The Golden Triangle

Our hospital tour of Northern Thailand continues....

October 10: We have been in Chiang Rai for several days now and I am ashamed to say that I dont have many pictures to show for them. We seem to have caught some strange bug - perhaps while crossing swollen rivers filled with runoff (read: waste) waist deep? Today, we finally got ourselves to the hospital for some blood testing. We are really getting into the groove of visiting hospitals in Northern Thailand!

Our blood tests confirmed that we did not have any dengue (there has been an outbreak) and the doctor told us we must have a virus and sent us home with vitamins. Actually the technical diagnosis was "post viral syndrome" which I think is an English translation of "there is nothing wrong with you - you stupid foreigner". We'll try the vitamins. The self medicating possibilities here are also endless as you can buy absolutely anything over the counter in the pharmacy, and very cheap.

Chiang Rai is a pretty interesting place. It is the largest city in the Golden Triangle region. The region is where Thailand, Laos and Burma meet and the historical centre of the opium trade in the region. It has a pretty nice night market with great food stalls where Dan ate chicken fingers at least 3 nights in a row. You can also buy roasted bamboo worms - but hey sometimes you need comfort food eh?

October 13: We have just returned from 2 nights in Mae Salong - a town about 1.5 hours from Chiang Rai towards the Burmese border. To get there we had to take a local bus to a junction in the highway and then wait...and wait... while the sawngthaew driver hoped that he might get 8 people to pile in his truck for the ride up the mountain. We waited 2 long hours. The drive was stunning - at one point I looked out both sides of the truck to see sheer drops on both sides as the road took us along the crest of a mountain into the village. The road is lined with amazing vistas of tea plantations and Lahu, Akha, and Lisu villages along the mountain sides.

Mae Salong is a small village in the mountains which was settled by members of the 93rd regiment of the KMT (Kuomintang) after the Chinese Revolution. It is, reportedly, much like a small Yunnanese village with red lanterns in all the shops and Mandarin in most shop fronts. Well into the 1980s the village was involved in the growth and trade of opium in partnership with the Shan United Army and opium warlord Khun Sa. Now, the main industry is tea, mostly from Taiwan. We spent a day exploring the surrounding countryside by moto and trying tea in the tea shops. There is a beautiful wat high on a mountain side overlooking the village and we decided to forego the 793 steps up and take the moto up the 4 km road. This was much easier said than done as the road is very steep and these motos are not meant to carry 2 pudgy white people up a mountain side. I think we were quite the sight: 2 large "farang" (white folks) in little black helmets trying to lean forward as much as possible in an effort to be aerodynamic as this little 125 cc moto put putts up the road at a snails pace. At least twice the moto stopped and I had the privilege of hopping off and walking up the steep incline. Local people already laugh at us for wearing helmets as we whiz around on the motos as they regularly put 3-5 people on the things, including babies.

We also found what seemed to be an abandoned "tea theme park" with huge tea pots and sculptures. Later on in the afternoon, at the empty but large Chinese Martyrs museum, we learned that this endeavour seems to have been undertaken with funds from Taiwan?

We stayed at a great little guesthouse with bungalows over looking the mountain scenery. The man who runs the guesthouse was born in Mae Salong and his father was a soldier with the KMT. Everything about our stay was comfortable, though I admit it unnerved me to notice a pilot light go in the hot water shower in our bathroom....it was its own little individual water heater - gas line and all!

This morning with our bellies full of Yunnanese food and too many different types of Oolong tea, we came back to Chiang Rai for the night before heading out tommorrow morning for the Lao border. We spent the afternoon at...you guessed it...another hospital! Dan had his fourth shot this afternoon and we opted for the public hospital here in Chiang Rai as we were still grumpy at paying $60/each for blood analysis to learn we had "post viral syndrome" at the private hospital. It was a little overwhelming as the place was packed, there are so many different counters, and everything is in Thai. A kind thai lady took pity on us as we clearly looked lost and showed us the ropes. Only one more shot to go!

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