fruittbatt

I've never trusted authority, especially when clad in a police uniform with gun in pocket, crew-cut, and poker-faced. In fact, I have flown thousands of kilometres to morally support people who have danced on and dented the roofs of police cars and twisted precious police Ray-Bans in protests in Australia.

Today, in desperation, and without any expectations..., I enlisted the help of the Thai Tourist Police.
A week ago a certain tour agent in Hua Hin, "Mr Ed", sold me tickets for a Songkran-dodging boat trip. Songkran, or Thai New Year, is basically an exercise in mass drenching by water-canon, bucket, hose, etc. No one escapes the dousing. Then there is the cream powder slurry-smearing and the foam parties and the LOUD bands that don't sleep for three days and nights. It is a festival for the young and gung-ho, not for the curmudgeonly and geriatric. Sailing out into the Gulf of Siam and getting thoroughly and voluntarily wet seemed like a good alternative. Until the Manager of the Company visited us two days ago to explain that the tour was cancelled because of Thai New Year. Duh! Mr Ed would refund us in full, she assured.

Mr Ed was not around when we fronted his makeshift booth near the Hilton Hotel yesterday. When we returned an hour later, Mr Ed's booth had also evaporated, as had the Bangladeshi tailors who had advised us when he would return.

This morning we called Mr Ed, whose only English was the word "NO", repeated incessantly. I had a little more luck speaking in Thai. Mr Ed assured me the tour would be ON tomorrow. We should just wait for him to pick us up. I called the Manager of the Company. She insisted that the tour was definitely OFF. She would call me back. Yeah...
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The tourist police spoke far better English than I speak Thai. They confirmed my story before escorting me to the back seat of the police car. Three of them, one of me. The guy with the crew--cut drove and multi-tasked admirably; dodging motorbikes, smiling through the ordeal of bar-alley where whores in tiny shorts smudged slurry on the windows of the cruise car, aimed water canon at the windscreen, and tipped their buckets over us. The policeman talked constantly on his mobile. He was on the case of our $120 refund. He sped through red traffic lights.

The very young woman in the back seat with me looked like a uni student in her white shirt and pleated black skirt with bulldog-clip holding the belt in place. She reassured me in excellent English that they would get our money back. I believed her, against all reasonable hope.

The crew-cut cop was not deterred by the sight of Mr Ed's unmanned booth. Within two minutes he had discovered Mr Ed's home address in an unsalubrious soi, opposite a crash-repair shop. Mr Ed's scribbly son advised that his father had spent the day drinking at a friend's house. The friend lived in an even narrower and nastier soi. He was a huge-gutted man in greasy shorts and no shirt. He stroked his belly. Mr Ed had gone to his mistress's house in neighboring Pranburi, he said. The police in Pranburi said their office was closed already for traffic duty, monitoring the holiday mayhem on the highway south.

The woman cop in the front of the car was in a holiday mood, advising the driver to run red lights and commenting on the specials at the new KFC which would open tomorrow for New Year. She phoned the tour Company, and both she and Mr Crew-Cut demanded that they refund our money. Within half an hour we had the cash in hand.

Thanks so very much to the Hua Hin Tourist Police for your fantastic efforts in recovering our money. You are brilliant. Happy New Year to you and here's to your standards of excellence.