Northwards, again

Although I promised a write-up of the fantastic finale last week, I have learned I do not have the consent of all involved parties to publish the story. I will honor that request, and will only add that it was an episode of high-risk, high-tension, high-energy adventure that belongs in some annal somewhere.

At the moment I am in Phitsanulok, the site of the famous folklore museum with step-by-step instructions on how to smash the testicles of a live bull. Let us step now into the world of serialized re-runs: the current visit to Phitsanulok is simply not very exciting, and I'm in a grouchy mood anyway. So here, from 1999, is the original episode.

PHITSANULOK

We boarded the train North to Phitsanulok. Our plan was to check out the cluster of national parks on Kho Sawai Plateau in the north-central part of Thailand. I waved at the curs in Ayutthaya and the monkeys in Lopburi, and then the sun went down.
We arrived in Phitsanulok very late at night, and wandered uncertainly around town for a long time until we spotted a guesthouse. There were no lights on and no person on duty. We were both sleepy, so we just stretched out under a pagoda. I wrapped myself up in a mosquito net and crashed.
In the morning we wandered around town and had a look at the local museum. We learned that Phitsanulok was the home of a bloodthirsty conqueror named Naresuan. There were statues and pictures of him all over - he sported a very fetching flattop. The museum's primary focus was ethnography, for Phitsanulok had also been the home of primitive people who had left behind copious artifacts. The trap-section was particularly replete: rat traps, snake traps, monkey traps, aquatic porcupine traps, bird traps, and roach traps. It did not say whether all the trapped animals were then eaten. Scott commented that he was ashamed to be a primate when he saw the monkey trap. It consisted of a box with a hole in it, and the trapper would place a treat inside the box. When the monkey reached through the hole and grabbed the treat, he could not then pull his fist through the hole, and waited around for the trapper to come club him upside the head.
Another section featured photographs and a step-by-step description of bovine castration. The ritual began with an offering of incense, cigarettes, money, and oil. There was a picture of a gnarled man with his hands clenched together, with the caption Mr Wan Toinoo, age 67. Occupation: Specialist who can sterile the cattle. The next picture had a gang of men tugging an obviously reluctant bull, with the caption Assistants of the Specialist help pull the ox go between the trees. After that, Mr Wan used a special forked stick to wind the bull's scrotum taut, and then he beat at it with a flat paddle until broken. To finish, Mr Wan knocked an empty coconut shell on the bull's head, back, and hindquarters, to show the sign of prosperity. By this time, the bull was looking decidedly dispirited. While it was a fascinating insight into traditional castratory practices, it nonetheless gave me the shivers.
That afternoon we hiked across town to a full-blown shopping mall that had sprung up near the highway interchange. I bought a small blue tent for a mere fifteen dollars, anticipating camping in the national parks. I informed Scott that if he intended to sleep in the tent he would have to carry it. He affixed it to the rear of his pack with a few grumbles.
From there we hopped a bus going East, hoping to make it to Phu Hin Rongkhla Park by nightfall. Unfortunately we could only get to a hamlet called Nakhon Thai, where we learned that no more buses were going to the park before morning. We ate noodles and watched the sun go down, and began asking around about guesthouses. Nakhon Thai was very small, and did not often get foreign visitors. Nonetheless, there was a single guesthouse over a mile out of town on a side road. We walked out there, swatting at mosquitoes, and found that they only had a single bed for five dollars. Since I had just that day bought a tent, we decided to find someplace around town to erect it.
As fortune would have it, there was a sort of mini-carnival in Nakhon Thai that night, and a dozen tents were already set up in a broad grassy soccer-field in the middle of town. Our tent blended right in. We bought meat on skewers and watched the crowd. Eventually someone set up a big white screen and backed a pickup in front of it. The pickup contained a movie projector, and a large crowd gathered on the grass in front of the screen. We were pleasantly surprised to see Raiders of the Lost Ark, dubbed into Thai. After the movie I had ice cream with some teenagers and watched things wind down.