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Published: September 23rd 2007
The Wall Crew
Lom (owner's 'wife'), Bram (Dutch guy), Mark (Kiwi), Jeed (crazy waitress), and me looking lame.Yeah...I've been on the road for 4 months and needed another vacation to catch up on sleep and recharge. For my last 'vacation' I got stuck in Queenstown, NZ for an extra week and this time I got stuck in Chiang Mai. I mentioned in the last entry that Chiang Mai is the anti-Bangkok. I say this because there are no large buildings, the traffic is much less crazy, and it generally just feels like a chilled out place to be. Perfect for taking a break from constantly being on the move.
Chiang Mai has a lot of short term ex-pats and many foreigners who have simply moved there. One of these foreigners is a Dutch guy named Herman who opened a pub called "The Wall" - both due to his love for Pink Floyd and the fact that Chiang Mai is surrounded by a wall. In any case, this place was showing the Tour de France on the TV, so I went there my first night, met some folks, and just kept coming back. When there weren't sports on, Herman would play DVDs of various rock concerts. The selection was a tad strange. Pink Floyd, Eric Clapton, Fleetwood Mac,
and...umm...Tina Turner. And the Tina Turner video seemed to be his favorite. Rollin'...rollin'...rollin' down the river...yikes.
One comment about the night life scene in Chiang Mai...there's one club called Spicy that stays open later than the rest of the bars. It's a bit of a crazy dance club place and could probably be the subject of a long study in human social behaviors...on many levels...but I won't go into it and will let your imagination run with that one. The one experience I thought I'd share involves going to the toilet there.
Quick aside...for some reason I feel that Americans seem to be uncomfortable with the word "toilet". We'll say anything to avoid it. We have no problem with saying...
"I'm going to the restroom"
"I'm going to the men's room"
"I'm going to the washroom"
"Excuse me for a minute"
"I'll be right back"
These are all ok, but for some reason, we just don't say "I'm going to the toilet". The rest of the world uses this term, but we don't in the US. I have to admit, it took me a while to adjust to saying that. Do other Americans out there feel this
Digging Into Our First Dish
Pad Thai was the first of our 6 courses. One of the best pad thai's I've ever had. way? Perhaps I'm just looney, but somehow it just made me uncomfortable at first.
Anyway, back to the toilet at Spicy. Don't worry...nothing graphic. I walk in and see that there are several bathroom (toilet) attendants. I assume they're there for the (what I consider to be) regular reasons - offering soap, towel, etc. Well, I cruise up to a urinal and about 5 seconds later feel two sets of hands on me...one set on my legs and the other set on my shoulders...both frantically massaging me. This freaked me out...I turned my head and told them both to never touch me again. This apparently didn't register very well with them and they went right back to it...I tried telling them again to stop, but they just kept going at it and finally finished off with probably the most complete neck cracking I've ever had.
They eagerly awaited a tip as I washed my hands...but this was something I wasn't prepared to reward someone for. I certainly have nothing against a massage or a good neck cracking...but there's a time and a place for everything...and standing in front of a urinal is not the place for this. Thankfully
Bombs Away!
The mad chef working on stir fried chicken with cashews. the guys got to know me well enough that they knew I wouldn't tip, so they eventually started to leave me alone and focused their attention on other customers.
In the midst of my busy schedule of chilling out, reading, and fighting off touchy-feely toilet attendants - I did manage to do a couple of touristy things as well...no great adventures this time around, but worthy of a mention, I suppose.
The most entertaining of these being a full day Thai cooking class. The tour was to begin with a market tour to see some veggies, curries, etc. I got picked up by a 15 person mini-bus and we proceeded to drive all over town for the next 30 minutes before finally returning to the market that was a 2 minute walk from my hotel. Not exactly a model of efficiency, eh?
