A Game of Buddhas

Before us on a street in Banglamphu, Bangkok, walked a well-dressed Thai, peering at shop windows but generally just tiptoeing on. We trodded along behind him in the burning heat, trying to find either a decent store for shoes (which I badly need) or a restaurant selling local food. Yesterday it had been +38C, but this day seemed the hottest of them all so far.

After about 500 meters of this tag-along, the local guy turned around and came to talk to us. He claimed to be an English teacher at a nearby school and began to tell us how today was special - that we could visit some great sights free just today, because it was some Buddhist special day and government promoted. He marked four sights on our map. Tomorrow the same sights would have an entrance fee.

Among these sights was the Standing Buddha and the Black Buddha. He also said we should visit the Golden Mount and some other sight, and even beckoned a tuk-tuk for us. Only yellow tuk-tuks would do, as they were government supported for this. It would only cost us 20 baht for all four sights. Vroom, and we were off. Such an easy thing to send two farangs off in any which way, it seems.

The Standing Buddha was a somewhat decent sight to behold. The golden statue towered above us just a little like the ancient Colossus. Although I am in no way religious, I visited the shrine inside the temple and took a moment to sit down and pray.

"You are very lucky you in Thailand today, because today is the only day the Black Buddha is open. Only one day open every year!" the English teacher had said. I was suspicious from the start, especially since I'd heard his English wasn't quite perfect, but I was willing to see how this most-likely a scam would work. Plus the 500 meters of tiptoeing made me give him the benefit of the doubt. "Lets see the Black Buddha next", I told the tuk-tuk driver, who was waiting for us outside the temple area. And off we went with a nod.

However, after the second temple (the Buddha here had not been black) I insisted we would pay the 20 baht to the driver and go and eat something, as we had originally planned. The driver refused the money and said he could wait happily for a few hours for us! Was this not just a tad too suspicious? Refusing money and willing to wait for hours? And for what? He would get his 20 baht earlier this way, not later, and with less work. It made no sense.

So I insisted. His expression turned sour and he grabbed the 20 bahts from my extended hand with an angry gesture, but he did not make any rude remarks and simply walked away. It was clearly a scam, yet I didn't know what for. Someone would've probably tried to sell us something overly expensive at some point.

It is such a shame Thailand is infested with these scams. Being mostly a poor country, I understand an individual's need to resort to a scheme such as this, but the morals are no less questionable. Today it ended up costing probably more than it was worth for them. And our adventure walking the streets we did not know had begun for us. That, not the temples, was the most fun part of today.

Perhaps next time I will play ignorant and go see the Buddhas again for 20 bahts.