The Tooth with the Bamboo Stuffing

Well, I know everyone (except me, of course) is sick of looking at my teeth. I swear I cannot get enough, and I will be glad to have them on the site to gaze at from time to time. In an effort to be done with all this, I post for you the x-rays and some root canal photos. Make sure you look at the last one. It is so trippy looking, like they stuck bamboo shoots up the hole in my tooth. I cannot stare at it too long. Any theories about that? I think it is making room for the posts you will see in the x-ray, but that's just a guess. Meanwhile, gaze away.


















Here are the best of the x-rays. I am too lazy to format this, so just look ^^.

Reconstructing My Tooth

Well, this one should be pretty self-explanitory, so I will leave the pictures to speak for themselves. I just could not believe that from that massive hole, a tooth was just remade (and I mean it looked real!) That was accomplished in about 45 minutes. Pretty amazing what modern dentistry can do. Enjoy.

Weak Stomachs Refrain

Well, this is not really how it happened. Unfortunately I did not get them all, but here they go, with the commentary I have time to put up right now.

This is the top left side, molar (g14, I believe) with a temporary filling.

This is after the temporary filing had been removed to continue the root canal. Here, I am all strapped up, so you see the plastic making an impression of sorts over my other tooth.

Here we continue with the same molar, stripped of its filling, staring you in the face. Well, it feels better now than before. This is actually during the root canal that they took these shots. They have a tiny camera, about the size of a pen, and you get to see this stuff on a flat screen TV in front of you!

These next two show the cement that holds in the medication and coagulant that keep you from bleeding all over the place and clean the infection (which is a big part of the root canal). I have no idea what the little brace there on the bottom is.

TOMORROW! The rebuilding of a tooth....my personal favorite.

Muy Thai

Well, these are photos of the one and only Muy Thai match. Was pretty good, I will leave it at that. Yours truly imbibed some beers and ate a papaya salad. The kicks were hard and the blood ran freely (not really, about the blood). I do not understand why some of the flash pictures came out so well and others were blurry, when I was trying to use the same settings in the situiation...well, I am sure Harris will tell me.
Here they go--the two blurries. (More coming soon).

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Guy on the left was the Thai section of the last, and main, fight. He loved posing and he was tough.
Above are the gamblers, following the action closely.

MATADOR TRAVEL

I am going to be writing for this site, and it seems great. Definitely go there qand stick in your email address to get on the mailing list, and with any luck, you will see an article or two of mine in the coming months. The site's creators seem to have a great philosophy on travel and the world, so the articles and content should be cool. And, just by the looks of the front page, it is just going to be a fun site to be on. www.MatadorTravel.com

Also, spread the word around to those who like travel.

Hopefully I will have some pics to show soon.

Songkhran, at last

Traipsing through the pasty streets, overrun with smears of white faces and bodies, buckets of water, super-soakers, music and yells from vendors and participants alike, I am taken aback. This is inconsistent with the info I gained from my cursory glances at the tourist propaganda and my friend's passing mention of "Songkhran". After a few swipes of paste on the cheek and a thorough soaking, I realize that my detour to the dentist is going to take longer than expected.
I don't travel like this. Usually, research, a little language study, reading up on history and the like are half of my travel experience. This time, however, I have just finished a stint in Seoul, South Korea, my teeth are rotting out of my head (not to mention the pain) and I am late for a deadline. My research ended about 5 minutes after I booked my flight from Seoul.
Songkran is the Thai New Year, celebrated by parading through the streets applying paste to people's faces and bodies andthen washing it away with water. As I am told, this symbolizes the washing away of sins for the New Year. Fear not, the Buddha gets his fair washing from passers-by in tiny stalls set next to the road.
By looking at the tourist brochures, I see reserved Thais in traditional dress, whisking water onto each other out of small pails in idyllic village settings. Comforting and quaint as that may be, the Thais have a more interesting way of celebrating it, at least in Bangkok.
A six-block square swath of Bangkok is crammed with souls from around noon until two in the morning ensuring that no one stay dry or paste free. Many a small entrepreneur has endeavored to facilitate this goal by setting up roadside paste and water vending tables. At around 5 baht a pop, who can miss out on the fun? The government even chips in on the effort by providing large tanks of water, in case you happen to not see or not have money for the thousands of vendors.
This being my third time ringing in the New Year, I feel thoroughly entrenched in 2006. This fact does not deter me from joining the moistened, plastered masses in celebration.
What in most Western countries would be extremely restricted in time and scope and cause widespread chaos, flows freely in Thailand. Bodies cramming and rubbing up against each other cause no emotional friction. WHile some participants seem slgihtly traumatized by the event, the vast majority smile warmly and continur pasting, dousing and repasting the absolute strangers among them.
Only at one point do I see anything violent: gleefully squished between thousands of people, a board flies in the air, smacking its intended recipient. A brawl of sorts ensues and the crowd tries, unsuccessfully, to shuffle off the street. Sticks and fists hurle through the damp air. Suddenly they cease. In the distance, I see the police. Commotion. Yelling. A few figures just in sight are on the ground in handcuffs. Cheers. Applause. The proud Thai people continue marching through the mist.
After three days of this, I have chafed thighs, a rebruised foot and a residual alcohol hangover energized by adrenaline. I took a day, Sunday, to rest and get ready for my 6 AM train to Chiang Mai.
Finally dry, if still partially covered in crusty white paste, I head out to the train street toward the train station. A few partyers from the night before linger quietly drinking on mats on the sidewalks. Swirls of creamy pink float slowly toward the gutters, ushering some of the trash with them. Buildings that had been invisible through the hoards became visible for the first time. Then, it started to rain, drenching me once more, Mother Nature's final touch on the festival.