A-Broad in Education: Traveling in Thailand: Second stop... Chiang Mai

Hello from Chiang Mai!!

I hope you had a chance to read my previous post about my experience in Bangkok. If you haven't, feel free to read the previous post before you read this one. My traveling journey is still progressing and I have landed in Phuket. I guess I can say that this is a late post from Chiang Mai because I spent three days there and now I am at the next destination.

I have absolutely nothing negative to say about Chiang Mai. It was actually right on time after the hustle and bustle of Bangkok. I was looking forward to a place a bit more chilling and relaxing and Chiang Mai was the perfect place.

After the hour long flight from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, I found myself entering a completely empty hotel with not a person in sight outside of the working staff. Leaving it up to booking.com, I found myself alone and outside of the city. You really have to be careful with that website because although the price is reasonable, most times there is a catch. The catch this time was that it was about fifteen minutes outside of civilization and did nothing for my trip. After a horrible persuasion speech from the manager and being charged for one night ($30), I politely asked them to call me a taxi to get me the heck up out of the boondocks! When the taxi came, he found me a place to stay... not the Conrad... but it was a decent room to sleep in.

As soon as I put my bags down in the room, I went down to the tour desk and prepared an itinerary for myself. I hadn't prepared anything for this trip before my arrival. The lady at the counter showed me a book of many little day trips and things to do in Chiang Mai and I arranged for myself to do a cooking class that night.

When I arrived to the cooking class, I was greeted by a group of tourists from many different places (two girls from San Diego, a couple from Germany, and a couple from Paris). To add a bit of spice to the group, in came my little country ol self! The class began with a quick discussion about the organic garden in the back yard and that led us to a trip to the grocery store. Our teacher taught us about the different kinds of things sold in the market and the things that we would need to make our meal. After shopping, we headed back to the class to start cooking. Now for those of you that don't know... I had a housekeeper for two years while I was in Morocco that cooked and cleaned for me. That included shopping and cooking about three meals that lasted a full week. On the days that there wasn't food in the house, my phone worked pretty well to order in. Now that I am in Abu Dhabi, I can honestly say that I have NEVER used my stove. The closest that I have come to cooking is making a salad and guacamole! I order every meal that I eat and I know that's the reason why many of the delivery men in my neighborhood know who I am. Overall, this girl can use a serious cooking class!

Our teacher was very funny. She was a cute Thai lady who kept mocking the British accent. There was much involved with the cooking. I made phad thai noodles, green curry and tom yum soup. It was all so delicious! The soup had a coconut milk base and was mixed with many different vegetables. We all had so much fun together.

.Just a side note... I can cook.... I just CHOOSE not to!! At least not too often!

The next day I booked a trip to go to the elephant village and tiger kingdom. I woke up the next morning and was ready to conquer the day. I arranged for a tour bus to come and pick me up from the hotel. It was funny because when the guide greeted me, she made sure to inform me, Oh I'm sorry but we have all Chinese and two Vietnamese people with us today. In a nutshell she was telling me that it was only me to represent my people!! When the two Vietnamese girls got on the bus, one of them was very interested in me. We started discussing Vietnam and she insisted that I come and visit Vietnam. We started talking about the Vietnam war and she told me how her father fought in the war. To this day, he still has nightmares and wakes up out of his sleep with memories of the war. I shared the story of my uncle with her and told her how interesting it was to hear a story from the other side of the war. As with many wars, the soldiers are simply sent home and forced to find a way to cope with the brutal realities of combat. My plan is to go and visit and see it all for myself. She was really sweet.

When we arrived to the elephant village, I was so excited! The day started with a display of how elephants are bathed in the river. A few things that I learned about the elephants is that they can be pregnant for 17-22 months and they usually have about 5 babies in a life span. Their skin is very thick too. Thailand has many elephants because they were used during the wars. After the wars, they realized that they could not be sent back into the wild because they had already been raised by humans. They eventually opened up orphanages to care for and keep them safe. I don't believe that all of the orphanages are actually keeping them safe though. There are many orphanages in Chiang Mai.

