Nakhon Sawan

This past weekend featured a series of rather confusing streets and even more confusing plans. Nakhon Sawan is not only a much larger province than I gave it credit for, it’s also a “non-tourist place,” as a woman in the temple on the hill put it. Even here in Amata I spot a westerner once every, oh, couple weeks. Nakhon Sawan proved to be completely empty of farangs, although it did house the highest Chinese immigrant population in the country.


Due to the lack of Western tourism, there was also a noticeable absence of rip-offs. A three-entree meal, including a pair of rice bowls and bottled waters, added up to 3 US dollars per person. A hotel room that included television, air conditioning and free breakfast was about 7 dollars per person. Even more significant, at least to me, were the demeanors of the people. The locals not only smiled, they reached out to us befuddled farangs, even when assistance it wasn’t requested (I guess our puzzled expressions said it all).

We visited a temple on the side of a mountain, and I put a coin in a prayer bowl for good luck. A recording of a monk began to play, and a golden display lit up in celebration of my donation. A Thai woman approached me and attempted to translate. “He’s blessing you with good luck,” she explained, listening to the monk murmur on, “but he’s telling it in very, very many words.” We laughed as the monotone monk droned on. She suggested that I look up what day of the week I was born, because this was quite significant to Buddhists. She then advised me about places to visit in Nakhon Sawan, and invited her mother over to make suggestions. Her little mother expressed a deep wish to be my guide because “she wanted so much for me have a pleasant time in her province.”

This woman was the first in a sequence of pure-hearted locals; later that day we were sitting, lost and sweaty on a dirty street corner, and a woman rolled up on her motorbike and offered to help us in any way she could. When I had trouble communicating with a tuk tuk driver, a local came over and offered to translate for me.

That evening, the first night in a week-long Chinese New Year festival, we wandered through a typical Thai-style street fair (food stands, cheap clothing and jewelry), then stumbled upon a nice light display. There were massive lanterns constructed of intricate wire frames and colorful cloth. There was also some sort of stage show whose plot I could hardly piece together, but which drew in a massive crowd of onlookers.



The next day we rode a tuk tuk pimped out with a karaoke machine to what looked like an enormous boat on the map we'd acquired, but turned out to be the local aquarium (built in the shape of a gigantic ark). The facility was actually very state-of-the-art, and featured tons of marine life (including the local species, the Tiger Fish), as well as a glass tunnel where you could observe rays and fishes the size of grown men. After that we had dinner at a floating restaurant on the shore, and I watched children play in the water. This weekend turned out to be the opposite of my last weekend in pretty much every way, but I liked both for their distinctions. I guess the ideal travel itinerary is one that combines the picturesque but overpriced tourist spots and the sometimes shabbier but more authentic local areas.