The train to Chiang Mai was an all-night party. It was exactly unlike the Chinese train in that our car was filled with foreigners and the Thai crew were partying with us on the way up. We sat next to an exceedingly cheerful bald Amsterdamian in his late thirties who was to trek through the jungles with his father. His father, a good man with a mustache curled at both ends, gave me a small pouch of quality Dutch tobacco. He had been to the Indonesian jungles eight times and is exactly what you'd expect an 18th century colonial safari sojourner to look like.
We arrived at around ten in the morning and tuk-tuk'ed to the Banana Guest House. It's the first time I've never had to pay up front for a room. Even my lunch was put on a tab. We spent the first part of the morning wandering around looking at Buddhist temples. We struck gold with Wat Chedi Luang, a 700 year old temple half ruined 500 hundred years ago by an earthquake. A sign to side read "Monk Chat," so we spent the next hour with a 21 year old monk talking about infinity, faith, science, and Buddhist rituals. I bought a book from him, exchanged email addresses [he also had a cell phone {to call his mother}], and I intend to keep the conversation alive.
I upped adventure up a notch after that. I rented a motorcycle for roughly $3. I've never ridden a motorcycle before, or even ridden on for that matter. I thought it was a moped. It was not. I spent the next hour struggling to keep on the left side of the road, shift gears, and figure out where the hell I was. Luckily the core of Chiang Mai is walled in making it truly difficult to get lost. My legs are still shaking from that little party. I'm not sure if I have the testicular fortitude to continue learning this particular craft. It feels as dangerous as it is. I've never wanted a seat belt more.
Don't know where we're going now. There's a lot of "trekking" near here... to village tribes, to elephant riding through the jungles, to white water rafting, downhill mountain biking, even cross-border visa runs to Myanmar and Laos. My gut is telling me to take the three hour bus ride through the mountains to Pai, a hippie hide-out on the Burmese border.
It's an object of curiousity what exactly all these hippies are doing here. We're not talking young dread-locked experimentalists you'd catch a String Cheese Incident show. We're talking mid to late twenties, sometimes older, guys and gals with dreads and very free flowing clothes. They're dressed more native than the Thai's. Sometimes I feel like I'm back at a Rainbow Gathering.
It's also of curiosity my reaction towards them. In America I have a bit of admiration for the legimate counter-culturalist. But these guys are in Asia. My new neck of the woods. I place where I try my best everyday to adopt to cultural norms. I'm not so appreciate of white counter-culture here, but that could change if I knew how the Thai's felt about it. I think there's a strong chance that this is, indeed, not China and the Thai's really are as non-judgemental as they appear. This is the land of the "girl-boys", the only thing a Chinese person can tell you about Thailand.
Monday, February 05, 2007
The Bangkok Scam
"We drive you everywhere you want. 3 hours, 4 hours, 5.... OK," a Tuk-Tuk driver said as he unfurled a map. He pointed to four or five temples and asked where we wanted to go. "I take you for 60 bat [$1.25], OK?"
It sounded too good to be true so we asked more questions.
"We take you to the Thai Center. You go in, look around, no have to buy anything, we get coupon for free gas."
"We don't have to buy anything? We can just browse for a minute, walk in and walk out?"
"That is fine."
We confirmed with the tourist sitting near us that this wasn't too good be true. So we hopped on and spent three hours looking at three or four temples. One of them, built on top of a hill, gave an amazing view of the Bangkok skyline. In the distance a few skyscrapers clung together. All around us were the Hershey-kiss styled Wak temples reaching into the sky. There are over 300 such temples in Bangkok. From their my first impression was confirmed: Bangkok really isn't that big of a city. At least not by the Chinese standards I'm used to. It was also flush with culture, especially if religion is used as a relative index. My fear that the rest of Asia looks like China is luckily falling apart.
We got dumped off at at the Asia center, really just two stores. The first was full of fluent Indians trying to sell expensive suits. I only last two or three minutes before bolting out.
"No no no! You must spend 10 or 15 minutes inside!" He grabbed me by the arm and led me into a jewelry store. I figured I could spend ten minutes there working off my taxi fair by looking at shiney objects.
Inside there were six workers in kiosks doing nothing. At the far end of the store in a display case was a box of rocks next to another box with the polished counterparts. I spent a good six minutes staring at the box of rocks before Lyndsey had to bolt.
