Bumpkin in Bangkok

 Bob and Pat Coats headed up the Thailand Baptist Missionary Fellowship (TBMF) office in Bangkok and represented the American Baptist mission for us (for background on the TBMF visit https://tbmf.org/ or see “About: Our place in Baptist Mission History” within this blog).  In their role (a role that Marcia and I would eventually inherit), Bob and Pat were responsible to help us get settled and to get started in language school and we were

happy to lean on them. Roger and Gen Getz were also very helpful. Former missionaries to Burma and present during the mid-1960’s when Burma expelled all missionaries, the Getz’s were imprisoned before being convinced to leave. Nearing retirement in 1982, Roger was serving as the mission treasurer. Many others helped us along the way as well and we’ll be mentioning them as time goes on.

Our first few days were largely spent at either the Bangkok Christian Guest House (BCGH) (https://www.bcgh.org/)  or the TBMF office.  Both of these entities still exist but neither looks anything like it did. The TBMF office was just a couple minutes’ walk from the BCGH so it was convenient to go back and forth. Marcia grew up in the city of Cleveland, rode city buses and had more of an urban background, but I was much more of a suburban bumpkin. On the other hand, I don’t remember feeling particularly intimidated by being in the “big city” so I think I was fairly game to figure it out.

One of the first things to figure out was how to cross Silom Rd. Bangkok was notorious for snarled traffic in 1982 and it certainly had a lot more cars on the road than we ever saw in Jefferson, Ohio. From a pedestrian view point, it was nice when the traffic was jammed at a traffic light. We could casually stroll across the street without a problem because the cars weren’t moving. But whenever we were walking, it seemed the cars were always moving. Plus, at the time, that stretch of Silom Rd didn’t have any traffic lights so there was no reason for the cars to stop. And be assured, like big city drivers anywhere, no Bangkok driver has any intention of stopping or even slowing unless they are absolutely forced to do so. So, how do you cross multiple lanes with bumper-to-bumper Bangkok traffic going as fast as they can so they can get as far as they can as quick as they can? It is a question our cross-cultural training did not address.

Fortunately, we had guides that coached us as to how and when to cross the street. Actually, our coaches would just walk off and leave us if we didn’t follow so we soon caught on. There is no official system but here are a few street crossing rules that worked for me:

1.      Don’t look directly at any car or driver. Pretend you don’t see them. Eye contact signifies weakness, hesitation and a lack of commitment. You look at him/her or if they see you eyeballing the car, they’ll likely speed up. Ignore them and start walking and they figure you’re really going to do it so they might let off the gas enough to let you cross.

2.      Don’t hesitate. If you start the first step, finish it and keep going. At the first sign of hesitation, the driver is going to step on it so if you have to flinch, pause or look uncertain in the slightest, step back to the curb and wait for the next opportunity (though know that the next opportunity could be a long time coming).

3.      Don’t worry too much about getting all the way across all lanes all at once. The cars will be staggered across the various lanes with motorcycles trying to shoot the gaps between the cars and tuk-tuks. Take it one lane at a time and you’ll usually find that once you get across one lane an opening will appear in the next, then the next, etc.

4.      If a fellow pedestrian appears confident and especially if they look to be a local resident, follow them. If they start to cross and they are going your way, join them. It’s likely some others will come along as well. The drivers might not mind hitting one person, but they’re less likely to run over a group.

We weren’t the only ones that needed street crossing lessons. Once we caught on to it, we took great delight in standing in the TBMF office where it overlooked Silom Rd. watching tourists cross the street. They would take a step, go back to the curb, try again, run back to the curb, etc. Sometimes it would go on for a long time and we would gloat about how street savvy we had become and chuckle.

Sadly, the building that housed the TBMF office on Silom was replaced and is now a Central Department Store/mall. The Skytrain (elevated rail) was built too, so now there are platforms with escalators that can take you across Silom Rd and I believe there are even pedestrian traffic signals to let people scurry across the street. Sigh…., the street crossing drama of Silom Rd. is no more.