Our first Songkran in Phuket started early!
We got in The Spirit Of Patong, riding slowly thru the sweet village of Baan Nam Sai Yen on the way to the beach.
The little children were already lining the roads, complete with powder and blessing water.
It started off with minute amounts of powder, followed by a very light sprinkling of water.
The intesity of the day seemed to elavate by the time we arrived the few kilometers to the beach…with tourists, barflies and locals dumping full buckets of water at us as we whizzed by.
Dodging a super squirt gun here or a full pail of water there, we made it to Thai Garden, totally soaked to the bone!
A little forethought however had saved our “stuff that shouldn’t get wet” by way of a plastic bag!
Crazy Dave let out his big bellowing laugh when he saw the two drowned rats emerging from the scooter. He helped us tip the sidecar over and about 40 gallons of H20 flowed freely from it, the red Toyota bucket seat was squeeshy, but we knew the hot Patong sun would soon dry it out.
Being somewhat prepared for the day, wearing bikinis under singlets, we just went across the street and jumped in the warm blue Andaman, caught a few waves and were dry by the time we got back to Thai Garden for a bowl of noodles and a Green Spot.
The festivities worked their way up and down the beach road that day, with Paradise Bruce renting a big truck and filling it full of his staff & patrons, along with many 55gallon drums of water attached to high pressure nozzles! Everyone didn’t seem think this was a good or even Godly idea, but they went off drenching any and all, we watched them go, feeling that things were beginning to change, not for the better…:-(
We hung around Thai Garden the rest of the day, only venturing back to the Waterfall house just before sunset when most of the water drenchers were subdued by a long days celebration.
The commericialization of the locals was surely taking over. Little Patong was growing like a weed. The Asian way of copying anything was in full affect by now, holidays/festivals were getting that advertising touch, there were always “deals” on stuff during these times. It was only the beginning.
