Hey Ray,
I appreciate your kind words and while we were really pleased with the Saturday ride and the great turn out and atmosphere in the evening, this was one big learning experience for me and after Friday I thought it may end up a big embarrasing one.
To explain, last year at KK Bike week Vol 1, I met some of the organisers, one of whom speaks good english and rode and socialised with them during last 6 months. They asked me to join them in organising this one and handle the international rider side of things. I attended about 8 committe meetings, made 2 TV programs, one in BKK, one in KK, made a speech at the press release event, turned any output for print or TV or poster etc from Thai English to English English and organised the Sat Ride.
I understood only a small percentage of the committee meeting content, and voted on things I did not really know what I was voting for, by voting with whom I thought were the good guys. I published where I could the Fri and Sat timetables on various websites and helped with finding hotels for people etc. I also made various announcements and speeches etc in English. Non of it ardous.
I turned up on time for the Fri opening at 10.00am and made the opening speech to myself. Virtually none of the Saturday timetable happened and I intercepted what people I could who came along and tried to explain what was not happening.
Seems that there was a general agreement that it was far to hot to put on day time displays etc that the Thais understand weather better than we do and so the whole thing really did not take off till Saturday. I handled the flack from the few who turned up best I could.
We Farangs are just not flexible about these things and I was embarressed that published events did not happen till late in the day. The ride and the evening programme went to the book. I had 2 very long and hot and tiring days ,made worthwhile by the Saturday turnout.
Hope that explains it a bit. Apologies to those who may have only wanted to attend Friday.
Those who arrived Friday, enjoyed a good night out in KK town, rode with us Saturday, rested for the hot afternoon and turned out after dark had a great time . Same for those mostly Thai groups that turned up Sat afternoon evening.
So I learned a lot and next year the published info with match up as much as it can over here, and maybe my Thai is good enough to understand and contribute more at the earlier planning stage.
The reason I have gone into so much detail is maybe to encourage others to get involved in their local bike weeks and hopefully more of it will be to our international tastes and expectations. Any suggestions for improvement welcome.
Next year we make it a one day event
