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Published: February 25th 2007
Mr Sammy
Not a believer in the buddy systemThe bus to Nan from Chiang Mai was, like many other enterprises I've seen here, ludicrously overstaffed, with not just a driver and a ticket checker, but also a hostess whose sole function appeared to be to distribute a packet of biscuits and a bottle of water to each passenger. Unlike in the West, people here seem quite happy to sit in the first available seat, even if there are completely empty doubles further back in the bus, so I spent most of the journey next to a lady who was wearing off-putting perfume.
Nan had been mentioned as an up and coming trekking area in the RG so, with the usual information lag inherent in any guidebook, I was expecting to find a trekking scene maybe a little less thriving than Mae Hong Son's but still well-established. In fact, it seemed to have gone into reverse. It was clear that the town just does not receive many foreign visitors at all. I could tell this from the many curious looks, shy smiles, and instances of broken English shouted at me in the street, the complete lack of the Bangkok Post (the main English-language newspaper in Thailand), a town-wide Diet
Coke drought, the fact that no-one has blogged from here before on Travelblog, and (obviously) the almost total absence of foreigners at large around town.
I did have a couple of conversations with local people who were eager to practise their English. One, who owned a rice/noodle stall in the market, I called Fred Rice, due to that being an item on his menu. He'd called out to me as I was taking my evening stroll, curious because - in his words - I was too tall to be English but too thin to be German. I didn't get to the bottom of where he'd learned English, but he'd spent several years in France and also spoke French. At the age of 62, he is working a 9 to 5 job as a car mechanic and then running the food stall with his wife until midnight. I suspect that's not an uncommon working day for many people here. My other conversation was with another old guy, who waylaid me as I was walking past his shop. Unfortunately he displayed a characteristic of much of the English spoken by Thai people, in that he kept omitting the last syllable of
each word. This made the listening experience somewhat akin to completing a crossword puzzle. It was quite frustrating, as he clearly had a good vocabulary (the words solar system and Christianity popped up in the conversation) but no-one had ever taught him correct pronunciation. I later learned that this is a consequence of English lessons in Thai schools focusing solely on reading and writing, not speaking. Thus English teachers may well not be able to speak the language at all.
The town itself had a couple of attractions that I dutifully popped in on. The Nan National Museum contained information about the various hilltribes in the vicinity, as well as the feng shui-like rules governing houses and orientation, e.g. don't build over a stump or where a pestle and mortar has been located, sleep with your head to the north or east, etc. There was also an exhibit dedicated to the King. One section - unfortunately written in Thai so I didn't get much of the detail - showed him parping, strumming, and tinkling away on a variety of instruments, in settings both casual (he seems to like Asics trainers) and more formal (e.g. playing with Benny Goodman). There
Mosquito nets
Wat Phra That Chae Haeng was also a gallery of his paintings, many of them featuring Queen Sirikit and painted in various styles.
Wat Phumin was the most striking temple in the town, its interior walls enlivened by murals depicting Buddhist stories as well as scenes of northern life. I also took a stroll out to Wat Phra That Chae Haeng on a rise outside of town, which had a couple of enormous stone serpents flanking the driveway. I've possibly seen too many temples now, the cumulative effect of which has been to blind me a little to the unique charms of each.
I scoured the guesthouses and bars of Nan for 2 days in order to find people to form a trekking group with, and eventually had to admit defeat and pay well over the odds to go alone. My guide was Mr Sammy, a small leathery 66 year-old with an amazingly angular face and a superb set of teeth. The travel company owner had nicknamed him John Wayne because of the battered hat that was constantly on his head. A pair of Ray Bans and dangling cigarette completed the look. I later learned that his wife, a larger person than himself,
was rumoured to give him a slap if she caught him smoking (or, oddly, drinking coffee) at home, so he made up for lost time by puffing constantly while guiding. Over the course of the 2 day trek, he filled me in on information about the local flora and fauna and hilltribe customs. Slightly less predictably, he had lived in New York City for 5 years in the late 80s/early 90s, so I was able to bring him up to date on what the city was like now. He'd worked a variety of jobs in the US, including chef, cinema usher, and deli assistant, while taking evening classes to learn English, and had some fond memories of New York including seeing the Bee Gees in concert at MSG and learning ballroom dancing.
