2/17 -- Night Train North

We got to the train station at a little after 9:30 AM. The 2 PM train to Chiang Mai would have gotten us there at the early hour of 5 AM the next day, but the only seats available were 1st Class sleeper cars with AC. We’re not First Class Cats, Aud and me; the 2:30 train still had regular 2nd class, fan-cooled seats.

We’ve generally found bus travel to be cheaper and sometimes faster than trains, but the comfort and antics of trains are superior. This trip was no disappointment.

We ate at the train station cafeteria, which uses a somewhat convoluted coupon system in place of a cash-for-food exchange. Aud had a tasty noodle dish in a beef broth, and I went out on a limb at the “Islamic Food” Station. (I’ve put that between quotation marks because ‘Islamic Food’ seems to connote something very specific, perhaps religious, and possibly inaccurate.) Despite the admonitions of the young man serving the food, I tried what he said was his favorite dish: spiced chicken stomach with vegetables. The texture was poppy and exciting, the taste a bit chalky but pleasant like processed meat sometimes is, and the spice left a glorious ribbon of dew on my brow.

Onto the train, where legroom was generous and the seats were pen-cap-blue pleather. Caramel wood paneling framed the large, operable windows, and every two rows was an 18” oscillating fan bolted to the ceiling. These fans were basically useless, as every window was open shortly after departing.

Unlike the other trains we’ve been on, this one did not serve meals, those microwaved entrees of savory sauce and mystery meat over rice that Aud scarcely finishes inspecting by the time I finish mine and begin leaning over asking if I can have a bite of hers. Instead, men and women pace the aisles bearing boxes and baskets of goodies, calling out their descriptions in melodious Thai that is utterly unrecognizable to my tone-deaf ear. There is a range in both value and deliciousness among these: a fresh coconut icee for 5B is a steal; 50B for a can of Chang (i.e. Thai Coors) beer is not; sticky rice with fat-moistened beef jerky is scrumptious; processed, foot-colored pork rinds are not appealing.

As we cruised along, I’d been working my way slowly but attentively through the Bible. I had just finished the book of Exodus when…Ack! A plague of locusts! A plague of gnats and gadflies and mosquitoes! As night fell, buggies of every size and predilection began flying through our open windows and crashing into us, dazed. In the dark, the train is nothing so much as a giant bug lamp, a four-car tube of seductive fluorescent allure churning through the countryside. We made sure to sleep with our mouths closed…

Between sections of reading I looked out at our changing surroundings. Going north and east to Cambodia took us to a depressingly dry and harsh area compared to the greenness of the Southern Peninsula. But up here the land seems fertile and kind. Huge tracts of land devoted to rice cover the flatlands, geometric carpets of brazen, electric green and hues borrowed from pond scum. As we rumbled by a fallow field I could faintly smell the earthy scent of the freshly tilled soil, but it was mostly overpowered by the persistent, heavy sweetness of last season’s crop as it burned in preparation for the next cycle. Bits of ash floated in through our windows and threatened to recolor our clothing. The first twenty minutes of evening glowed lavender and raspberry with the burn’s light.

But some things are universal in the rural world, it seems. Rising out of the monotony of the fields is the biggest structure for miles: the grain elevator. I don’t presume to know about how agriculture is organized here in Thailand, but in most of the world the grain elevator is global capitalism’s sacred mark, not merely a structure but an institution in itself signifying monopsony and depressed food prices. It is all very nice if you buy your food, but selling food to such a machine is nicht good.

Aud turned to me and remarked that now that we’re back in Thailand it’s obvious how much wealthier it is here than in Cambodia. And she’s right. But Thailand hasn’t changed, even if our perspective has. On the banks of the turbid streams, on the margins of the rice fields, are the homes of Thailand’s rural poor. The contrast between the radiance of the fields in which they toil and the apparent dimness of their prospects is striking. Four moldering support beams and some corrugated tin panels—is that a home? A rusting lean-to, sagging like playing cards atop a drinking game glass. How much longer can it be supported? A sinking foundation, a home just trying to hold together and hope for better things tomorrow. Maybe people inside, doing the same.