Yesterday I woke up after a few hours sleep, unable to stay in bed from the sheer excitement, even though I was still absolutely exhausted. I had a strange Thai breakfast of fruit, and barley in coconut milk, then had a little wander around the weird little guesthouse in which I'm staying. On the top floor the corridor has been created by smashing through the brick partitions of several buildings, joining the rooms along a dim, wood-lined passage that's almost pitch black, even in the day. There's a balcony at the end which is a veritable jungle of what I guess we call house plants, though here of course they're all growing outside. After my slow start I went back to Chatuchak Market yesterday, having decided to buy a couple more of the light cotton shirts I'd picked up the day before. But could I find the stall again? The place is a sprawling warren, and no matter how many times I wandered in circles and ended up at the same point, having trawled through hundreds of alleyways and stalls, I couldn't find the nice young lady who gave me a nice discount a big Thai smile. I settled for a couple of almost identical shirts for 100 baht more, and bought a white trilby to keep the sun off my head. I'm looking rather Hemingway at the moment, if you give or take a foot or so, a beard and about seventy-five pounds. After escaping from the market I set off through Chatuchak Park to find No.7 Stadium, where a Muay Thai tournament takes place on Sunday afternoons. As I looked up the path ahead I saw a squirrel moving across the path very slowly - too slowly for a squirrel I realised as it became clear that it was in fact an adolescent Monitor Lizard, heading towards the cool green water of the lake. He decided to head back when he saw me move slowly towards him, quivering with excitement as I fumbled to get my camera out beffore he disappeared into the bushes.
I kept on through the park, finding the Northern Bus Station, then utterly failing to find the stadium, and traipsing along the main highway coming into town, receiving strange looks from the street vendors who sell food and bumper stickers to the bus and taxi drivers. I'd given up on the Thai kickboxing and decided to go home when I heard an enormous roar from one of the covered foodstalls. Looking in to the crowd of animated men, I saw that they were watching a Muay Thai contest on the TV, shouting bets across the crowded space, jumping out of their chairs when the fighters delivered crashing blows with their knees and fists, and with powerful kicks. I decided to stay for a drink, and to soak up the atmosphere, but there were no drinks for sale. I stayed anyway, being invited by means of pointing and mime to join the book. I declined, pulling my pockets out to show how I knew I'd end up if I was naive enough to put my money down with these guys. The lady who was cooking brought me a pepsi in a glass with a straw and some ice - I thought I'd risk whatever microbes might have been frozen into crystalline form for a short period for the sake of courtesy. When I left at the end of the second fight, I had a hard time paying for the drink, even though it turned out that she'd sent someone over to the bus station to buy a pepsi for the strange farang who walked along the motorway to watch Muay Thai on the TV, and who didn't even want to bet.
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