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Published: October 27th 2005
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Snake man
Snake man or should he be called 'fruit cake'!!!! Well folks,
Sorry for the delay but we've had a hectic few weeks. This, my friends is our story of Thailand!!!!!
We arrived in Bangkopk after catching a flight from Singapore...major contrast between these two cities....Singapore is clean and unpolluted... Bangkok is fairly polluted and a bit crazier than Singapore. We got a taxi in from the airport and stayed in the D & d on Khoa San Road. The place had a pool and you basically walk out the front door and your in the middle of Khoa San Road....backpacker street in Bangkok basically. The place is mad!! Stree traders and stalls selling loads of T-Shirts, food, cd's and any other bits and piecers you can think of!! The food astalls sell fine food and its dirt cheap.Thought i was going to waste away in Asia but thankfully, i do actually like whats on offer....bought a few bits of pieces and met a few people from college as i was just walking along. Its mad where you see people. Gotta a few 'tuk tuk's' aswell. Now these are an experience in the middle of bangkoks polluted streets (if you stay alive to experience it and dont die of
Drogheda Utd for the Cup!!!
Will the transfer papers go through on time!!!! smoke inhalation!!!). They're dirt cheap but they bring yopu to tailors and jewellary shops along the way so that they get feul coupons...major pain in the rear end and it does lead to a few heated discussions but thats part of the experience!!All tuk tuk drivers only know one phrase- "Ping Pong in PatPong"....now i wont go into the meaning of it(all of you whop have been in BKK will know what im on about)...Leanne wanted to go but i declined!!!!!
Couple of disasters in Bangkok.....Leanne went for a full body oil massage (and i mean its a FULL body massage!!!)....they're dirt cheap here and well worth the euro or two you spend on them!!! Anyway after the massage, she went to lie by the pool but didnt wash of the oil so she got a bit of a scalding without realising it at the time!! She was sore for a few days after.....While she was getting her massage, i decided to get my haircut in this fancy looking salon by the pool on the seventh floor of the hotel we were staying in!!! All i wanted was a nice neat haircut....not too long and not to short.....was all
going good, ur one was chatting away (to her mate) and then disaster struck. As she was talking she didnt realise that the blade had slipped off and when she did i had a zero blade half way across my head....she tried to blend it in but it didnt work so i got it all shaved with the zero blade.....i fitted straight in with all the buddha monks!!!!
After a few days, we took 12 hour night bus uop to Chang Mai, the main city North of Bangkok.......it may as well be on a different planet never mind be in the same country as Bangkok 'cos they're two very different cities. Chang Mai is very chilled and relacxed like the rest of Nortern Thailand and 'relaxed' is not a word usually associated with BKK. We signed up for a 3day 2 night jeep trek in Northern Thailand before we left BKK....little did we realise that the place we booked was basically an Israeli tourist agent.........35 people on the trip, 33 were Israeli and guess who the other two were!!! Actualy i lie there were a few thai drivers and mechanics with us....we got a fella called 'Domino' who used
Cheeky Monkey
"And you thought monkeys didnt like cornetos" to be a buddha monk but was now married...very interesting chap whom i had to nickname 'four star' out of badness!!!
Day 1 of the trip started with a visit to a snake farm where there was a mad man putting all sorts of live snakes in his mouth and letting scorpions crawl all over him!! Good photo opportunity but il be hoping its the closest that either of us gets to a snake in the next year.....At the same place, there was an elephant show... It was a bit disturbing and neither of us were that impressed (reckon there were cruel methods used to teach them to do the tricks!!), but one elephant was able to take penalties and pick up the ball with his trunk, throw it over his back and back hill it with his back right leg about 50 metres......maybe Drogheda United could do with him if the cupo final comes down to penalties!!! After lunch we did an elephant ride for 45 mins and a bamboo raft for 45 mins down a river......bit touristy but still a different and enjoyable experience.... Went off roading then where a few of the jeeps got buried to
their b#ll#x in mud (excuse the terminology) and it took an hour to dig them out!! Overnighted that night in what could be described as an old mental institution on Phong!!!
Next day, we visited the long neck/big ear, akha & karinge hill tribe.... No playstation potables here folks!!! These are people who live a different old style way, possibly the way Ireland was 200 Hundred years ago!!! Went to a monkey cave after that where with a buddist temple inside....i nopw know where the term "cheeky monkey" comes from as a picture of a monkey eating a cornetto will prove.....After luunch it was onto the 'Golden triangle', a point on the Mekong river where Thailand, Laos & Burma meet and traditional place for trading in gold and 'black gold' (opium)(hence the name!!!!) for these three countries and China. Went onto a laos island there where i had a taste of snake whiskey....they actually have dead snakes preserved in the bottle of whiskey!!!Stayed in Chang Rai that night and bouhgt a few more t-shirts at the night bazaar!!!
Day three took us to an unbelievable waterfall where you could stand near in the pool at the bttom and
Hotspring
"F#ck me, thats hot!!!" get a free massage (we're big into the massages now!!!) from the spray of the water. Unreal is the best way to describe it!!!! More off roading brought us to the top of the wawee mountain which lives up to it's 'WOWEE' description!!! After that it was onto a hot spring where we did a bit of bathing and then back to Chang Mai!!!..................Was a fgreat few days and we knocked a good bit of banter out of the Israelis so much so that we were invited toi celebrate 'kaduci" with them in Pizza Hut that night (think its spelled that way but basically its a meal and wine they offewr up in the jewish religion the night before their day of rest on a Saturday, id be thinking whatever god they believe in is worth more than a trip to Pizza Hut!!!!))
The next day we left Chang Mai for Chiang Khong, a town in Thailand on the border of Laos....overnighted it there and went for a few drinks with our bus buddiers who we got to know very well over the last bweek (You'll have to wait til we leave Laos before you hear those stories!!!
Leanne, Domino & Ronan
"This is our very own 'fourstar' buddha monk!!!" Anyway folks, thats all for now.....we're in Laos now and we have some great stories from here (possibly the most unspoiled and natural place ive ever been) but you'll haver to wait a few more days for them
Keep the emails coming
Ronan & Leanne
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Geraldine Rock
non-member comment
Monastery
Hope your new hairstyle doesn't mean you will be carted off to a Buddist monastery - what a waste of a year that would be!