High Kick

2nd night in Bangkok and we're at Lumpinee Stadium. Obviously no one is going to Bangkok and not seeing a Muy Thai fight, especially since Jake trained Muy Thai for years and I'm a huge MMA fan.

To back up a bit, our group has changed already. Pat's cousin and buddy have gone down to Krabi in southern Thailand to rock climb and we've been joined by another one of Pat's friends from SF, Josh. Anyway, we arrive at the stadium via cab and grab some street curry for a quick bite. In Thailand, you ALWAYS need to ask/specify/insist on the spiciness of your food. Thai people can handle a ridiculous amount of spice and they will test you here if you're not careful. After hearing that this particular curry was "a little" spicy, we knew we were screwed but just ate it anyway.

I pretty much spent the next 20 minutes with my mouth open, hoping that the air would make the burning go away. Beer didn't work either. This was pretty much the reaction around the table while the Thai guy next to us dumped whole chilis on his curry and took it down without flinching. Lesson learned.

1700 Baht later (about $50) we had seats 6 rows back from the ring. The stadium is not particulary huge and we had an excellent view of 8 fights. These guys are vicious and just beat the living shit out of each other. Liam would have been so stoked being the Fairtex fanatic that he is.......

All the fighters were lightweights, bantamweights,etc (not too many heavyweights in Thailand, everyone's so small), but they really put on a show. We also got to see the fighters warm up as they do it in the area in front of the bathroom where our seats were. You're standing at the urinal and next to you is some short Thai boxer taking a piss before he goes and kicks his buddy in the head. Pretty sweet