Chiang Mai

Another sleeper train, another journey. This time to Chiang Mai from Hua Lumpong station in Bangkok.  The experience was every bit as enjoyable as the first time – you can pick up a second class sleeper bed with air con for around 600/700 baht – which is particularly good for a 13 hour journey. 

(above left - a crab in Chiang Mai Market)

On the train I met two lovely American girls, one of whom worked in Bangkok as a teacher.  I love meeting Americans abroad as they try to compensate for the (completely unfair) perception of the majority of Americans by being super nice and great to chat with.   The teacher asked me an interesting, but completely valid question: what’s the strangest thing you’ve seen whilst you’ve been in Thailand.  For me it has to be a toss up between fat water boy (see previous post) and 4 people and a dog on a moped.  Apparently she had seen a dog with a paper tray around its neck full with photocopies of official documents.  After 20 minutes, we still couldn’t work out what the dog would have been doing.

Chiang Mai was a world apart from Bangkok.  A big city in a small city is the only way I can describe it. It’s kinda like a mini Bangkok but without the pollution and madness.

It is basically a city with a city wall and its own moat, which unsuccessfully tried to keep out the Burmese or Khmer (I wasn’t listening) a great night market, great culture and food, including an Israeli and Burrito restaurant, both of which I have eaten at.

One of the main reasons for visiting Chiang Mai was to see my friend Seema whom I used to work with.  It was amazing to see someone who I knew, kinda emotional, and we had so much to catch up on. 

After checking in and showering (I didn’t bring my jim jams – not that I own a pair - so I had to sleep in my clothes on the train) we went to get a coffee at the coffee house where I am now writing this blog (Kopf Coffee in Chiang Mai – great coffee, Wi-Fi and pool).  There we met Paul – a very well travelled English footballer who was about to sign for Chiang Mai FC.   Thence began the creation of a new gang to hang out with.

Now, at school there was always the problem of having two Pauls in my class.  Inevitably my moniker would be appropriated to “Afshar” or just “football head” (see previous post) so having two Pauls again presented a problem.  I’m known as Reza (my Iranian name) and Paul interchangeably to some people, so this seemed a suitable solution. The only problem is, that Thais, and from my limited experience the Chinese, choose or decide not to pronounce “r”, or rather, they pronounce is a “L”.  So as Reza caught on, I became known to Thais as “Lezza” or “Leesa”.  Bad times.

Fortunately/ unfortunately it was “Buddha Day” all over the country – a religious holiday.  So we decided to head to the bigger of Chiang Mai’s Buddhist temples.  I’m quite spiritual, but don’t define by one religion, but once you enter the temples, a strange tranquillity and peace takes over you.  The architecture is so beautiful and the monks (some child monks) seem so at peace with the world and their existence.  We approached a monk to receive a prayer.  We knelt down whilst he prayed for us, sprinkled us with holy water and gave us a white bracelet for luck.  I still have it on.

Later that night, our gang grew by two more as we randomly met two Canadian girls on the street (I know this sounds bad, but they were staying at our guesthouse and we recongised them) – Sarah and Hailey.  What is it with these damn Canadians and Thailand Ey?  (apparently Canadian’s say “Ey” at the end of every sentence – although this was soon corrected by said two girls.

I decided that this week I was going to try and pick up my ill fated exercise routine again.  So Seema and I enlisted the help of professional sportsman Paul at the 50 baht gym.  There was born the “300 workout”.  The workout is so called as the cast of the (pretty rubbish) film 300 used it to get buff.  10 sets of intense exercise later I could barely stand and was certainly not ready to face the intense Thai sun again. 

We then went to the UN Irish Pub (don’t ask me where the “UN” comes from) which, according to the menu was started by a woman from Donegal, who then married an Thai guy, and then returned to Ireland where ownership passed to said Thai guy who then sold it to a Kiwi and an Aussie.  Maybe that’s where the UN came from.

It was there we planned our trip to Pai.  I had heard a lot about Pai from various travellers back in the UK and out here.  But I was not prepared for how amazing it was – more to follow later.

On Buddha Day most of the bars were closed or could not serve alcohol until after 12pm.  But, like all things in Thailand, there was a way around this.  Earlier that day we met another addition to our group – Ruth – an Isreali girl who was travelling around South East Asia for an indefinite amount of time.  So we invited her out that night.  With her, Paul, Seema and the two girls began many drinking games and a McDonald’s later (you can take the boy out of England…) we headed to bed.

After a few more excursions around Chiang Mai (which has a lot to offer at night, but not so much (in the city at least during the day)) we had a massage.  Note to self and everyone else, having a Thai massage by a bloke is a painful but ultimately rewarding experience.  I have never felt the pain of a Thai man’s hands until that day, but afterwards it felt like I had a new body.

The Chiang Mai night market is great and has a real buzz.  Selling more Thai wares than the Patpong night market we scuttered around looking at everything from Thai silk to handheld tazers disguised as mobile phones (scary things) and the girls came back with some pretty nice stuff.

That night, however, has to possibly be my worst night in Thailand.  After searching for a decent bar (failed) we headed down what initially looked like a market of bars.  It was soon we discovered (after ordering our drinks) that this was a bazaar of around 30-40 “girlie” bars where some pretty rank old western men paid for over-priced drinks to grope Thai girls.  There was also a mis-placed Muay Thai boxing ring in the centre of it all, where some “show fights” took place.  (Show fights are exactly that – a bad WWF style form of fighting where it is all staged and fighters are intentionally mismatched for the viewers humour).  We called it a night after a 6’5” fat English bloke beat a 4’ Thai guy who feigned unconsciousness in the first round.  Bah.

We were all ready to go to Pai.