IN BISBEE AZ, THE BIG PARADE IS ON THE FOURTH OF JULY. AND ON THE FOURTH OF JULY, IT USUALLY RAINS. IN CHIANG MAI, THE BIG PARADE, THE ONE CHUCK AND CURT AND PEGGY AND I CAME THOUSANDS OF MILES TO SHOOT, OCCURS DURING THE DRY SEASON. WHICH, I SUPPOSE, IS WHY THE OLD BRITISH GENTLEMAN STAYING HERE AT THE KHUMSIPHAYA RESPONDED AS HE DID WHEN I COMMENTED THAT I HOPED THE PARADE DIDN'T GET RAINED OUT. "IT'S THE DRY SEASON, YOU DAMNED FOOL. SO IT AIN'T BLOODY LIKELY THE PARADE'S GONNA GET RAINED OUT." 'Well, excuse me for walkin' upright. How the Hell was I supposed know the dry season from the wet season?" "You been here six days.", he responded. "Ye think the fact it ain't been bloody rainin' mighta' provided ya a clue?' Well, be that as it may, it's day 6, the day we get to photograph the annual Chiang Mai Flower Festival Parade. It's 7 am (That's 5 pm yesterday in Bisbee.), and Chuck, Curt and I have almost reached the Blue Diamond Cafe where we're set to meet Peggy for breakfast. We're going to be a bit rushed because we've been informed, actually misinformed as it turns out, that the parade begins at 8 am. That's when I decide to photograph an old Buddhist monk walking down the street. I compose, and I press the shutter. It's then that those three dreadful words appear on my LCD screen - NO MEMORY CARD! Oh Hell, this is embarrassing. We're already running late and I forgot to put a memory card in the friggin' camera? CHUCK AND CURT ATTEMPTED UNSUCCESSFULLY TO HIDE THEIR UTTER CONTEMPT AS THEY OFFERED TO ORDER BREAKFAST FOR ME WHILE I RACED BACK TO MY HOTEL ROOM TO RETRIEVE MY 8 GIG SDHC. When I arrived breathless back at the Blue Diamond, Chuck and Curt were seated with Peggy at a table for four, In front of the empty space sat the bowl of fruit I told the guys to order plus a whole wheat English muffin and hot Chinese tea. This was great. In my earlier discombobbled state of mind, I had just said bread and had failed to mention beverage. And yet it was like Curt and Chuck had read my mind. As I sat down, Chuck turned to me and said,"We told the waitress to bring coffee and a croissant but she brought this instead." The waitress, it appeared, knew what to bring me without being told. I guessed I was now officially a regular at the Blue Diamond Cafe. After breakfast, we continued walking the rest of the way to the parade area. A huge number of onlookers was gathered as well as dozens and dozens and DOZENS of booth merchants hawking their wares. 8 am came and went. NO PARADE YET. 9 am came and went. NO PARADE YET. I photographed the crowd, the merchants, the Buddhist monks. STILL NO PARADE. Finally, I decided to pay a visit to my old friend Ronald McDonald who stood beckoning to me from a nearby street corner. As soon as I entered the establishment, I could see that there were a few differences between this McDonald's and ones I had visited in Sierra Vista and Tucson. First up, the menu items were not quite the same. After studying the menu for a couple minutes, I settled on the Tofu McMuffin and a cup of hot Chinese Tea. The young female server asked cheerfully if I wanted to make it a value meal. I shook my head NO. The French fried seaweed just didn't appeal to me. I was handed a number, and I stood waiting for my meal. This part was just like it was in the good old U.S. At least that's what I thought at first. However, after about twenty minutes of watching the speed at which orders were coming out from the kitchen, or rather the speed at which they failed to come out from the kitchen, I realized that these people simply did not grasp the basic concept of fast food. A good forty minutes after I walked in, I was finally handed my lousy McMuffin. As I left a short time later, I took great care to kick Ronald McDonald in the butt. The parade, when it finally got there, was wonderful. Huge floats constructed from colorful flowers, carved melons, seeds and other such (just like the Pasadena Rose Parade) and attractive young men and women from all over Thailand, dressed in colorful traditional garb, streamed down the street. Photographing the marchers was comparatively easy. I could get right up to them and SNAP! Floats were a different matter entirely. The problem was that people would wander out into the street fascinated by the oncoming float. Then the person would stand there, like a deer with its eyes caught in the headlights, watching the float till it was too late. If no one intervened, the onlooker would quite simply be run down by the gigantic float. However, the local constabulary had, thank God, already been around this particular track a few times. So the police, as well as what appeared to be special volunteer tourist police, would march in front of each float and shove onlookers to the side of the street in the nick of time before the oncoming float could mow them down. What this meant for me though was that I would have to go out into the middle of the street, take whatever shots I could, then dodge aside before the approaching cop decided to do it for me, or should I say to me. This was at best somewhat disconcerting. Then again, I guess the cops did serve as sort of a safety net between the approaching float and me, the photographer. All in all though, it was another wonderful day in Paradise. Larry Elkins Elkinsphotos
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