Our first race day, wahoo! I was SUPER excited for it, and it was pretty much amazing… just so that is clear before I even start describing it. Anyways, the Race started at 1pm right after lunch. Each team chose 4 people so that logistically it would be easier. For our team, Mark, Sarah, Haley, and I participated. We started at the YWAM base when Amanda, our race coordinator, gave us a list of tasks we had to complete in whatever order we wanted. The first thing we noticed was that we needed to find a bowling alley and bowl a strike. There happened to be one right down the street so we decided to go there first, along with all the other teams. We were the last team there, but the first to leave, since it only took me one try to accomplish our task… I guess bowling class paid off after all!
For our next task we started looking around for 4 different kinds of fruit at a local market. We were only able to find 2 of them so we hopped into a taxi and made our way to Baiyoke Tower II (aka task #3). It took a good thirty minutes to get there, and the fact that we’re still alive is enough proof that there is a God! You know what I’m talking about if you’ve ever been in a taxi overseas! So at the tower Haley took a picture of Mark at the top and at the bottom of the tower and Sarah and I went off to accomplish some of the other tasks. We were able to find one of the other fruits in a nearby market as well as buy a “same same” t-shirt, which would be used later to accomplish another task. From this point we walked to Siam Paragon. We were going to take a Tuk Tuk, but they wanted us to run into a store for them on the way and get some card stamped, so we thought that was weird and decided to walk instead.
It was a good twenty minute walk, and we were very excited to find the inside was air conditioned once we arrived. Siam Paragon is the “epitome of wealth” in Bangkok, and we were instructed to take team photos in front of Gucci, Burberry, Versace, and Maserati. Check!
Next, we had thirty minutes to get on the sky train and find Amanda at one of three local starbucks in the Nana district. We found her at the second one and completed our task of giving her a birthday gift (the same same t shirt) and taking a picture with her in it, because we also had to get a picture of someone in the same same t shirt. That’s what we call creative! After this, Amanda gave us the task of praying for twenty minutes over the areas and the sex trade industry, which is very prevelant in that area. I’m not going to lie—it was hard to switch over from game mode to prayer mode, but we did, and it was good.
After twenty minutes we were off again on our way, this time with Cameron coming along to get some footage. The first place we headed was the Sri Mariamman Temple. This place was ridicusly hard to find because it was a Hindu Temple in a predomintly Buddhist area. It took us a long time, but eventually we found it and snapped a picture.
Next task… find the remaining fruit and take a picture in a photo booth. We found the fruit at a local grocery store and the photo booth on the 4th story of a mall.
We are rushing at this point, only 2 tasks to go! So we find a tuk tuk which will take all 5 of us for only 100 Baht (about 3 bucks) to our next location. This is when we got stuck in California-style traffic. I felt right at home as I imagined being stuck on the 91 or 15 freeway. Anyways, we called Amanda and found out that there were still no teams there and all we had left to do was take one picture at a park and then find Amanda at a night market… good to go! Well, we sat in that Tuk Tuk for a good 45minutes. Bummer! When we got to the park, we found the picture spot pretty quickly, snapped it, and literally ran another twenty minutes to the night market.
We arrived at the night market 7 hours after we first began, sweating profusely, hoping to find no other team there; but unfortunately we were greeted by 2 other teams, who had completed all the tasks and arrived 30 minutes prior to our arrival (i.e. we received 3rd place). The competitive spirit in me wants me to be bummed because we lost, but really, we did a great job, had lots of fun, and I’m happy with how it went.
Race Day #1 = SUCCESS
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