While You Were Sleeping

It's really weird being 6 hours ahead, I've been out all morning whilst you lot have been in bed, I still haven't got my head around it yet.

Today we used a song-thaew for the first time (I won't even TRY and write it in thai-english, I'm guessing that's a phonetic spelling). It was a refreshing change from the tuk tuk drivers. Here's the view from the back of a song-thaew.

Sara in the back of the song-thaew

You flag them down in the street and you can either just tell him where you're going and jump in the back then pay 10 or 20 baht when you get out, or you can charter them and they work out pretty cheapie cheaps. We decided to go to the temple on the mount today, Doi Suthep, and the guy who picked us up was an old gent who said it would cost 400 baht between us there and back charter, which wasn't too bad we thought.

That's until he stopped halfway at a place where there were people selling souvenirs and drinks/food etc and began yelling out of the window at people. Oh no!! I thought the tuk tuk nightmare was happening all over again, but no, there was no pressure to get out and buy anything. All of a sudden a younger man appeared at the window.

'I take you, I take you'

After a couple of questioning looks from us he said 'I'm his son'

Ahhhhh, ok! After making sure we were still paying the same price we leapt in the back and he drove us up the mountain, the LONG winding road on the mountain.

We got to Doi Suthep pretty early, thank gawd, as we hadn't realised that there are two hundred and something steps to climb to the temple! Bastards! It's a beautiful temple and I bought a pack containing a lotus flower, 2 candles and 3 sticks of incense which are offerings to Buddha. When you enter temples you have to cover your shoulders and knees (and presumably your decolletage...the buddha does not likey bewbies), so I slung my scarf around myself and wandered in.

It's obviously a well visited temple, both by tourists and worshippers. The local people would circle the stupa and then kneel in front of the buddha and deliver their offerings. There are other touristy bits going on, check out these two...



The view would be better if the atmosphere wasn't so smoky...pollution is the keyword in SE Asia.

200 and something frigging steps!

Ring a bell 3 times for good luck

On the way back we decided to visit the waterfall, our song-thaew driver again dropped us and waited for us to come back. The falls are pretty dry at the moment, so we didn't spend too long about it. We were then driven home and prepared for the excess to be added to our fare for the extra stop.

'400 baht please'

Wow, I was in love with this man...he DID get a tip :D

This was good, I've now learned that not EVERYONE in Asia wants to rip you off!



As for this afternoon, I've spent it mostly eating....for lunch the spiciest soup I've EVER come across. In its defense it was named Spicy Beef soup with fresh chillies.....and for dinner we went to a vegetarian place and I had a fried rice dish with garlic, onions, shallots and spring onions....hoping it'll keep the bugs at bay. I didn't get bitten last night, fingers crossed for tonight.

Spicy red beef soup with fresh chillies...frigging heck

Mmmmm, Thai beer (Chang)

Apart from that, it was massage time, I opted for a foot massage and Sara went for a full thai massage. Mine was lovely and relaxing for the most part, except when she jammed her fingers in between my toes, and when she got this weird stick out and started poking my feet with it! Then, at the end she grabbed both of my feet, crossed one over the other and pushed all her bodyweight onto them, for a moment I thought she'd thought I'd asked for a foot binding (look it up..Japanese, not pleasant). Ouch!

Then she gave me a shoulder massage seemingly for free, though...massage didn't seem the best word to describe it...torture? Closer to the truth. I'm going to have finger bruises tomorrow, and at one point she put her forearms on my shoulders and all her bodyweight down on them, I could clearly feel her bewbies on the back of my head.

OUCH!!

Apparently Saras was more like seeing a grumpy osteopathist with a hangover, I'm not sure she'll be able to walk tomorrow after being thumped, twisted, bent and trodden on.

Seen Sara off today, back to Bangkok, and tomorrow I'm off on a 7 hour bus ride to Chiang Khong, overlooking the Mekong river and Laos...my next stop.

Chiang Khong is quite tiny with a population of 9000 but I should have web access there, if I don't then I'll update you in a few days, I'll be on a slowboat to Luang Phrabang for 2 days...watch how mental I get after that!

On the road ag'in.....xxxx

Hee hee hee

What I'll remember most about Chiang Mai: Song-thaews and TESCO lotus (yes....TESCO, I think the 'Lotus' is an attempt to asianify it).