0 IN THE TRIANGLE
Well, here we are in the fable and infamous Golden Triangle where Laos, Burma and Thailand all come together. Didn't take too long to get here either. My lover Kelly and I boarded a bus in Chiang Mai this morning and after just a seven hour ride to go maybe 150 miles, we are now at the end of the road in Tatong right on the Thai-Burmese border and gateway to the Opium fields. Neither the Thai nor the Burmese control the area. It's controlled by Kun Sa, the Biggest, Baddest Opium Warlord in the entire world. He has his own standing army and is said to control 80% of the world’s output of O. Even the DEA won't fuck with this dude. A while back the DEA put a bounty on Kun Sa's head. He retaliated by putting an even bigger bounty on any of the DEA agent’s heads. The DEA then withdrew their bounty so status quo.
We get off the bus and notice that almost every older male is armed with either a shotgun or an automatic weapon. One of them walks up to us and asks if we need a guide to go up into Karen country where the O is. The Karen’s also have their own army, are allied with Kun Sa and are at war with the Burmese. The guide explains that we will need an armed guard because the Thai's are fighting the Burmese who are fighting the Karens. And the Thai's and the Burmese are fighting Kun Sa, the Pathet Lao and all the other warlords, political insurgents and general bad guys who all live in the triangle. If we decide to go alone, we'd be lucky just to get robbed, rather than raped, he says looking as Kelly, then killed, looking at me, and then robbed. Why just the other day, he tells us, the Pathet Lao machine-gunned six hill-tribe people to death in a pick up truck simply because they weren’t Laotians. We tell him that we'll think about it and ask where the hotel is being that it's already 4 p.m. and too late to go into the Triangle today. He shrugs like it's your funeral and points down the street.
It's the only hotel in town. When we ask for a room the clerk asks how long we want it for. We say one night then ask him about going into the Triangle. He tells us that starting at 5 a.m. pick up trucks will be going up whenever one fill with enough people to make it worth the driver's while. We tell him to wake us at 6 a.m. After supper we go to bed. It being a hard day and so fall peacefully asleep
About midnight we're awakened by noises coming from the next room, there's giggling, panting, groaning and bed squeaking. Some bodies are screwing in the next room and the walls are very thin. We think this is cute and funny and after a few minutes it stops so we settle down and go back to sleep, but just as we're about to doze off it happens again. We heard the couple leave after they were done so we think that they must have gone out for something and are now back. After the third time this happens we realize that the hotel also doubles as the town whorehouse (a common occurrence in Asia) and that we will get very little sleep this night. About 4 a.m. the trips to the room peters out and we are finally able to get a few hours sleep.
It's 6 a.m., time to get up and at that O. We find a driver, who asks, "Where to?"
We tell him, "To the best Opium den that you know about."
He nods and tells us to hop in back. We get in and when it fills up with people, the driver honks his horn and off we go. After about an hour of riding up and down a dirt track we stop at a village where the driver honks his horn and tells us to get out then he starts yelling in Thai (?). A guy comes out of the house and talks to the driver, he nods, we pay the driver then follow the guy around his house to the back.
He points to a loft above the barn and says, "20 Baht a day." ($1) We check it out and say okay. It's just a wooden floor with some straw and blankets on it but good enough since we did not come for the accommodations.
We ask him about smoking some Opium.
He says, "Later no problem." so we hang out waiting for later.
We find out that he's a Karen and the headmen for this village. He shows us his wife, children, animals and the village. His wife makes us lunch and we spend a very pleasant day with him. Since it is so dangerous, the headman assures us that what the guide told us is true and that they don't get many foreigners here, that we'll have to an armed guard when we go smoke the O. After sundown the headman tells us that it's time and leads us to a pick up with a driver, a guy with a shotgun in the bed and another with an AK47 riding shotgun.
The headmen says, "20 Baht, 20 Baht, 20 Baht." as he points to each of the men.
We say okay. We get in the bed with the headman who tells us to lie down so no one can see us. We do and we're off. We ride for about 20 minutes before we're allowed to sit up, and when we do we’re in dense jungle. We stop in front of a huge stand of bamboo and the headmen tells us to get out, this is the place. This is the place? There's nothing here!
The headman says to follow him and walks right into the bamboo. In the middle of the grove is the Opium den with mats, pillows and kerosene lamp burning and of course, the Pipe Master. We lay down on the mats and the Pipe Master asks us if we want pure or half pure? (The other half is powered aspirin)
We say, "Pure."
He asks us how many pipes?
We ask the dose?
He says that five, a half gram, is the usual.
We ask the price?
10 Baht a pipe.
We tell him 10 pipes, a full gram apiece sounds about right.
I take a prepared pipe and the Pipe Master lights it. The smoke is so light that you can barely feel it as it enters your lungs and you only taste a slight sweet flavor. I smoke 5 pipes then Kelly takes 5, then me, then her once again.
The Pipe Master asks if I’d like any more?
Well, why not just one with aspirin, or maybe two ....
After we're done we lay down on the mats and wait. It doesn't take long to feel the effects. It's a warm golden safe totally contented feeling overtaking your entire body and mind. Your whole being is engulfed in pleasure and it just keeps getting better. Before we get too high to move the headman tells us it's time to go back the village. We lay in the bed of the pick up looking up at that star filled sky and ride.
Now whether that ride took 20 minutes or 20 million years I didn't know or care. I only knew that I felt better than I ever had before in my entire life and that this was the ultimate high. I was simply part of the conscious universe with no feelings, thoughts or cares, just pure unadulterated bliss. When we got back to the headman’s house he took us over to the banana patch so we could puke but it was more like fountaining and with each fountain I got higher, more golden, more liquid. He then led us up to the loft where we laid down and stayed there dreaming, dreaming, dreaming for the next 36 hours.
Next morning (for us anyway) we were feeling a little sick but the headman’s wife fed us and gave us tea to drink then the headmen gave us some ganja to smoke. After that we felt fine enough for the ride back to Tatong where we spent the night in the hotel/whore house but this time we slept right through all the fucking. Next day we caught a bus back to Chiang Mai. The Thai cops searched us on the way out of the Triangle making sure that we weren’t bringing anything back with us but we didn't care because we had just experienced the finest high in the entire world.