About 5 months ago I decided to improve my fitness and have since set my sights on the Bangkok marathon at the end of the year. Until today my exercise regime has taken place in a small but satisfactory gym on the 2nd floor of my apartment building. Starting with the treadmill I usually aim for a 4-5km run which is made a hell of a lot easier with a rotating fan, air conditioning, a cold water bottle and a sweat towel. Today I ventured outside and had none of these added extras which I really had taken for granted.
There is a park not far from our apartment blocks which is ideal for running; well, ideal as you can get for Bangkok anyway. To get there, according to my pedometer, it takes a little under 1.5km through residential streets and across a highway. Instead of walking to the park I decided to jog which turned out to be a 1.5km obstacle course. First, there is little or no footpath so I had to run on the road. This is generally ok but Bangkok traffic is never quiet and taxis, tuk tuks, cars and motorbikes zoom through the streets. Being at the bottom of the food chain means it is my responsibility to get out of the way. Where there is a footpath it is imperative to always look down for holes, cracks or loose bits of cement which are determined to roll your ankle.
As I turned the first corner a mangy mutt took an interest in my jogging and followed me. Dogs are, to my knowledge, placid beasts in Bangkok but I was unsettled to have this one tagging closely behind. Having just finished a Stephen King novel, one where a mangy mutt not dissimilar to this one snacked on a human, my nerves were a little on edge. Images of his dirty fangs digging into my calf and an evening spent at hospital fighting off rabies were too much to handle so I legged it. I didn’t look back until the next corner. The mutt had lost interest and I was already getting tired.
After, I passed food stalls with people digging in to an afternoon noodle soup, then a bus stop where the masses waited to go home. I weaved through a motorbike taxi rank at the front of the skytrain and past people selling coffee. Young workers from a construction site, dirty and tired, smiled and joked as I ran past. Two umbrellas, on either side of the footpath, made a kind of tent which was transformed into a kitchen cooking up Saturday evening street food. Chicken and fish were being grilled over hot coals and I got a good mouthful of the thick smoke as I ducked through. Burning chili sent a brief sting to my eyes and nose but it was the next smell that got me. The stench of stale piss was a bit too much, and occupied a long area on the side of the road where taxi drivers stop to relieve themselves. The smell clung to the inside of my nostrils as I tried to cough it away. It was absolutely putrid. I legged it again until I reached the overpass that crossed the highway. Here I watched the busy afternoon traffic below as the approaching gray clouds grinned down.
Once on the other side of the highway it was near the entrance to the park which has a great running area with 1.8km per lap. It is peaceful and relaxing with an artificial lake in the middle. There were no dogs, taxis, food stalls or stale piss so I could run in peace. After two laps it was definitely feeling more difficult than the treadmill but if I want to run the marathon it has to be outside so outside I will go. I managed a 5km run which included a 1.5km obstacle course which is a good start, I think, to running in Bangkok. I will try and get out here a few times a week.
