IN MEMORIAM CHRIS EVANS 1958-2012
IN MEMORIAM
CHRISTOPHER DAVID EVANS
(19/04/1958 - 17/08/2012).
They called him “Tall Chris” or "Too Tall Chris"; the people who knew him in Bangkok. Some local Thais knew him as "The Long Man".
His younger sister Caitlin describes the cover picture of him, taken in 1978, the year he turned 20, as illustrating how dynamic and full of energy Chris always was.
This is the same picture that was attached to his casket for the funeral ceremony. It is probably as he would like to be remembered, "a likely lad".
Born in San Francisco while his father was finishing medical school, Chris was the son of Patricia and Phillip Evans and the brother of Bronwyn and Caitlin Evans.
In 1962, when Chris was about four, his family settled across the Bay in Berkeley Californian.
Chris as a young teenager.
Caitlin wrote:
"Berkeley in the 1960’s was at the front edge of huge cultural change in America and a magic place to grow up and become aware of the larger world. The University and its role in the free speech movement was at the core of this educated and very progressive community. We lived in the hilly part of Berkeley - home of college professors, doctors and lawyers. There were fancy houses and lots of good parties, pretty people and - in the 1970's - way too many drugs with far too little parental oversight.
"Chris’ early years were spent in a culture of free speech, free love, free school and anti-war demonstrations. Civil disobedience was the rule and rules were to be broken. With change there is chaos. There were many kids who got lost in the shuffle in Berkeley. Many of the boys had the hardest time making it through. They had a lot of fun, it cost them, but it also prepared Chris for what lay ahead."
Despite the affluent background, Caitlin describes Chris as being "a really sensitive kid with a hard spot in the family. It was never easy to be Chris and there just wasn’t a lot of parenting going on. Very early on, drugs were a way to sooth the angst that he felt as was acting out the youthful role of 'King of the Bad Boys'."
Chris as a young boy.
In tribute his older sister Bronwyn wrote: "Good Bye Little Brother. Thank you for your last message to me - you sounded so strong and clear. I listened to it every day and now its gone too.
"I had a bad accident after I got the call from the Embassy that you had left. Apparently it was my way of protesting your departure while getting closer to you all at once. Nothing compared to what you had last spring, though still much physical pain in my effort to short circuit the anguish of losing you once again. Self medication taken to the next level.
"So please know how much it mattered to get to be your big sister. The role defined me as I protected you the best I could, being only a kid myself. We had some fantastic times as kids doing kid things. You were pretty funny. Your freshman year at Berkeley High we watched you go from 95 to 165 lbs in the course of a school year - all straight up with legs from Hell to Breakfast. You grew so fast it seemed super natural.
"I understand your choice to stay in the place you loved with the amazing friendships you grew (one of your many talents). How grateful I feel that
we said 'I love you' and 'I miss you' a lot in the last many months, and so achingly heartfelt because perhaps we knew.
"And so Good Bye until next time,
So much love, Bronwyn."
Chris as a young man growing up in California.
While Chris may have been "King of the Bad Boys" as a young man growing up in California, he was later, in a sense, to become King of the Bad Boys on the streets of Bangkok.
Everyone, everyone who ever knew him could tell bad stories about Chris. These were stories better shared with laughter at a wake than rendered in print for gossip.
On his passing, what surprised people the most was the outpouring of affection for this errant soul.
“He helped me,” “He helped me,” individual after individual in the sub-culture for recovering alcoholics of Thailand’s capital stepped up to say; proudly declaring themselves to have been a friend.
Chris died alone in an apartment he had miraculously acquired with the assistance of his American family.
He might have died alone but he did not live alone.
The number of people he knew rivaled the prince of any kingdom.
While he came from a comfortable upper middle class background in America, Chris spent years on the streets of Bangkok as a street alcoholic, with no money, nowhere to live, without even a passport. He occasionally dreamed of travelling to Sri Lanka for a holiday, but his lack of travel documents made it an impossible dream.
