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Published: April 11th 2014
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Today was a nice reminder of how Thailand really brings out the best in people.
It started off like any other day…slept in till 1, made some ramen and lounged around until Lala and I couldn’t take it anymore. We decided we’d check out the outlet mall in Phuket. We’ve been here for 6 months and managed to avoid it, but I was in the market for a GoPro camera and that seemed like the best place to find one. We hopped on my bike and headed down the road. After turning off the highway, within sight of the mall, my bike gave out. We figured I must have snapped a belt since no matter how much gas I gave it; we slowly rolled to a stop. There was a small parking lot just a couple feet further, so we jumped off the bike and pushed it in.
Not knowing what to do next, we called Tony, our resident guy and de facto all-things-guy-expert and told him what had happened. He confirmed what we had thought, that it was probably a belt issue and promised to come save us. We gave him rough directions on where we
were, and within 45 minutes he came coasting along.
Sure enough, no amount of kicking and cursing would get the bike moving so we decided to start hiking it down the highway until we could find the first mechanic stop. Now, to be fair, in Phuket (as well as most of Thailand) mechanic shops make up about 70% of all store fronts so we figured it probably wouldn’t be too big of a mission to get to one, but obviously my bike gave out in the one area of town where no mechanics could be found.
We had seen some Thai people pushing a bike by propping up a leg onto the broken bike and pushing it with a second, working bike. We tried to give that a shot, but we were sloppy and Tony’s manual bike posed some issues. We gave up and decided good ol’ fashion pushing was going to have to count. So there we were, 3 farangs on the side of the highway pushing my broken bike. Just as we were dripping in sweat, cursing the cars honking as they were driving by (because obviously on the side of the high way was our first choice of hang out joints) a random Russian guy pulled over and offered to help. He got Tony to get back on his bike with Lala, got me settled on my bike, hiked a leg up onto my gear box and Thai style push-towed my bike the next 2 miles.
At first it was a little awkward, I kept trying to “help” but using my feet to balance while struggling to keep the handle bars straight. The whole time he kept a smile on his face and told me not to worry. At one point he stopped and had a full conversation in Thai with a lady on the side of the road, whom I can only assume directed him to the next turn. He then continued to push me forward, through a left turn and down a neighborhood road to a mechanic. Every couple minutes he’d give me a good kick forward, roll up next to me crack a joke then return back to his pushing position. Once the mechanic was in sight he gave me one last kick, pointed to the mechanic and drove off without a second look back. I yelled thank you after him, but I’m not even sure if he heard. This kind of pure, unadulterated kindness is what Thailand is all about. It reminds you how a simple gesture to a stranger can completely turn their day around. We’d still probably be pushing my bike along the side of the road if that man hadn’t spent 10 minutes helping us to a shop.
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