Before beginning the trek, we visited a couple of factories. The first made clay stoves, which are still commonly used because their fuel (wood) is free, compared to gas or electricity. In a clear breach of workplace standards, posters from some Thai equivalent of Playboy had been hung around the building. The second was a weaving factory. In neither was I subjected to any hassle at all,
though I suppose it would require a superior bit of salesmanship to persuade a foreigner to buy a clay stove.
We passed through several villages, some of hilltribes (e.g. Hmong, Htin, Yau, etc) and some of "normal" Thais, and it looked like however these people may differ in terms of religion or customs or traditional clothing, they all have access to the same material goods, e.g. electricity, TVs, phones, cars, etc. Most work as farmers so there was no sign of the hunter-gatherer lifestyle that I'd perhaps been expecting. In other words, there were no obvious differences in how "advanced" any of the groups were. The main problem with the farming lifestyle here (other than it being hard, hard work that doesn't pay very well) is that for the 4 or 5 months of the year when there are no agricultural tasks to be done, husbands and wives usually have to go south to Bangkok to work as construction workers or nannies, placing a strain on families, especially those with children.
The trekking itself passed through some interesting terrain but was only particularly strenuous on the second day. The hills contained forests and fields of corn/rye/etc, together with
the occasional piece of land deforested for timber and being turned over to agriculture. Farmworkers' resting huts were scattered throughout. The sun was hot and intense, so any passing clouds were welcomed, any stretch of bamboo forest a cause for celebration, and any cooling breeze a relief. The path meandered over several streams, the first ones of which were crossed via bamboo "bridges" but subsequent ones required some ankle-deep wading.
We spent the night in a Hmong village. Most people barely gave me a second glance, due to a combination of it being a common trekking stopover and the fact that there were apparently 7 Belgians elsewhere in the village, who could not have failed to be more entertaining than me.
The village was fascinating, with roosters, hens, chicks, pigs, dogs of all ages and breeds, and the occasional worried cat all pecking, chirping, snuffling, barking, sleeping and hiding. Even with TV an option, kids into their teens were outside being active, riding bikes, playing games with stones, or participating in an acrobatic football/volleyball hybrid that is popular in Thailand. Some of the younger children were intrigued by the red-nosed foreigner in their midst, and periodically came running
Wat Phumin
Temple in grounds over to conduct a smile conversation with me before sprinting off again, embarrassed. I also made friends with one of the youngest puppies. Just looking at it would make its tail almost wag off with excitement, then it would bound over, ears flapping wildly, and lick my leg as though it was the world's tastiest lollipop.
My accommodation was basic, consisting of half a bamboo hut (the other half of which was Mr Sammy's quarters). The sole contents were a mattress, coverlet, pillow, blankets, and a mosquito net - no frivolous luxuries like a light or even walls that couldn't be seen through. The bathroom block, which was shared with other nearby huts, contained a toilet and a large water tank. Washing was accomplished by scooping water out of the tank and pouring it over yourself. This turned out to be as bracing an experience as you might expect from water obtained from a mountain stream at ~1,000m above sea-level.
I insisted on helping Mr Sammy prepare dinner, and he sized up my cooking skills perfectly by assigning me eggplant-chopping duties. The resulting green curry was a masterpiece of pleasingly-shaped vegetables, prepared in virtual darkness due to i)
Hmong architecture being such that houses generally have no windows, and ii) the electric light being broken.
I met one person in the village who spoke excellent English, and he and his family were the only non-Hmong living there. They had actually been brought up in Laos, where the man had been working for the CIA to fight the communist forces. When the US abandoned its interest in Laos in the 70s, he and his family had fled to Thailand. Even now he was helping insurgents fight the communist government, and could never return to Laos for fear of being killed. An interesting story which gave me some food for thought as I spent a few minutes star-gazing before heading to the "Holiday Inn" (Mr Sammy's words) for a 9PM bedtime.
