Cooling Off, Thai Style

I woke up this morning thinking about how unusually cool the weather felt. I didn’t begin to sweat the second I left my air-con bedroom, and come to think of it, riding home last night on the motorbike was almost chilly. Then I checked the actual temperature on weather.com. The high is in the mid-nineties. How hot must it normally be for 90 to feel cool you might ask? Oh, between 105 and 110.

We are right in the middle of summer here in Khon Kaen, and it is hot. Even on a cool day it’s hot. I used to think that people who covered up to protect themselves from the heat were crazy- of course it must be hotter under all that clothing. Nope, it’s not. Direct sun-on –skin contact is to be avoided at all costs. Normally riding your motorbike is a cooling activity. A few days ago I remember thinking that riding in the heat felt like continuously opening the oven door while cookies are baking: just wave after wave of heat.

Of course the Thai people know how to make the best out of the situation, thus a week from today begins the Thai New Year, aka Songkran. New Year is not a single-night celebration here as it is in the US. Songkran is a 4 day water festival where basically the only objective is to make sure that every person in the county is soaked from head to toe in water. You walk down the street and literally (or so I’ told) people will just throw buckets of water at you. I’ve already had two Thai friends offer to show me around the festivities, personally I think they just want to see me all wet. Songkran conveniently falls right smack in the middle of summer. What better way to cool off from the 100+ heat than to take a few days off of work and douse every moving being with refreshing water? I’ll let you know how it goes.