His affection and respect for the people he met on the streets remained with him into sobriety – a period of his life in which he enjoyed various successes working as an extra in Thai movies and as a teacher all over the kingdom.
Even when he had money, Chris’s bohemian life-style continued. While often enough particular about his diet, he always regarded the take-away meals available from the “Seven” stores that dot Bangkok as akin to a feast. He patched together a living from various sources, including working at all sorts of odd jobs. And as often as not he relied on “the kindness of strangers”.
His sister Caitlin records: "Diagnosed with Lymphoma in January of 2012, Chris sought a variety of non-western treatments including acupuncture, and various other alternatives along with his meditation practice. His health was further deeply compromised in March of 2012 when he was struck by a motorcycle. His leg was badly broken as were his teeth and he suffered a serious concussion. Though his family provided funds for dentistry, food and rent, and offered to pay for any further cancer treatments (or to pay for his return to California), Chris made a choice to stay in Bangkok and continue his alternative treatments. During this time he remained positive in phone calls home saying again and again that he was getting better and just needed rest. He said he wasn’t afraid."
Chris was a multi-faceted, inconsistent, empathic almost clairvoyant character.
One of his many acquaintances, Simon Kind, recalls him thus: "He was quite particular about his diet, when he could be. I remember him pushing rice brain oil a lot and he liked to talk about various health kicks.
"Then again, a good feed was always welcomed regardless of calories. He also had an insatiable curiosity about all kinds of spiritual concepts, from Symona Rich and Florence Scovel Shinn to Dr David Hawkins."
Sections of speeches from these philosophers remain on his You Tube page.
Prior to the descent which saw him living on the pavements of Bangkok, during the 1990s Chris had lived an even more wild and colourful life amongst some of Bangkok’s richest Thais and the litany of colorful characters of Bangkok’s netherworld of bars and sex workers.
But rather than the high life, it was the low life on the streets of one of the world’s most challenging, beautiful and ever fascinating cities which shaped the personality Chris was to become more than any other experience. That left him with an understanding for those who fall through the cracks, who live on the streets of any giant city, who cannot abide the orthodoxies of middle class working life and who much prefer sleeping rough to the comforts any hotel can provide.
You could be walking with him down some non-descript Soi off the main Bangkok thoroughfare of Sukhumvit when Chris would point to a pile of boxes and garbage accruing in a street corner and say: “She’s a marvelous woman. You couldn’t meet a nicer person. She would always bring me food and make sure I was OK when I was on the down and out.”
No normal person would even notice the wizened face at the center of the boxes, much less know her by name or speak to her kindly.
Above are scenes from an earlier sunset.
Chris’s sister Caitlin says: “These are pictures of a very important view. This is from our family home in the Berkeley Hills looking west at sunset to the Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco. This view was in Chris’ mind always as we grew up with it and lived in it. It’s important to his spirit.”
Picture with his younger sister Caitlin taken in 1965.
While he spent many years in Asia Chis was also shaped by his childhood. It didn't take too much intuition to realize he had come from a good background.
Here is one tribute from a childhood friend, Katherine Anderson Schaaf:
"I grew up in Berkeley and have been friends with the Evans family for over forty years. I remember playing hours of chess with Chris when we were both preteens...
"The home was a magical place where chess was played bouncing on a waterbed in the living room, and dozens of rabbits (Muddy Water was the first) were snuggled while lazing around...
"There was Otto the dog, and those awful geese. But most of all there was warmth and kindness and love. I remember their grandmother explaining how you should never eat the tip of a cow's tongue because that is what they licked their nose with (I never have!).
"I remember raiding the refrigerator during an adult party and eating cake, licking the cream off our dirty fingers...
"I remember singing at the top of our lungs into a tape recorder... And then playing it back! I remember always feeling at home there.
"I haven't seen Chris in more than thirty years, but I will never forget his smile when he would beat me at chess..."
