And so I have arrived in Bangkok again; 3.5 months after I left Munich. The timing is pretty apt I think. I arrived in Asia one day after the western "New Year" and I'm leaving Asia on the last day of Songkran, the Thai New Year celebrations.

The question is of course: Have I changed? Did all these months travelling through South East Asia affect me? And if so, did they change me for the better? Of course I don't have the answer to that. I think almost noone can say for sure whether he has changed or not before he returns to where he comes from. I think we need the surroundings we know and to see ourselves in those surroundings to be able to reflect whether we still are the same. I suppose I'm not. I mean, I had changed a lot after Sweden and that was far less radical then what I'm doing this time. But I suppose I haven't changed for the worse.

Almost all alone in Bangkok

Bangkok on the other hand is very different from when I was here last! When I arrived here on Jan 2nd, the city was full of tourists, it was even difficult to get a place to stay - unless you wanted to stay in Khao San Road. This time, there are considerably less tourists around and the Suk 11-Guesthouse is almost empty. In January you had to reserve at least a week in advance! Part of this is of course because the high season ended in March. But another part of it is apparently because of Songkran, the Thai New Year celebrations. Apparently the place to go to celebrate Songkran is northern Thailand and so a lot of tourists have gone there. At the same time a lot of locals return home to their families to celebrate so that a lot of shops are closed. I couldn't even get the fake IDs I wanted for Australia (Student-ID, VIP and IYHF-passes)! All the vendors on Khao San Road simply told me: "Come back on 16th". Well, I suppose I'l be able to get them in Singapore just fine.

Norwegian persistence

My last days on Ko Pha Ngan were rather unexciting: I read a lot, spent more time in Internetcafes then I should and went to another Muay Thai class. This time I got to hit and kick my teacher - cool (particularly since Muay Thai is a full-contact sport)! Ingvill and Mari, the two Norwegian girls, have decided to stay on the island until Thursday. Originally they had planned to leave on Saturday evening, but since they didn't manage to wake up before 15.30 they figured they could just as well stay that day - and over Songkran as well for good measure.

Funny shirts and wet pants

Ah yeah, Songkran. What is it anyhow? Well, here the New Year celebrations seem to consist mainly of going to the Wat (of course) to pray, parading Buddhas through the streets and - and this is where it gets interesting - spraying water on strangers for good luck. Of course traditionally you sprayed a few drops of water on a small number of people. But boy, did the invention of plastic change that tradition! I mean, people carry water-pistols and water-guns here that are attached to a 10 liter tank on their back!!! And buckets. Big ones. Some of them so big that you actually can't carry them buthave to have them on the back of your car. Buckets big enough to sleep in Diogenes-style (as my friend Nino did after a birthdayparty of his). In other words: you get soaked! Which, considering that it's more than 30 degrees Celsius in Bangkok, is not at all only negative.

The other thing you apparently do on Songkran is dressing in shirts that immediately make me think of a pacific island belonging to the USA. And the funny thing is: they don't look as bad if everybody is wearing them. I suppose it's a bit like with Zebras. If you have a lot of them, it's very difficult to see the individual members of the group. Of course it's also entirely possible that I don't find these shirts so horrible any longer because I'm wearing one very much like these myself. But I have an excuse (and a rather good one as well): I had a longish relationship-talk with Naja on Ko Pha Ngan (you know, the kind where everybody rants about that his/her lovelife is much worse then everybody elses) and she told me that my problem was that I looked not superficial enough. Now, in my list of awkward compliments, that one went straight to the top. So I told her to go shopping with me and get me a superficial outfit. I returned from the shop with said shirt (various kinds of red with white flowers) and fake, black, lowriding Diesel-shorts that are already starting to fall apart.

Deadly fun - not funny

But enough of that: Unfortuantely Songkran has a negative side as well. Apparently a lot of people die in Thailand but also in it's neighbouring countries because some people find it funny to throw bags of water at motorcyclists who then, surprise, surprise, fall off their bikes. And considering that most people don't wear any helmets a lot of them die! I read in the Bangkokpost yesterday that the number of road accidents on Songkran last year exceeded the number of deaths due to SARS worldwide and still exceeds the official number of civilian casualties in Iraq since fighting began.