Pai and the Lesson about the King, aka The King and Pai

Pai is a small town in the middle of a pretty nowhere populated by Thai hippies and coffeeshop types and the kind of tourist Lonely Planet helpfully identifies as “bird shit” foreigners – so called because they wear fisherman pants, smell bad, and are super cheap. Hmmm. (Don’t worry, that’s not us – except for that day that Jeff ran out of shorts, and the next day when I decided it was just too hot to wear normal clothes.) Pai is a real cute place, with lots of vegetarian restaurants and yoga studios (What’s worse than Birkram yoga? Not much, except, I assume, yoga in a fan-cooled room full of bird shit foreigners in 90 degree heat) and chill bars with bearded Thai musicians doing classic rock hits.

Jeff and I hit one of these places one night after dinner and got a lesson on the King from a bartender named Siam who was maybe a few cards short of a full deck. We already knew that they love their King here – many people wear yellow rubber bracelets stamped “Long Live the King” and it seems that they really mean it. (Sadly, it’s pretty shocking to be in a place where people truly respect and trust their leader. FYI, Thais don’t feel the same way about their elected representatives). According to Siam, the King is a very talented blues musician and has jammed with all manner of jazz and blues greats. Plus he speaks 7 languages and built an expressway in Bangkok using his own money. Or something like that. Yesterday, Jeff and I bought the King’s cd, entitled HM Blues (His Majesty’s Blues). We haven’t listened to it yet, but just the idea of it is pretty cool.

Anyway, while in Pai, Jeff and I went for a splurge and got ourselves a fancy cottage all our own right on the river with a private deck and everything. And a good thing too because I spent an entire night, the next morning, and a miserable ride back to Chiang Mai being sick. That was kind of it for Pai.