Another childhood friend Mark Somerville recalls: "I knew Chris through my brother, and Chris was always good to me even if I was younger. We skated together at Iceland many times and got into mild trouble on occasion. He seemed to love being there; he always went into things fully. I saw him on the swing erected in John Hinkle Park, suspended from a tree branch. It broke, of course, with Chris on it, and he rebounded quickly. "I remember his Praying Mantis egg sack that hatched in his room. Maybe 1,000 of them were living with him briefly. One stayed as a pet for a good while "
Chris in the eight grade, middle front row. Picture supplied by Mark Somerville.
As they grew older the wilder, darker times which characterised the 1970s loomed. Another childhood friend Ruby Blume recalls: "Chris..was already heading out as I was partying with his little sis at their house in the Berkeley hills. It was '74 or '75 and we were both in the 9th grade. The older kids were into PCP (Ed: an anesthetic style drug never approved for human usage which distorts perceptions of sight and sound) and coke (cocaine), who knows what else. It was wild and dark and intriguing too. It seems his life was both blessed and cursed and magical in its' own way - so different than what most people live. I offer my warm thoughts and condolences..."
Bangkok’s aging but well known Park Hotel in the heart of the tourist district of Nana.
Ever energetic, Chris’s love of and understanding for the under-belly of Bangkok life and for those struggling to gain some sort of stability in their own lives, led him to start or attempt to start several different recovery meetings, with varying degrees of success.
He was the co-founder of one of Bangkok’s smallest and longest running meetings, at the Park Hotel in Soi Seven off Sukhumvit.
Charles Ramsden from California recalls:
"I met Chris in Bangkok in 1999 and became friends...through life in Bangkok.
"My best memory of Chris was in 2004. Chris was ill - he had a tumor on one of his internal organs.
"At that time I was working at an office on Thong Lor, a few blocks from Chris's apartment. He and I would meet often at a coffee shop in the late morning, and hang out. Chris knew he was sick and needed to get medical attention, but did not know yet that he would need surgery. He did not have enough money to even go in for the initial treatments.
"He asked me and several other friends around town to help him with the expense. Several people helped out. He ended up collecting more money than he needed for the hospital. He received the initial examination and still had a few Baht left over. What he did with that money is what was remarkable.
I met with him the day after he received the diagnosis. He told me he was very sick, would need surgery, was scared, depressed, felt lost, and wanted to use. He had a few Baht in his pocket and was walking around the Lower Sukhumvit area at night. He ran into a friend who was drunk. Chris thought he had a choice to drink with him, or help him get sober too. It was too late to go to a meeting anywhere in Bangkok - so he had an inspiration to start a new meeting right there and then.
"He walked into the Park Hotel and negotiated the terms of the meeting. Chris started the Park Hotel Meeting, with nothing but permission to sit in the back of the lobby and order Nam Soda's from the coffee shop.
"This was Chris' legacy. He helped others - to help himself. This is only one story - there were dozens of other times that Chris helped new comers get a bowl of soup because they could not keep food down - or begged people for rides only to take another newcomer to a hospital.
"When I think of Chris, I think of him as the ultimate Bangkok Farang. Chris was Bangkok - and all that came with it. and Bangkok was Chris.
"Chris stood up at our weddings, wore a suit and showed respect when others showed up in sandals. Chris drove our wives to the doctor when they were pregnant. He watched our backs on the streets of Bangkok. He talked to us about spiritual principles when we were angry, resentful, and self obsessed. He reminded us of how lucky we are to have the gift of life, and to have today."
A dispute over the lack of formality, structure and financial accountability at the Park Hotel meeting led to the formation of a breakaway group known as the Ambassador Hotel, now the largest and most formal of the recovery meetings frequented by foreigners in Bangkok.
While not to everyone’s taste the meeting is regarded as a beacon of traditional “hard-core” recovery, as a lighthouse for alcoholics attempting to establish a sober life in a new country and in a city as replete with so many temptations as Bangkok.
