Thailand - Chiang Mai

This trip to Thailand should be called "Finding Artit." If you recall
from my last "The Nomad Speaks," Artit was the guy I met and took a quick
tour of Old Bangkok with. He invited me to stay with him and his family
in Chiang Mai during the Songkran Festival.

While in Southern Thailand I was trying like mad to contact Artit.
I was getting conflicting answers from the locals about the phone number
being 7 digits instead of 6, the proper way to call Chiang Mai, use
a blue phone, use an orange phone, dial 1234 before dialing the number, etc.
Every attempt to call him resulted in a fast busy signal. I
attributed it to lousy phone service and decided that I should try to
contact him from Bangkok before I left for Chiang Mai.

When I arrived in Bangkok and started asking around, everyone was telling
me that the number was incorrect ... too many digits. It was funny to
plunk 10 baht into a phone and have a local tell you, "You can't call
Chiang Mai from that phone, you have to use the other one." I did some
research of my own and googled the address Artit gave me.

Rajchavithi, the street name he gave me, was slightly misspelled ...
it's actually Rachavithi (or Rawchavithi). Searching on Rachavithi
found "Your House Guesthouse", a guest house at 8 Rachavithi Soi 2, the
exact address Artit gave me. Needless to say I was confused, as I knew
that Artit was not a guest house owner, or at least I didn't believe him
to be. Additional searches uncovered that the postal code he gave me
was incorrect as well. My thought -- take the bus to Chiang Mai now
and sort it out when you get there.

Fast forward ten hours to Chiang Mai, next day. The guest house I'm
staying in was very helpful and tried to call Artit for me. They were
confused as well, since the number was 7 digits not 6. I thought maybe
he made a mistake in converting Thai script to Roman, maybe he added an
extra digit. All attempts of every combination of numbers in the phone
number he gave me failed with a fast busy. They also confirmed that
the postal code was incorrect. They told me that every school child
learns from early age that the postal code is 50n000 (n=1-3). Once
again, I thought, "Ok, this guys old, maybe he just converted to
Roman incorrectly" giving him the benefit of the doubt.

The thing I can't describe at this point is the feeling that you get when
you're travelling in another country. Your mind is already tweaked, and
you (or at least I) have a spidey-sense telling you something just ain't
right. To find out that you can't reach a person who seems like a
genuinely nice guy and who wouldn't possibly want to screw with a farang,
yet you still have that feeling in the back of your mind that you've
been duped. Even though I wasn't out any money (he paid for the boat
and the beer/chips), I still felt duped. Why would he lie? What did
he have to gain?

I decided to walk around until I found Rachavithi St. and until I found
Artit. I was on a mission. As I'm walking around in the back alleys
asking locals for "gow rachavithi" they point and I follow. I walked
into a house and an ex-pat Aussie was there sitting back, relaxed,
sipping a milkshake. He said, "'oo ya lookin' far?" I said, "Artit."

I was blown away as the Aussie said, "'eah, I know 'em." and he began
to describe Artit in great detail ... glasses, history teacher, gray
hair, wife and daughter, etc. The Aussie says, "I just sawr 'im
down the street getting drunk." He threw me on the back of his
motorcycle and we went down the street to the pub, but Artit had just
left a few minutes before. He then drove me back and pointed and
said "'e lives there, I reckon you could knock but I doubt 'e's 'ome."

Then he told me that Artit plays guitar at a pub on Tuesday nights.
Today was Tuesday. The planets were in alignment, chi was flowing.
The Aussie gave me directions to Riverside Bar, a few blocks from the
guest house I'm staying at. The whole time I'm walking there I'm
thinking to myself, "What will I say to him?", "Why did you give me
the wrong address/phone number", "Ha, I found you ... you tried to
lose me but I found you!" When I walked in to the bar, someone was
playing the piano and I asked the bartender "guitar" and made a
strumming motion with my hand. He said, "If you're asking about Oot
the guitarist, he'll be here shortly." Oot? Who's Oot?

Then I saw him. An older thai guy, swaggering into the bar carrying
a guitar with a denim vest and a hat on. "Wow" I thought, "Artit looks
a bit different from when I met him in Bangkok." Sadly, this wasn't
Artit. It was Oot -- yes, that's his real name. Oot is a high school
teacher who matches the description of Artit. After Oot played his set,
I asked him if he knew Artit. He seemed confused (or drunk) and said
he didn't know who Artit was. So I sipped my beer and ate my Khoe Soi
(a Chiang Mai curry noodle thing) in utter disappointment and astonishment.

As of today (the 2nd) I still haven't found Artit. I don't even want to
spend time with his family now, I just want to know one thing. "Why?"