I had a few problems dropping off to sleep due to a pig fight/orgy taking place nearby, then several hundred roosters announced the arrival of 5AM, but in between I experienced only sweet dreams.
Mr Sammy prepared a breakfast for 5, even though there was only going to be me eating it. A large bowl of lukewarm lettuce and tofu soup was the centrepiece of this
feast, which I made a valiant attempt at but finished about a gallon short. The steamed rice, omelette, and wedges of pineapple that accompanied it stuffed me to bursting point. I think my overall eating performance on the trek must have convinced Mr Sammy I didn't like any of his food, however I don't tend to eat much in the heat anyway, least of all gargantuan portions like the ones he specialised in.
We had a late start on the trek due to our guide being pressed into service as an emergency ambulance, to ferry a whiskey-sozzled villager to the doctor after he'd fallen off his motorbike. We needed the guide because our first target of the day was to find some members of the Mabri tribe, the only ones still living a vaguely nomadic lifestyle in the region, so specialised local knowledge was needed. The Mabri are called "Ghosts of the Yellow Leaves" by local Thais, due to their elusiveness and the fact that they move to a new location when the banana leaf roofing on their temporary shelters turns yellow.
We ventured into the steepest terrain of the trek in order to find the Mabri but
had no success for about an hour, until one of the guide's periodic shouts finally elicited a response. We had found Mr and Mrs Bah, the 2 oldest members of the local Mabri tribe. They were relaxing in between bouts of foraging for forest potatoes (though I may have misunderstood Mr Sammy's interpretation). Mr Bah, looking good for his age, was wearing traditional dress essentially consisting of a loincloth. His ears had been widely pierced at some point in the past but the left hole had pulled through, leaving the lobe flapping in the breeze. His wife was wearing modern clothing. Mr Sammy had brought them a gift of some pork fat, which they crammed into a bamboo cylinder and cooked on the fire.
Though the Mabri had originally been hunter-gatherers, that lifestyle had become less and less productive (for all the usual reasons) to the point where now they had fixed villages and only visited the forest for a week at a time at most. Many were now employed as farm labourers by other hilltribes. As the children saw more and more of the attractions of village and city life, they were becoming less and less interested in
any aspects of the nomadic lifestyle, leading Mr Bah to think there was only a limited future for the current Mabri way of life.
I wanted to get the Bahs involved in the conversation, but Mr Sammy answered every question himself, even ones where I was asking for the Bahs' opinion on something. This made the whole interaction rather zoo-like, and I came away feeling it had been unsatisfactory.
The rest of the trek was pure plodding, including a tricky section where we crossed a field of cut and dried bamboo. The smoothness of the stalks, and the unknown depths to which they were piled, made the footing both slippery and uneven. Once through that, we reached another village where the car was waiting to take us back to Nan.
I enjoyed the 2 days but neither the scenery nor the hilltribe encounters are likely to stick in my mind as highlights of my travels - it's more likely the conversations with Mr Sammy will. Perhaps a more exciting alternative would have been to do what a dozen Germans did a few years ago via the same travel company - 10 days of jungle trekking on elephant-back,
Enormous serpent
Wat Phra That Chae Haeng camping each night, with a retinue of 15 cooks/porters/guides, all for a very reasonable $2,000.
A final thought on Nan - the place is overrun with oranges. You can buy them on any given 10m stretch of road. Mr Sammy kept plying me with them, when I was dropped off at the guesthouse after the trek the driver gave me a bag of them, and when I checked out the receptionist thrust a few more into my hands. Scurvy is unlikely to be in my immediate future.
My passport was telling me that my Thai visa was about to expire, so it was time to say farewell to Thailand and cross the border into Laos.
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JRM
non-member comment
Nice
O, great pictures. excellent use of geometry and angles.