The persistence of the English language meetings has now led to the establishment of Thai language meetings and the adaption into the Thai Buddhist culture of the “Twelve Step” programs originally developed within a fundamentalist Christian tradition in the America of the 1930s.
A memorial meeting for Chris was held at The Park Hotel in Chris’s honor in late August 2012, shortly after his death.
Some 40 people, all with stories to tell about their encounters or relationship with Chris, attended.
It was more attendees than the meeting had ever seen and went well beyond the usual allotted duration of one hour.
While there were occasional references to the more colorful side of Chris’s life – “the bastard left owing me 4,000 baht” got an instant laugh of recognition for example – the tributes were in turn compassionate, sad and affectionate.
And that line, “he helped me a lot”, was often repeated.
Unlike the more comfortable members of any recovery program, Chris always had an eye out to help the new comer.
Sometimes he would cause controversy by dragging drunken Thai men from a nearby whiskey stall into the meeting.
Always looking from the outside on the comfortable middle classes from whence he came, Chris dismissed his critics with an airy wave of the hand as nothing but simpletons, hypocrites, pissants who had no idea what it was like to genuinely suffer the throws of addiction and alcoholism and hence no compassion for those less fortunate than themselves.
There were a number of precursors to the establishment of the Park Hotel meeting.
Thomas O'Brien recalls: "A meeting which Chris started in the tourist area of Khao San was at Wat Bowon. This meeting was held in an idyllic setting in one of Bangkok’s most beautiful wats.
"Chris was well known to one of the senior monks who had helped him when he was destitute and still using. Later a sober and clean Chris would visit and received spiritual guidance from this Ajarn, or teacher, who gave his permission for a meeting to take place there.
"Chris was well aware that there are many active alcoholics and drug addicts in this area and felt it fitting that a meeting take place there. He would often trawl his old haunts after the meetings, with an eye to carrying the message. The Wat Bowon meeting enjoyed two periods and ran during the high seasons. Chris was back over at the Wat in the months prior to his death and was seeking to resurrect the meeting. This was a true measure of the man, even in his darkest moments, he sought to keep going.
"Chris loved the traditions of so-called "twelve step" programs for people in recovery from addiction to alcohol and other substances and always asked for them to be read out at meetings.
"Ever balking at authority figures, he did not like the cross sharers and power drivers or controllers amongst those attending. The meetings at Wat Bowon and Park Hotel that he founded/ helped found were ones where those recovering and/or suffering could hopefully feel safe and relaxed in an environment of love, tolerance, compassion and respect."
As one of the speakers recalled in some hilarious detail, Chris had established the Park Hotel meeting after persisting with trying to establish a meeting in another tourist mecca, Bangkok’s Koh San Road, once a center for the backpacking set and now a major tourist destination for budget travelers.
At one point the meeting Chris was trying to get off the ground was held upstairs at Burger King, at another point it was held at a local noodle shop. While the meetings were attended by a few loyalists, the sight of the gaunt frame of "Too Tall Chris" upstairs at Burger King waiting for newcomers reportedly being something to behold, in the end he decided a meeting in the center of the bars and brothels of Nana was likely to be far more successful and better attended.
Thus it proved to be.
The meeting, once held seven days a week and now held only on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays, has endured despite controversy and small numbers. It is still far less formal and therefore less intimidating to newcomers than any other meeting in Bangkok. And to this day, because of its history, no money is ever collected.
This is a picture of Chris as he appeared in a Thai movie My Keno Werk.
The readings for the role can be seen at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnOIXZ4CjO4
Bert Lee wrote of this stage of Chris's life: "He would show up on the set on time every time. His suit would be hard pressed. His hair perfect, exactly the color his director would like it to be. The man tried very hard to be what he wanted to be.
"I met Chris eight years ago in Bangkok. I was broke, scared and hopeless. Chris gave me 100 baht, which I used for the bus fares to commute from my mother’s house out of town to Bangkok to attend recovery meetings. Not too many people could claim that they were given money by Chris. It was Chris’s kind gesture that made me feel I was loved and accepted.
