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Published: February 5th 2006
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Well, we have been in Thailand for a month now (and away for 65 days!) and have worked our way up to Chang Mai in Northern Thailand. Second in size to Bangkok, although they share no other features at all! The old city of CM (where we live) is a neat square bounded by moats and remants of a medieval style wall rasied 700 years ago to defend against Burmese invaders. Although a million tuk tuks circumnavigate the old city, narrow bricked soi (lanes) branch off into a sleepy quiet village of fruit tree gardens, dusty school yards, pushcarts and slow easy smiles. Very quaint and cool in every sense of the word!
The climate is more forgiving (at night anyway). bookshops predominate instead of glitzy shopping centres and the regions unique cultural heritage is worn as proudly as its vibrant hand-woven textiles. During the day it is extremely quiet. Chang Mai is like a giant university - much more for the cultured traveller like ourselves than the scummy farang (foreigners) you see elsewhere. There are classes in Thai Language, Cooking, Meditation, Massage and the areas biggest draw, hill tribe trecking.
After arriving we pretty much went straight to
bed (another long overnight journey and another bloody freezing one!). Then we spent some time exploring the billion temples which are dotted around the city. Chang Mai has more temples than Bangkok despite being tiny in comparison. However, it's really hot and dry here during the day and after having seen a few they all start to blend into one so we checked out the food scene - VERY good. Some of the best food we have eaten so far.
Being in such a cultural mecca we thought we should do our bit and enrolled in a Thai Cooking course. It was based on an organic farm 17km out of the city at the foot of the mountains which surround the city. We started our course by going to a local market and learning about lots of produce and rice and other Thai things such as making coconut milk. It was interesting, but pretty gross really. There were actual pig heads on the tables, people cutting the claws off chicken feet and then selling the feet (maybe thats what the crunchy bits in some of our dinners have been hhmmmm), and we watched a man batter a live fish
to death (soaking andrew in the process with fish blood) then starting to scale it before it was even properly dead. So, after gladly leaving that behind we went to stay on the farm where we learned about all the different types of herbs and vegetables which were then picked and we used in our cooking. We did all our prep on a bamboo hut over a pond, and our cooking in this old style kitchen with open sides. Very rustic. We made green curry with Gai (chicken), spring rolls, Chicken with Chilli and Basil, Tom Yam Spicy Soup with Shrimps and Banana and Coconut milk. We got to eat everything we made (which Anderw obviously wet himself about!). Travelling is weird when you think about food. You do go to bed most nights hungry but you get used to it. Thailand is so much better than anywhere else for food so far and we are adopting a policy of stockpiling in our bellies at the moment because Cambodia, Vietnam and China and Japan will probably be a bit poor on the food front. We were so glad we had picked this course. There are over 200 cookery schools in
CM but most are based in the town. We got to eat organic food and cook in amazingly beautiful surroundings. Well worth the extra 100 baht!
Chang Mai has a fantasic Night Bazaar and on Sunday has a great Sunday Market. This is cheaper than the night bazaar and a lot less touristy with lots of locals going. The streets were packed until midnight. Lots of bargains to be had but Andrews idea of a budget is very different from Lara's. Lara rationalises the budget much like her "dessert stomach". In her words you have two stomachs, one for main courses and another one when thats full of main course for pudding. That way there is always room for pudding. She would like to have another stomach (or more aptly - budget) for shopping on this trip, but all credit to her she does not buy anything, we always just say...when we come back for a holiday....At this rate we will spend the rest of our lives holidaying as the list keeps growing!
A highlight of the trip in Chang Mai (other than the eating and the cooking) was our trip to the Thailand National Elephant Conservation Centre.
We were both thinking it may be a bit tacky but were stranded for a day. It was really great. We watched them bathe, got to feed baby elephants (they cuddled us too!) and watched an "elephants at work" show where we learned how they were used in the jungle prior to logging being made illegal in the 60's. It was really cool. Although, elephants snot A LOT, we had to thoroughly wash all our equipment (cameras that is) after the trip.
So, tonight we are heading back to Bangkok for a day as a stop on our way back to the islands in the South. Chang Mai has been really great. The nightlife is good - lots of students means lots of live music and we have seen some great acts on the riverside whilst partaking in a beverage or two. There is really chilled out atmosphere. I know we say this about everywhwere but we really wish we had more time here because Lara would love to do a massage course for a few days, Andrew would like to do a longer Thai cooking course, the climate is nice, the people are friendly and the food fantastic.
We could go on. Although we were not expecting Chang Mai to be like this it has been great. We have sat and read our books and people watched, Lara has written her journal whilst sitting in cafes. Lara, as anyone who reads this will know, finds it pretty hard to relax. This whole trip so far she has kept thinking about going home and back to work and getting a new house, blah, blah, blah. For the first time she is starting to relax and just thinking about what lies ahead abroad rather than when we come back. A big step. She's still a stress head and worrier, but a more relaxed one who is not on a countdown to coming home (which is approaching fast she tells me...ha ha)
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