Continued from June 13th.
Okay, so they busted out the whisky again, a new bottle mind you, and proceeded to drink up. Then, the father, daughter and teacher decided to go into the waterfall. You can climb up on some rocks and stand in the water before it cascades down a bit further. Of course, they ignored my response from earlier and proceeded to try to drag me up with them. After a few minutes they finally gave up and moved on. I was fine for about 15 to 20 minutes just sitting and waiting trying to relax while the mother was starting to lose control in a conversation with her cousin who had decided to join us. I knew things were about to get ugly when the cousin left and it was just the mother and I sitting there. Not good.
She decided that I could speak Thai and was simply ignoring her or pretending to not understand what she was saying. After about 10 minutes of just talking to me and me only smiling and nodding she stumbles to her feet and pulls me forward. Now, I would have simply just sat there except that she started to get angry with me because she obviously wanted me in the waterfall with her and her family right now. So, I walked her across this bridge made of sticks trying to keep her from falling into the river as her cousin arrives again. Now, she has her two children with her. One is a two year old girl and the other is a four year old boy with downs syndrome. Both of whom wish to go to the falls as well. Have you ever been in a situation where you know something bad is going to happen and there is nothing that you can do to stop it? Well, here we go.
The little boy starts to run ahead towards the water with his mother screaming after him. We were already at the foot of the falls when the boy arrived. The boy decides he wants to climb up some rocks. His mother is yelling at him to get down. Here's the bad part. The mother that I was with, the extremely drunk one, decides she needs to save the day and climbs up after the boy. When she is fairly close she motions that the boy should fall or jump to her. This is normal for people who are one, strong enough to catch a four year old and two, sober enough to catch a four year old. This woman was neither. The boy jumps, colides with and throws the woman backward. She falls and hits the back of her head on a rock. He falls head over heels over her and then head over heels again hitting his face on a rock. The mother of the boy proceeds to yell at him as if everything is his fault even though at four you trust people when they say jump, I'll catch you. Finally, the father, daughter and teacher see what is going on and come over.
Unfortunately, they do not realize how drunk the woman is so they take her up the waterfall. I use that as my chance to exit. After about 30 minutes I notice that the woman doesn't seem to want to come down from the waterfall. The father and daughter are trying the old, we're leaving and walking away bit but she won't have it. She's just sitting there, crying, I'm guessing. Now, don't get me wrong, I feel very sorry for this woman and her family.
Now, the teacher decides she has had enough with the waterfall and comes back over to the picnic area. Okay, I feel pretty uncomfortable at this point and have no desire to spend a second night at this families house as the plans apparently call for. So, I ask to return to Chiang Rai considering the circumstances. The teacher doesn't seem to want to do that for whatever reason but I plan to get back one way or another. Remember the boy I mentioned was with us? The one with the teacher. Well, he isn't to happy about this either and was trying to avoid contact with people altogether. But, when they really started having a hard time getting the mother off of the waterfall the daughter starts to fall apart. Now there are two crying females standing under a waterfall in the near dark refusing to move. He kindly decides to try and help.
After asking me to sit in the car he wanders up the trail and into the falls. About 30 minutes later the mother finally comes down with the teacher (the father had given up). They put her in the other car and have the cousin watch to make sure she doesn't leave. The boy and the daughter are still up there and you can hear screaming from the daughter quite a ways away. Another 20 minutes pass and the two of them wander down the trail to the cars. The parents are off and after the boy has a quick change of cloths we are off as well. One hour later we arrive at their house again.
After the daughter exits the car I take a chance and ask the boy if he is interested in staying at the house that night or would prefer to return to Chiang Rai. He goes nuts. He is so excited that I want to leave he goes running into the house to ask the teacher if we can depart immediately. Now this is interesting. Upon hearing the request the teacher immediately starts devicing a plan to get us to stay. I'm the guest, I'm not having fun, I have asked to leave. What would you do? You would take me home as I requested. Did she want to do that? Noooooo. She waits until Oon, the boy, is out of the way and tries to convince me that we need to stay because he cannot get back into the temple where he lives at such a late hour. I'm not buying it considering how happy he was with the idea so I ask him what the deal is and he starts to get pretty upset with the teacher. Appentely even if the gate is closed he has an apartment. Lie number one down.
Now, the teacher tells him to go to the car and make sure he has the key. While he is gone she proceeds to tell me that even if he has the key the agreement was never confirmed and he won't be able to stay there anyway so can we stay here. Lie number two down. Oon returns with the key, they have harsh words including "she wants to leave, I want to leave". The teacher decides that I'm a teenager and the two teenagers and ganging up on her so we should leave. Taking the keys from Oon she announces that she will be driving. I say no way, you have been drinking. "No I haven't, okay, just a little". Lie number three down. We say goodbye and thankyou to the family, force the teacher to give Oon the keys and head out.
About an hour later we reach Chiang Rai and drop off Oon at the temple where the gates are still open, of course. As we head toward my house her car over heats and we have to put water in it. Nice. She continually keeps slowing down when she doesn't need to almost in an effort to prolong the goodbye to me. Very strange. I mean very strange. Wow, so I finally make it back to the house, say thank you and head inside. After taking a hot shower to wash myself of the weekend I head to bed to do some reading and clear my mind.
Talk about learning about people. I've never been in a situation even remotely similar to that one. Absolute craziness!!! Sunday, I didn't want to do much other than talk to my family and catch up on some laundry. I watched a movie and read some more but that's about it. Today, the teacher is acting as if this is a totally normal situation to bring a foreign guest into and doesn't have an incling as to my true feeling regarding the events. Amazing!!
