas: abandoned, away from the public and full of crazy motherfuckers.

Within the warehouse ramps have been constructed, transforming space which was considered valueless to larger society into a location of limitless creativity for the skateboarder. Anything

which could be scavenged has been thrown in the transitions, railroad ties, rocks, chunks of pipe and pieces of trash can all be seen poking out from the expertly finished surface. 

For reinforcement chain-link fences were bent into transitions, providing not only stickable surface for the concrete but also adding the strength of steel into the tranys.

Rumor has it that the Burside boys themselves laid down the transitions and the place definitely has a ruggedly professional 

feel. Everything is built using minimal materials and maximum scavengability, but it is also built proper. Tranys are good, the surface is smooth and the only real issue is clearing out all of the debris, glass, rocks, dust and gravel from the flat-bottom. Even the unruly have respect however and a broom which looks like it has swept one to many ramps is left on sight to clear out the wreckage which accumulates between the two sides. 

 Town is a gem of renegade skatespots. If you can find it, respect it and be thankful to those who put in the sweat and time to create a space for everyone.

Christopher Shauger and I rolled out on a sunny afternoon to check out the new Gabriel Skatepark in Portland. Located at SW 45th and Vermont St., the first impression is that it was another waste of public funding. No coping can be found around about half of the transition and the main bowl looks like a throwback to 1970's parks or the old Whiterock park in British Colombia. Everything is rollie and the site is baking hot, not a breath of shade available anywhere. Outside the main bowl the "snake runs" and "pump humps" are pretty useless. They are tight and fling you with excessive speed which  the little two foot transitions can't  handle. The snake run dumps you right out into a dirt patch. The "wallride" could potentially be really fun, but to access it you have to push uphill which limits its versatility.

However, after a few runs within the main part of the park it becomes apparent that the designers did in fact know what they were doing.  Although the course lacks tons of coping, the rollable banks make it easy to pick up speed anywhere in the park. There are actually plenty of lines to be had and the pool-like coping grinds like butter (with a little added concrete squeal). 

Although the park may not be as multifaceted as some, for what it is, Gabriel offers a good time for sure and it is great to have something skateable in SW.

 

My first day entering the blogosphere, and later today a mission to Battleground. Spot checks coming soon