"Chris and I started to be friends. Chris often talked about many things that other people don’t normally talk about. Chris loved meditation. In 2006, Chris discovered that he had cancer. While the doctor was able to contain the cancer at the time, Chris said it was the meditation and prayers that got him through that difficult time. He also said that starting the meeting at the Park Hotel to help hopeless people like me helped him through the difficult time. I became a frequent member; and it helped me to find hope in life at the end of the day.
"It was unfortunate that the cancer came back for Chris. During the last conversation I had with Chris he expressed that the pain was unbearable. Chris went into meditation and prayer for the last time. This time Chris found the eternal Peace. He will always be in my thoughts for the rest of my life. He has been a part of my peace foundation, and always will. Chris's world was too beautiful, the reality of it never could have measured up. He taught me a lot I couldn't find in any open book. He is at peace now. I love you, Chris..."
Friend Howard Weiss has provided the following links for another movie, Dark Bridge, in which Chris was involved:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1612281/fullcredits#cast
http://vimeo.com/14314848
Dark Bridge (2011) - Full cast and crew
www.imdb.com
Dark Bridge on IM
Weiss wrote: "I am an old friend of Chris's from Tokyo from the early 90's. I am still based in Tokyo and frequently travel to Bangkok over the past several years seeing Chris every couple of months. I do have to say I really miss him and my visit to Bangkok last week wasn't quite the same."
Weiss also provided the following picture of a different Chris to the way many people remember him:
Chis punked up
Amongst other tributes was this one from Andrew M:
“When I remember Chris I think of his John Huston smile. He was a handsome devil, tall and debonair. I think of an American frontiersman, a guy that would lift his hat when you got off the postal coach in the gold rush town.
“Chris could see those who were hurting in the (recovery) rooms even though often they are trying to be invisible. He saw me for example. I was lost and I needed someone to talk to but I was too proud to admit it."
Andrew describes Chris as "the champion of the downtrodden".
“Twenty years from now, someone who has been sleeping rough will walk into a meeting that too tall Chris founded and hopefully be spared the hell that is the final stage of alcoholism. Chris was tough, almost sought out adversity. Anything was better in his mind, even sleeping rough in Bangkok, as long as sister freedom was there. He didn't want to be locked up in a job in Wal-Mart like most Californians are.
“God speed Chris. I hope when I reach the other side you will be there to greet me with that smile and show me around the new town.”
Another tribute from Charles Agar declared: "He touched a lot of lives, mine included. Chris was..always so kind, self-effacing and funny."
And Ola Larsson: "Chris was a very special person...I have many, many good memories of him. May he be happy and serene wherever he is right now!!"
Bevan Powrie wrote: "Chris helped many people, often those the rest of the world had given up on. He is greatly missed.
"I remember Chris when he first arrived from Japan. Back then you couldn’t get a decent pair of shoes in Thailand. This was just before globalization and the Thai’s wore nothing but rubber sandals. Everyone. Business executive’s, leaders of government all wore rubber sandals. There was like one store way down on Chareon Krung that imported Nikes. Leather shoes forget it. Imported goods were impossibly expensive and the local shoe manufacturers still hadn’t gotten onto the concept of the heal. "Well, Chris just had these chewed up old sneaks that he had arrived with. Extending a helping hand to new arrival we went on a shopping expedition. And it wasn’t for lack of money but we could not find a pair of shoes to fit his big Farang feet. I don’t know how long he was stuck with this shoes. And another memory, and I still teer-up when I think of this, but he was just getting sober and having a hard time of it. We at the Rum Ruddee meeting and this guy from San Francisco was there visiting. He picked up a twenty year chip. He thanked the guy who had taken him to his first meeting. It was Chris."