Our driver didn't get his coupon but still took us to another temple.
"We try again. We to TAT now."
TAT worked out much better. It was a travel agency. They had wonderful maps and were more than happy to answer all of our questions about transit options and activities in different towns. We were almost sold on a $25 three day hiking and camping trek through a national park outside Chiang Mai.
The driver got his coupon and dropped us off at the big mall [so I could buy another memory card for my camera {2gb, $17}]. He left us there though because he wanted to catch the Thailand - Singapore soccer game. He only wanted 20 bat for three hours of travel. 50 cents. 50 cents and fifteen minutes, anyway.
It sounded too good to be true so we asked more questions.
"We take you to the Thai Center. You go in, look around, no have to buy anything, we get coupon for free gas."
"We don't have to buy anything? We can just browse for a minute, walk in and walk out?"
"That is fine."
We confirmed with the tourist sitting near us that this wasn't too good be true. So we hopped on and spent three hours looking at three or four temples. One of them, built on top of a hill, gave an amazing view of the Bangkok skyline. In the distance a few skyscrapers clung together. All around us were the Hershey-kiss styled Wak temples reaching into the sky. There are over 300 such temples in Bangkok. From their my first impression was confirmed: Bangkok really isn't that big of a city. At least not by the Chinese standards I'm used to. It was also flush with culture, especially if religion is used as a relative index. My fear that the rest of Asia looks like China is luckily falling apart.
We got dumped off at at the Asia center, really just two stores. The first was full of fluent Indians trying to sell expensive suits. I only last two or three minutes before bolting out.
"No no no! You must spend 10 or 15 minutes inside!" He grabbed me by the arm and led me into a jewelry store. I figured I could spend ten minutes there working off my taxi fair by looking at shiney objects.
Inside there were six workers in kiosks doing nothing. At the far end of the store in a display case was a box of rocks next to another box with the polished counterparts. I spent a good six minutes staring at the box of rocks before Lyndsey had to bolt.
Our driver didn't get his coupon but still took us to another temple.
"We try again. We to TAT now."
TAT worked out much better. It was a travel agency. They had wonderful maps and were more than happy to answer all of our questions about transit options and activities in different towns. We were almost sold on a $25 three day hiking and camping trek through a national park outside Chiang Mai.
The driver got his coupon and dropped us off at the big mall [so I could buy another memory card for my camera {2gb, $17}]. He left us there though because he wanted to catch the Thailand - Singapore soccer game. He only wanted 20 bat for three hours of travel. 50 cents. 50 cents and fifteen minutes, anyway.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Thailand
So Lyndsey and I pulled things off perfectly - three border crossings in one day. Shenzhen to Hong Kong to Macau to Bangkok. The flight was smooth and we wound up sharing a cab and dinner with a Surinamese expat living here. Suriname is north of Brazil and east of Venezuala, for all those who didn't know - includuing every customs agent.
There's a little backpacker district we're hanging out in now. I've come to stay away from other white people and touristy areas, but this place rocks. Last night I sat in resteraunt of my hotel stipping beer, sharing travel stories with an Aussie, and feeding a small elephant celery. Today we zipped across town in the Tuk-Tuk's, little three wheel hybrid motorcycle-rickshaws.
We decided yesterday to visit northern Thailand instead of Laos. As much as we want to visit Luang Prabang, it takes too long to get there and there's not a lot of infrastucture there. Like, you know, ATM's. So we'll be heading up to northern Thailand tonight on a sleeper train and spend out time around Chaing Mai.
I'll write later. Times out.
There's a little backpacker district we're hanging out in now. I've come to stay away from other white people and touristy areas, but this place rocks. Last night I sat in resteraunt of my hotel stipping beer, sharing travel stories with an Aussie, and feeding a small elephant celery. Today we zipped across town in the Tuk-Tuk's, little three wheel hybrid motorcycle-rickshaws.
We decided yesterday to visit northern Thailand instead of Laos. As much as we want to visit Luang Prabang, it takes too long to get there and there's not a lot of infrastucture there. Like, you know, ATM's. So we'll be heading up to northern Thailand tonight on a sleeper train and spend out time around Chaing Mai.
I'll write later. Times out.
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