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Published: July 23rd 2010
First night in Thailand!
Me in my little room in Bangkok, perfect for a night between flights.The first thing that hit me was the heat. Or perhaps the humidity. Or probably just the crushing blow of the two combined. Either way, stepping off of my plane, first in Bangkok and then again in Chiang Mai, felt like walking into a wall of sticky, all-encompassing heat. Luckily every interior is furnished with remote-controlled air conditioning, so you can hop from one refreshing island of coolness to the next.
Karissa met me at the Chiang Mai international airport (I guess since there are flights to Laos and Malaysia, this tiny 2 gate airport can call itself international) Saturday afternoon after my overnight stay in Bangkok. She had been waiting for me at the other arrival gate, but luckily I had her number and we soon found each other, excitedly running towards one another and laughing like the noisy Americans we are. She knew which taxi company to take and just how to find them. I love having someone to meet me when arriving in a foreign country! It just makes the whole process that much easier. From the airport, she led our taxi driver to her, soon to be our, apartment complex on the opposite side of town.
SKK Mansion
My home, for the next 3 months SKK Mansion is a large blue and white building and our flat is located at the very top, on floor 8 (counting the American way with the ground floor as one). We are two blocks from the Tesco Lotus shopping center, where we can find everything we could possibly need and more. This is apparently a very Thai part of town, with only one other “falang” (white person) living in the complex with his Thai wife. This means that while I get to live a very Thai experience, I also have to learn some of the language if I am to do anything in the immediate area. I am actually very excited with this idea, as I have been studying linguistics for the last four years and now I get to see if I can actually do something with it! So far I have “Hello”, “Thank you”, “My name is” and the numbers up to 1,000, though they still need some work. Oh, and I can say “mai ow” (don’t want) and “mai ben drai” (it’s ok), so so far, so good.
The room Karissa and I will be sharing for the next three months is modest, a
Tuk tuk
Taking the tuk tuk home from Tesco. little larger than the hotel room I stayed in the first night, but definitely big enough for two people. I mean, Karissa came and stayed with me in my miniscule Parisian apartment, and this room is about 3 or 4 times the size of that one, so we’ll be fine. There is an average size bathroom with a flush toilet and a shower, a small entry space where we have a vanity set and a mini-fridge, a large space for the desk and double bed, and a small (4’x4’) balcony where we can hang clothes out to dry. With the air conditioner and the fan, the whole space is quite comfortable. And, as it is on the top floor of the 8-story apartment, we get a lovely view over the city. It’s quite neat to look out over a city and see the golden spires of temples peeking out through the apartment complexes. I have yet to visit my first “Wat” (temple), but there’s plenty of time for that later. For now, I have to start getting used to motorcycles.
As soon as my clothes were put away and I had had the grand tour of the apartment, Karissa
handed me a bright yellow helmet and took me out to her motorbike. Here, everyone travels by motorbike. Not big Harley’s, mind you, just small 150cc semi-automatic cycles or mopeds that are essentially bicycles with motors. The traffic can be bumper to bumper for the taxis, cars and song-thaus, but the motorbikes zip right by. We wove in and out of it all with the rest of the fearless Thai. While we wove, Karissa told me the lay of the land. In Chiang Mai, there is a river on the east side of town, a canal on the west, and a square moat outlining the old inner city. The moat had been built in 1200's to keep out the Burmese, but I guess it didn’t really work out that well, or so says Karissa. Truth be told, I’m more than a bit rusty on my ancient Thai history.
Of course, the World cup is being played at the moment and the entire world is indeed watching. This evening we headed to “the soi” (the street with all the white people bars) to meet up with some of the other English teachers for drinks and football. Here, the games start
View from our window
Looking out over our little piece of Chiang Mai at 9pm, with the second match starting at 1:30am. Tonight’s 9pm game is Germany-Argentina, and I will be rooting for Argentina, if I can stay awake for it!
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Dorothy
non-member comment
Oh, to be young again!
Thanks for the 1st person experience of our wide and wonderfilled world--djp