Christine Bierdrager: "Sorry to hear about your passing, Chris. May the transition be smooth and what comes next exceed your fondest hopes and wildest dreams. Haven't seen you in a while (back in USA), but still think of our talks and your support of others. Peace be with you." Tony: "I wish there was something that I could do. I knew Chris for about 10 years. He slept in my apartment a few times. And when I was in the shit, he let me sleep in his apartment. He helped me a lot. I was surprised/depressed when I heard of his passing - I got really drunk. The last time I had contact with him was about two years ago when I was at his apartment near Asoke. He appeared so healthy and full of life. He was so into the meditation and would take trips up to Suphan Buri to stay in a temple there for a few days, then come back to Bangkok. It was a big shock to learn of his passing. Unfortunately, I am still in the drink. I can't even organize my own daily affairs. My hat's off to him! He really turned himself around. Wish I could do at least as well as he did. I know it's too late to send anything but beautiful thoughts. Rest in Peace Chris."
Respectable Chris - as a teacher.
And below are yet more tributes:
Norah C, who has lived in Bangkok for 37 years and has been in recovery since 1979, recalls meeting Chris some 25 or so years ago.
"He walked in on crutches, having arrived from Japan, where he had been living," she said.
"He lived a long time there. He married a woman who subsequently suffered drug addiction problems. She came to Bangkok with him and then returned to Japan, where she later died.
"That was my first recollection. I remember Chris for the service he did, by starting new meetings in many different locations in Bangkok, both in the Thai and English languages. In spite of his many medical and financial difficulties he always kept coming back. Not many do. People get well, think they're cured and you never see them again. He always remained grateful to the program of recovery and the people in the program. And I have always respected and loved him for that.
"He had a good heart, he really did. I never heard him say mean things about people. So many people leave meetings and are mad at people, say vicious things about those in the program. Yet they forget that people in the program helped them to get better."
Adrian Hodge wrote: "Chris was a regular thread in the rich tapestry of my recovery journey in Bangkok from 2006 on-wards. I remember hanging out in the Wat Bavon meetings with Chris back in the early days of my recovery.. Going to those meetings then helped me a lot.. I've hung out with Chris all across Bangkok in the day and in the night.. He always had a tale to tell and a smile to offer.. I was with him a lot in the Rice Bran Oil days when Chris wanted to reach out to sick people by means of that same health product...
"As many have written here there was never an encounter with Chris when he didn't talk of helping a fellow addict or alcoholic. Aside from early sobriety hanging out at the Wat I remember clearly a long walk we took together, setting out close to his room in lower Thonglor along one of the city's canals.
It was another humid Sunday in Bangkok and the walk was one of two sober recovery friends with little care in the world other than to spend time in chat and wonder at the life and colour of Bangkok. Chris believed and I do too that Bangkok is a magical place. It can be dark too, though it is also populated by spiritual people of every kind.. Chris is one of those spiritual beings. We will never forget Chris, and Bangkok will always resonate with the presence of one of its adopted own. Rest in Peace Chris and safe travels on the journey, see you on the other side."
Chris: in his later years.
Yet more tributes:
Paul S: "Chris was the kind of guy normal guys envied and detested. He told me, "I don't even understand regular Americans anymore. No idea what they are thinking". He was so far removed from a middle class North American life.
"He would roll into Tokyo and within a day, have worked a deal with the Isreali mafia to get a street corner and have a new girl who was like a wife of 20 years working along side him. It always cracked me up to see. Some girl who literally was acting just like his wife. The conversations, hard work selling stuff on the street. Most guys couldn't get a girl to love them like that after years of being married. But for Chris, it was often a 24 hour from touch down thing. Going out to meet girls with him was unlike anyone else.
"For some reason he took to me. He told me that he thought of me as like him but having succeeded. It was a generous depiction but I thought of it as an honor. I came from a trailer park and in a way was living the life of my dreams.
"I thought of Chris as a real Asia Rat. The kind of guy that fascinated me upon arriving in Asia in the 80's. The type I wanted to become. A total rebel to slavish thinking. Someone who took life as it came and went deep down the rabbit hole and had deep knowledge of himself and humanity.
