Our time in Thailand has been absolutely incredible! After debrief we only got to spend about two weeks with our contacts, but it was jam packed and absolutely amazing! None of us really knew what w
e were getting ourselves into, but we showed up in the city of Nan after a 10 or 12 hour bus ride from Bangkok with our translator Nat and met Pastor Narong. We love him so much! He is hilarious and such a character. He only speaks Thai, so we have a lot of fun trying to communicate. Most of our time with him consists of him smiling and laughing at us. I don’t speak much Thai but I know that he likes to joke around with us a lot and tease us. Basically we’re laughing all the time, even though we don’t always know why and its great.
For our first day in Nan, Pastor Narong shows up at our hostel with a truck containing a massive barrel of water and a bunch of buckets. He introduces us to his children Sunday (20) and Monday (16). We were going to celebrate Songkran, the Thai new year! Its a time where there’s a massive water fight all over the country and if you’re out in the city walking, biking or driving around, you will get soaked. No one is safe! Not even the pizza delivery guy! (Poor guy. I bet he wanted to quit his job that week.)
Sometimes I’d see some people walking and I’d get all excited and want to splash them, but I’d hesitate and think “awww! They’re so cute! I love Thai people! I can’t soak them!” This compassion was my downfall sometimes because they’d splash me instead. My teammates had to give me some tough love and tell me that there was no room for compassion and to have no mercy. After that pep talk, they released a Songkran soaking machine named Dez Loeppky. Also in that moment, since I have this insatiable need to name everything all the time, the Furious Farangs were born (Farang is Thai for foreigner) and we had a blast splashing everyone all day. I may or may not have thrown my head back and let out a few sadistic cackles as I unleashed my farang fury on unsuspecting victims and reveled in it.
camera, motion for us to get close together and then snap a photo. It was hilarious. Then off to “play the water” as Nat called it and we’d refill our massive barrel of water to go out and soak opposing truck groups like ours (I called them rival gangs), innocent passersby, motorcycles and moped riders. Sometimes a rival gang would pull up beside us and we’d have what I fondly call a “drive by shooting” and attack each other with water. It was awesome.
For another break from the mayhem and madness, Pastor brought us through a small village (where we drove by and soaked the hose and supersoaker toting kids waiting for us and they screamed with joy as we engaged in water wars) to a river. There was a massive possibly sketchy rope and wooden suspension bridge high over the water that we explored. I won’t lie, sometimes I wondered if the bridge could take this many people, but I didn’t think about it too much. We then fed some shiny rainbow koi and then went swimming in the river with the locals. It was an amazing moment to see everyone, kids and adults, playing in the water, having fun and just enjoying what God made in this beautiful green jungle area. Many times I wondered if this was really my life right now.
e were getting ourselves into, but we showed up in the city of Nan after a 10 or 12 hour bus ride from Bangkok with our translator Nat and met Pastor Narong. We love him so much! He is hilarious and such a character. He only speaks Thai, so we have a lot of fun trying to communicate. Most of our time with him consists of him smiling and laughing at us. I don’t speak much Thai but I know that he likes to joke around with us a lot and tease us. Basically we’re laughing all the time, even though we don’t always know why and its great. For our first day in Nan, Pastor Narong shows up at our hostel with a truck containing a massive barrel of water and a bunch of buckets. He introduces us to his children Sunday (20) and Monday (16). We were going to celebrate Songkran, the Thai new year! Its a time where there’s a massive water fight all over the country and if you’re out in the city walking, biking or driving around, you will get soaked. No one is safe! Not even the pizza delivery guy! (Poor guy. I bet he wanted to quit his job that week.)
Sometimes I’d see some people walking and I’d get all excited and want to splash them, but I’d hesitate and think “awww! They’re so cute! I love Thai people! I can’t soak them!” This compassion was my downfall sometimes because they’d splash me instead. My teammates had to give me some tough love and tell me that there was no room for compassion and to have no mercy. After that pep talk, they released a Songkran soaking machine named Dez Loeppky. Also in that moment, since I have this insatiable need to name everything all the time, the Furious Farangs were born (Farang is Thai for foreigner) and we had a blast splashing everyone all day. I may or may not have thrown my head back and let out a few sadistic cackles as I unleashed my farang fury on unsuspecting victims and reveled in it.
Everyone, young and old participate in this festival. My favorite was seeing a truck full of elderly Thais holding water guns and buckets of water with mischievous smiles and smirks across their faces. The streets are full of trucks piled with people in the back splashing water on the people walking. Some people wait with hoses or supersoakers on the side of the road and spray the mobile celebrators. You know someone has a massive chunk of ice in their barrel, making their water freezing cold because the screams reach a new decibel level. Sometimes they even have colour in the water so you’ll have neon orange or green water flying at your face. So needless to say, it was a riot and we got soaking wet.
The fun was tempered by breaks of touring the area. We’d stop at a temple and overlook the city. Pastor would grab the
camera, motion for us to get close together and then snap a photo. It was hilarious. Then off to “play the water” as Nat called it and we’d refill our massive barrel of water to go out and soak opposing truck groups like ours (I called them rival gangs), innocent passersby, motorcycles and moped riders. Sometimes a rival gang would pull up beside us and we’d have what I fondly call a “drive by shooting” and attack each other with water. It was awesome. For another break from the mayhem and madness, Pastor brought us through a small village (where we drove by and soaked the hose and supersoaker toting kids waiting for us and they screamed with joy as we engaged in water wars) to a river. There was a massive possibly sketchy rope and wooden suspension bridge high over the water that we explored. I won’t lie, sometimes I wondered if the bridge could take this many people, but I didn’t think about it too much. We then fed some shiny rainbow koi and then went swimming in the river with the locals. It was an amazing moment to see everyone, kids and adults, playing in the water, having fun and just enjoying what God made in this beautiful green jungle area. Many times I wondered if this was really my life right now.
So that was our first day in Nan and if it was any indication of what was to come, the Furious Farangs were up for an amazing two weeks.