After the market tour we piled back into the bus and headed to the cooking school. We had a choice of 3 menu sets for the day and the one I chose included the following:
- Pad Thai (the basic Thai noodle dish)
- Spring Rolls
- Tom Yum Soup (spicy soup with veggies and
World's Largest Butterfly
Actually, I think it's a moth...and was about 8" across. chicken)
- Green Curry w/ Chicken
- Stir Fried Chicken w/ Cashews
- Mango w/ Sticky Rice for dessert
We'd all sit in front of the ingredients for each dish while the chef (Nokki) demonstrated and then we'd try to replicate what she had done. I'm pretty certain I couldn't do it the same all on my own again...but for that day, I was an amazing Thai chef. It literally was the best Pad Thai I've ever had, the soup was a perfect level of spiciness (meaning that I was on the verge of choking...but not quite), curry was yummy, the spring rolls were crispy, and the stir fried chicken was good too. We didn't actually make the dessert...but by that point my cooking muscles were so exhausted (what?) that I didn't want to put forth any more effort.
The other highlight was that when we made the stir fried chicken, there was a point where we dumped a small amount of water into the wok...thus causing the oil to pop/bubble/whatever and catch on fire...resulting in some pretty impressive fireballs around the kitchen (see the photo). Eating lots of good food and creating large fireballs...just a few steps
away from heaven on earth.
The only downer for the day was that I had been out to Spicy late the night before (but avoiding toilet massages) and was quite tired. So after my first dish, all I wanted to do was take a nap. But I powered through and am glad to have made/had all the dishes.
The one other thing that I was interested in doing was seeing a
hill tribe (click the link for more information) village in the surrounding areas. Many folks had done multi-day treks involving staying in a village, but hiking in this heat and humidity is not something I'm keen to do.
So I booked a one day tour which included a variety of other things - bamboo rafting, elephant show & ride, orchid/butterfly farm, ox cart ride, and the trip to the hill tribe. I'd already seen orchids and an elephant show with Danielle, but somehow watching elephants dance and play harmonicas was entertaining the second time around. And this time I got to go for a ride. Not the most thrilling experience, but fun nonetheless.
The hill tribe ended up being exactly what I feared it would
be...a bunch of people set up as a tourist attraction. As soon as we got there I wanted to leave. The basic gig was that this tribe (Karen tribe) has certain girls who have their necks elongated with stacks of rings as they grow up. It was set up so that we walk along past a series of thatch huts in which these girls are either just sitting on display (looking depressed out of their minds) or weaving silk scarves (looking just a tad less depressed). They basically do this all day. It depressed me too...though it was somewhat fascinating to see people with irregularly long necks.
The final comment about my time in Chiang Mai is that one night we left The Wall (probably because Tina Turner was on again) and headed to a Reggae bar. The bar looked the part...plenty of Bob Marley and other brightly colored Jamaican images illuminated with black-lights. The part that didn't quite fit the mold is that it ended up being a bunch of Thais with dreadlocks watching a preppy looking band (1/2 Americans and 1/2 Thais) playing jazz...not reggae. They were good...but the elements didn't seem to mix correctly.
After
so many rooms, towns, beds, people, etc prior to coming to Chiang Mai, it was nice to again get familiar with a place and some people. I truly did start to feel like a semi-local here...walking down the street and seeing people I know...not having to look for new unknown places to eat or hang out...going to my regular breakfast place ("Nice Kitchen") down the alley and the owner knowing what I wanted...etc. Just a touch of normality, I guess.
Now it's time to leave the familiarity of this corner of the world and head off to one that isn't familiar to me at all...Cambodia.
Marc
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Just to clarify...I've been a bit out of order for when I post my entries. The date listed at the top is applicable to when I would have posted had I immediately written each entry. Also if you go to my main page, all the entries are in chronological order...should help to sort out when I've been where. Apologies if it's all been confusing.
Again...I'm writing this 2 months after the fact and I feel like it's lacking as a result. Am trying to keep up with the
entries...but I somehow keep getting further and further behind.
Another comment...if you click on any of the photos, a new browser window will open with larger views of the photos in which you can scroll through all the photos.
Another-nother comment...feel free to leave comments or questions on any particular entry.
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Cam Wisler
non-member comment
Looks like fun!
Thanks again for sharing, even if it's out-of-order. Thanks, too for the little explanation at the end. Pretty cool to get a glimpse of something outside the US, for those of us stuck inside. I'll have to remember your 'toilet/massage' story for the next time we're 'toiletting' together - that's hilarious! Almost sounds like one of those hidden camera t.v. shows.