"Chris often lamented his lack of visa and passport but I don't know if it really bothered him too much. In many ways, he was made for what he was doing.
"Deep, simple, complicated. Chris, I was lucky to have spent time with you and been your friend."
Chris, in his final year of life, was already beginning to show signs of terminal illness. He had already survived a bout with cancer, but he still managed to make it down to his beloved Pattaya, where he had been a frequent visitor over the years. The memorial meeting at the Park Hotel ended on a somber note. Typically, as Chris provoked great loyalty amongst his galaxy of acquaintances, a friend of his he had got to know while living in Japan had flown from Tokyo just to see him. As the first to arrive at the apartment after the discovery of the body three days after his death and concern over Chris's failure to answer his phone.
It was no secret that Chris had been sick. He continued to attend meetings despite his rapidly deteriorating condition, exhibiting all the signs that his immune system had collapsed. At those meetings he spoke at some length, and afterwards spoke to everyone he could, as if he sensed he was not going to survive long. While he was still making plans for the future, none of them rang true. In a way those talks and his subsequent behavior were a plea for company, to commune with other souls. He rang people just to talk about nothing in particular, making it clear he was disturbed, if not frightened and in serious pain. In it all there was an overwhelming longing for others; and that was part of what made Chris such an empathic character, his need for and his genuine interest in people other than himself.
Six weeks before his death Chris listed as favourites on his You Tube account the Magical Healing Mantra: Om Mani Padme Hum, the Maharishi's Life Is Not Meant To Be A Struggle and David R. Hawkins' speech The Final Doorway. Clearly in a nostalgic frame of mind, he also posted links to those classic albums of his generation: Iggy Pop's Lust for Life and The Clash's masterpiece London Calling.
One of his acquaintances wrote: "Many people expressed shock and sadness at Chris's death and the speed with which he left us. Personally I think his death was mercifully short. I have had other friends die from similar suites of diseases, and their deaths are never pretty. Their lives are prolonged in ignominy and agony beyond all reason, beyond the collapse of human dignity and any point they would have wished to go. They are comparatively young men dying before their time; and with the assistance of Western medicine they fight their fates in an attempt to achieve their biological destiny of living to an old age. It was never going to be. Some people live their life's bright and fast. Chris's death meant an end to his suffering. It meant that most of us could remember him with his head held high and with a cheerful grin on his face; whatever his current difficulties and predicaments were. We can remember him as showing courage in adversity; as never having surrendered to the ordinary; of having been a frontiersman in a world with few frontiers left. And for that, and for the both irreverent and serious pleasures of having known him, we should all be grateful."
His sister Caitlin rounds off the tributes: "Chris led a wild life with many close calls. That he was able to enjoy a relatively sober and health final few years is a testament to his spirit and good luck. In 2002, at a very low time in his life, Chris was diagnosed with kidney cancer and came under the care of some monks he had befriended. Through this experience, in many ways, the last ten years of his life were his best. Its wonderful he got to have them." Chis Evans, who declared himself a Buddhist and often visited Bangkok's many beautiful and historic temples, was cremated on Sunday afternoon 9 September 2012 in a ceremony hosted by the US Embassy and paid for by his grieving family. The traditional Buddhist service, conducted with the assistance of four monks, was held at Wat Khlong Toei Nai, Khlong Toei, in Bangkok.
Chris's cremation was attended by a scattering of his most dedicated friends, a small percentage of the people he had helped and befriended over the years. They each made short but moving tributes to a unique personality. All commented on the way Chris had helped so many people over the years.
Below are imatges from Chris's final memorial service at Wat Sawettachat in Bangkok.
SCENES FROM CHRIS'S BELOVED BANGKOK:
A tribute to Christopher Evans 1958 - 2012.
Bon Voyage.
Printed and compiled by A Sense of Place Publishing.