Although they are a huge attraction for thousands of visitors that come to Thailand, I want to believe that they are not being abused and suffering from the attempt of a circus show with plans of putting them on display. The show was great though. The elephants were playing soccer and painting pictures as well.

After the elephant show, we took an ox cart carriage to the village. It was an old time feel. The wood was so old on the buggies that I was sure mine would break!

On the way, we passed fields of tobacco and local people that were trying to encourage us to pay 20 baht to buy bananas to feed the elephants. For you smokers, the tobacco plant is actually green. There is your excuse to make a bad habit not so bad. At least it is somewhat organic!

We ended the trip on a bamboo boat sailing down the river. It was a wonderful experience. The funniest thing happened while we were sailing. Another boat road past us and a man yelled out to the two Vietnamese girls... where are you from... and they said Vietnam. He then looked at me and said where are you from....

Now for my fellow Altonians... I don't deny where I am from... EVER... however it gets a little bit more complicated being overseas. Illinois is considered a flyover state... most international people fly over Illinois to get the east coast or to the west coast. So literally when I tell people that I am from Illinois, they have no idea where that is. I could take the easy route and say St. Louis, but usually that makes the conversation even worse. Most folks overseas know Chicago, so to keep from having to explain all of this business about being 5 hours south, across the bridge from, the Mississippi flows through, Robert Wadlow is from... I just say I'm from Chicago.

So I told this man... Chicago. He says oh that's a beautiful city and he and about three bamboo boats float on down the river. At a certain point, we catch up with them again and the man is yelling Chicago!... Chicago!!... clearly he is trying to get my attention. There is a local lady in the middle of the river selling drinks and he says please let me buy you a coconut water. I was getting ready to get one anyway so as I was trying to hand the lady the money, he insisted... no no please let me pay. Now this man clearly has about 6 women on his boat. I politely say thank you. The other people on my boat were watching and this man had already bought all of the local boys and every passenger on his boat drinks. So he looks at my boat and says whatever they want give it to them.... the Chinese man on my boat was getting ready to hand the lady the money and the man said... please let me... the Chinese man yelled out .. but I'm not from Chicago!!

We all started cracking up laughing. I turned to the man and asked him... can I ask where you are from... he said well that is a good question... he answered... well I'm from a small area called... Dubai! I cracked up laughing because those women were probably his wives and he was showing out like most of them do. This man had clearly bought the bar.......which was a river bar full of coconut waters and coca cola products!! I yelled out... I work in Abu Dhabi. He was shocked and then asked to take my picture. I wouldn't be surprised if he finds me... he will have his people get in touch with my people... I was looking hawt on that river bank though... I don't blame him for buying the bar... but in front of the wives??? That was a bit much!

After the elephants I went to see the tigers. I went to a place called Tiger Kingdom and they had it set up to where you could pay to take pictures with the tigers. Now I was afraid at first but the tigers were very sleepy. Of course I think they must have drugged them but even if they were drugged, you would think that when they wake up, that wouldn't stop them from biting someones arm off. I don't know. Ill just allow myself to believe that they were raised with people and trained by people. Fingers crossed. I wasn't happy with my first photo shoot so I arranged to go back. I actually went there twice. I told myself that Chiang Mai could easily be a once in a life time experience and I didn't want to leave with any regrets. I must say my second photo shoot was much better!

Overall Chiang Mai is more of a hippy, laid back and relaxed city. It feels like a town. I went to the salon and asked the Thai lady to do a bikini and underarm waxing for me. She was a bit confused because I wasn't interested in getting the Thai massage. She seemed a little uncomfortable in the beginning but she did the waxing anyway. After she explained to me that many European people do that and Thai women don't... I felt bad. I'm so used to it now, I don't mind flashing my parts to other women. As far as the waxing... Ill just say she tried her best!