Magic Bus

 

 

 

It’s two-twenty on a Tuesday afternoon and we’re on a bus from Chiang Saen to Chiang Rai, Thailand.  Big, fat drops of rain are exploding into the windshield, and every two or three minutes the driver hits the switch to turn on the wiper (only one side works, but it does a nice job.)  The bus is shiny but worn.  Overhead is bright chrome metal that someone has taken pains to keep clean, and there are sturdy metal fans that swing around and blow air over the passengers which is especially nice when we stop to pick someone up.

I don’t know how to begin guessing the weight of this thing, but it must be close to one million pounds.  There don’t appear to be any shock absorbers—or springs, for that matter.  The floor is made of thick planks of teak wood, and though it’s not oiled, it still has the look of frequent, regular cleanings.  Someone cares for this bus, and that, I think, makes all the difference.

The driver looks frequently into the rear-view mirror, as well as the mirror mounted on the windshield to see how his passengers are doing—what’s going on around him  His conductor is smiling in a blue, short-sleeved shirt.  She has her hair pulled back and has tied it with a white, lace bow.  Every now and then she gets up to collect a fare, then takes a new seat, chatting with the different passengers. We’re filling up, but so far there’s enough room. 

I feel safe.  We have yet to climb over forty miles and hour.  It’s not far to Chiang Rai—maybe fifty miles total—and could end up taking two hours.  But in this bus, on this day, at this speed, and surrounded by these people, I think we’ll make it.  At some level, I think each and every soul on this bus knows we will make it, feels our invincibility.

 The two kids in front of me look like dare-devils, with short, spiky hair.  The one on the left has arched eyebrows and tattoos covering his right arm and hand.  His buddy has his arm out the window; both have the air of confidence and carelessness one can only have in their mid-to-late teens, happy and torn, anxious and satisfied. Their great asset is a force of life running at its peak, but logic tells us even this is not enough; no one is invincible.  I look around and consider the possibilities:  Cancer lying in wait in the fellow across the aisle from me, who looks to be dozing against the window glass. After his shift behind the wheel, our driver steps out into the path of a truck filled with gravel, on its last run of the day to drop a load for road repairs.  Pedestrians wail and wonder why.  The two boys in front of me find their end racing back roads on hopped-up motor scooters. Yet none of these things have a chance as long as we are rolling along in this steel brick cocoon.  This wheeled, earth bound chariot.

Note-while writing that last paragraph we pulled to a stop.  I thought we were picking up a passenger, and continued with my writing.  Then Rebecca tapped my leg, and I looked up to see three armed police standing in the bus aisle, checking ID cards. I pulled out our passports, but they ignored me.  However, they completed a full shakedown of the two boys in front of me, making them stand so they could be fully patted down, asking questions, going carefully through their wallets.  All the officers wore dust masks, so we could only see their eyes.  Each carried a gun belt and side arm.  Then, just like that, it was over.  They stepped down to their roadside station, and we’re rolling along again. Things are just as they were, but somehow not.  The smiling conductor has pulled down the jump seat, and isn’t chatting with passengers; somehow the bus seems fuller, almost crowded, and my skin feels sticky and greasy in the wet, hot air. The bite of diesel fumes seeps through the floor boards.

In a way, this little episode serves as a metaphor for recent political events, in which the military, under General Prayuth, have decreed martial law, effectively executing a government coup d’etat, one of twelve since nineteen thirty-eight.   Though from where I’m sitting, you wouldn’t know it.  My buddy Mike Twohey sent me a link to an article from the AP entitled, From Beaches to Bangkok, Tourists ask 'What coup?’     

 http://news.yahoo.com/beaches-bangkok-tourists-ask-coup-111216839--finance.html

           The story surrounds various westerners who are here on holiday, and remain blissfully ignorant to the goings-on of what seems a small handful of active, angry politicos.  Indeed, the Thais we’ve spoken with have expressed a cavalier attitude over the whole thing, one—a women who ran a guesthouse we were staying in-- going so far as to exclaim, “They’re just bored.  When they have nothing to do, they change things up.  It makes no difference!”  Yet the article suggested a very real difference, especially in terms of tourism, which makes up seven percent of the country’s economy.  People are choosing to go elsewhere, affected, it would seem, by the stigma around the term coup d’etat, as well as various warning put out by the state departments of likely source governments, including the US. 

I made the case to Rebecca of how this whole thing would seem a game of perception, in which we humans predictably respond in a fearful, impulsive manner, rather than taking the road of logic and reason.

“I think in some ways the actions of the Generals makes sense.  The on-going protests were going nowhere, and people were dying.”  She considered my reasoning for about a nanosecond before concluding, “There’s never an excuse for a violation of human rights.  Especially the right to express oneself.  Television and radio stations were shut down.  Academics, journalists and former government and anti-government players were (are) detained.  Facebook was briefly shutdown.”  The last bit seemed to affect her in an almost visceral way, like the nerve pinch/death grip hold Spock so adeptly applied to various ne’er do wells. 

I made a half-hearted effort to support my argument, under the perceived truth of how it was unfolding around me.  But it lacked conviction and vigor.  The truth is, shakedowns change things.  Even though the kids in front of me were the only ones feeling the sting and humiliation of the cops’ attention (I since learned the reason for the shakedown was a random search for illicit drugs) we all felt something of a cloud descend over our happy world.  And with enough incidence of clouds, we risk our want of clarity, potentially rendering the sun a wistful, distant memory.