Okay, so they busted out the whisky again, a new bottle mind you, and proceeded to drink up. Then, the father, daughter and teacher decided to go into the waterfall. You can climb up on some rocks and stand in the water before it cascades down a bit further. Of course, they ignored my response from earlier and proceeded to try to drag me up with them. After a few minutes they finally gave up and moved on. I was fine for about 15 to 20 minutes just sitting and waiting trying to relax while the mother was starting to lose control in a conversation with her cousin who had decided to join us. I knew things were about to get ugly when the cousin left and it was just the mother and I sitting there. Not good.
She decided that I could speak Thai and was simply ignoring her or pretending to not understand what she was saying. After about 10 minutes of just talking to me and me only smiling and nodding she stumbles to her feet and pulls me forward. Now, I would have simply just sat there except that she started to get angry with me because she obviously wanted me in the waterfall with her and her family right now. So, I walked her across this bridge made of sticks trying to keep her from falling into the river as her cousin arrives again. Now, she has her two children with her. One is a two year old girl and the other is a four year old boy with downs syndrome. Both of whom wish to go to the falls as well. Have you ever been in a situation where you know something bad is going to happen and there is nothing that you can do to stop it? Well, here we go.
The little boy starts to run ahead towards the water with his mother screaming after him. We were already at the foot of the falls when the boy arrived. The boy decides he wants to climb up some rocks. His mother is yelling at him to get down. Here's the bad part. The mother that I was with, the extremely drunk one, decides she needs to save the day and climbs up after the boy. When she is fairly close she motions that the boy should fall or jump to her. This is normal for people who are one, strong enough to catch a four year old and two, sober enough to catch a four year old. This woman was neither. The boy jumps, colides with and throws the woman backward. She falls and hits the back of her head on a rock. He falls head over heels over her and then head over heels again hitting his face on a rock. The mother of the boy proceeds to yell at him as if everything is his fault even though at four you trust people when they say jump, I'll catch you. Finally, the father, daughter and teacher see what is going on and come over.
Unfortunately, they do not realize how drunk the woman is so they take her up the waterfall. I use that as my chance to exit. After about 30 minutes I notice that the woman doesn't seem to want to come down from the waterfall. The father and daughter are trying the old, we're leaving and walking away bit but she won't have it. She's just sitting there, crying, I'm guessing. Now, don't get me wrong, I feel very sorry for this woman and her family.
Now, the teacher decides she has had enough with the waterfall and comes back over to the picnic area. Okay, I feel pretty uncomfortable at this point and have no desire to spend a second night at this families house as the plans apparently call for. So, I ask to return to Chiang Rai considering the circumstances. The teacher doesn't seem to want to do that for whatever reason but I plan to get back one way or another. Remember the boy I mentioned was with us? The one with the teacher. Well, he isn't to happy about this either and was trying to avoid contact with people altogether. But, when they really started having a hard time getting the mother off of the waterfall the daughter starts to fall apart. Now there are two crying females standing under a waterfall in the near dark refusing to move. He kindly decides to try and help.
After asking me to sit in the car he wanders up the trail and into the falls. About 30 minutes later the mother finally comes down with the teacher (the father had given up). They put her in the other car and have the cousin watch to make sure she doesn't leave. The boy and the daughter are still up there and you can hear screaming from the daughter quite a ways away. Another 20 minutes pass and the two of them wander down the trail to the cars. The parents are off and after the boy has a quick change of cloths we are off as well. One hour later we arrive at their house again.
After the daughter exits the car I take a chance and ask the boy if he is interested in staying at the house that night or would prefer to return to Chiang Rai. He goes nuts. He is so excited that I want to leave he goes running into the house to ask the teacher if we can depart immediately. Now this is interesting. Upon hearing the request the teacher immediately starts devicing a plan to get us to stay. I'm the guest, I'm not having fun, I have asked to leave. What would you do? You would take me home as I requested. Did she want to do that? Noooooo. She waits until Oon, the boy, is out of the way and tries to convince me that we need to stay because he cannot get back into the temple where he lives at such a late hour. I'm not buying it considering how happy he was with the idea so I ask him what the deal is and he starts to get pretty upset with the teacher. Appentely even if the gate is closed he has an apartment. Lie number one down.
Now, the teacher tells him to go to the car and make sure he has the key. While he is gone she proceeds to tell me that even if he has the key the agreement was never confirmed and he won't be able to stay there anyway so can we stay here. Lie number two down. Oon returns with the key, they have harsh words including "she wants to leave, I want to leave". The teacher decides that I'm a teenager and the two teenagers and ganging up on her so we should leave. Taking the keys from Oon she announces that she will be driving. I say no way, you have been drinking. "No I haven't, okay, just a little". Lie number three down. We say goodbye and thankyou to the family, force the teacher to give Oon the keys and head out.
About an hour later we reach Chiang Rai and drop off Oon at the temple where the gates are still open, of course. As we head toward my house her car over heats and we have to put water in it. Nice. She continually keeps slowing down when she doesn't need to almost in an effort to prolong the goodbye to me. Very strange. I mean very strange. Wow, so I finally make it back to the house, say thank you and head inside. After taking a hot shower to wash myself of the weekend I head to bed to do some reading and clear my mind.
Talk about learning about people. I've never been in a situation even remotely similar to that one. Absolute craziness!!! Sunday, I didn't want to do much other than talk to my family and catch up on some laundry. I watched a movie and read some more but that's about it. Today, the teacher is acting as if this is a totally normal situation to bring a foreign guest into and doesn't have an incling as to my true feeling regarding the events. Amazing!!
