Simon took us for a quick bite to eat at some place not far from his and we had a couple of beers before heading back. Said hi to Pen (Sp?), his wife, and we sat outside and had a few more drinks. We tried the Thai whisky which Pen is fond of – different taste, quite aromatic and sure to give a bad hangover – but mainly stuck to Chang. Simon's new house is very impressive. We were staying in the 'Master Bedroom' which is bigger than most of the flats I've lived in in London. Ensuite bathroom with whirlpool tub. Massive teak bed. Very minimalist décor. Three floors. Overall we were rather inpressed. Simon now has a software development company and seems to be enjoying life. We went to bad after a few drinks as everyone gets up pretty early in the morning and we needed to as well if we were to get a lift into town.
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| Simon and Pen's house... |
Bright and early in the morning we all drove into town and Simon dropped us off at his office which is a short walk from the old town and city walls. We headed off and said we'd be back by 5:30. We walked down the road to the old town which is surrounded by a moat and the remaining bits of the city walls. We had borrowed a book about Chiang Mai which outlined the major temples so our plan was to do a little walking tour and then organise activities for the rest of the week as this was going to be an 'adventure week'. I'll be honest now and say that I don't remember the names of all the temples we saw, or even how many we saw, but there were loads of interesting buildings, impressively decorated buddhas and weird and unusual carvings and statues. In the first one all the monks were out having their breakfast so Bindya spent most of her time trying to surreptitiously take pictures of them.
The women who were serving them had to almost lie flat on the floor and push the plates out as far in front of them as they could before the monks could take it off them. Monks aren't allowed to touch women, even accidentally, or accept things directly from women. All in an attempt to avoid the suffering associated with desire. This has caused Bindya a lot of worry as, whenever monks appear on the street/bus/train/shop, she thinks that she might accidentally bump into them.
We went off to see one of the gates of the city walls and were approached by a Spanish woman who looked quite concerned. “Excuse me!”, she said, “but... where are we?”. I showed her the map as I wasn't sure how much she was lost, whether she knew she was in Thailand or what. We had an ice lolly and headed off to the next temple which had a very old part to it. I had my fortune told by a coin operated buddha machine but obviously couldn't read what it meant so just took a photo of it to ask Simon later (when he looked at it he said it said I was going to have good luck 'or something').
We picked up some leaflets about various tours and stuff and decided on a cookery course over lunch. We went up to where the course was held and signed up for it then went to see more temples. We were trying to find a place we'd seen on a leaflet that organised a little elephant ride/trek/white water rafting day trip and passed another temple that we went into. This one had a whole range of strange statues outside, including a full sized (assuming he is that size..) Donald Duck. We didn't find the tour place as people were shutting up shops now. We jumped on a tuk tuk to get back to Simon's office but as we were a little bit early, we went to 'The Pub' next door, which claimed to have an award for being one of the best pubs in the world in 2007 or something. It wasn't. We saw Simon and we all went back to his. We went for dinner at some riverside restaurant and had a few drinks and listened to the live band. This was my first experience of Tom Yum soup, which was insanely hot, and I had great difficulty eating for about 5 minutes after having some of that.
The next morning was our cooking course. First up – a big THANK YOU to Richard and Erin Garvan (and Luke and Fat Frank) for their wedding gift which paid for the cookery course (and other stuff like the day tour). We arrived, thanks to Simon, early for the course, we were greeted and were told to sit and enjoy some tea/coffee while we waited for the others on our course. When we sat down we had a chat...well actually she talked and we listened to a girl from the Netherlands about her time in Thailand, where she had gone, what she had done, what she will be off doing next. This is fine as me and Neil have got used to the single travellers who make conversation and are very chatty, however they all seem to like the sound of their own voice rather then a two way conversation. The rest of the group joined us and from our introductions for once we were the only Brits on the course. The others were from all parts of Europe, US and Taiwan ( later on the others showed their mental side) and the most sane person with us was the US guy. Anyway enough of the rant more about the course. We had a teacher who explained the course of the day and helped us to choose what dishes we would make. We had to do 7 dishes and so between me and Neil we did 14 so we had a bigger variety of learning and eating later. After this we headed to the market (though traidtional in look) it was clearly the place all cookery courses took there farangs (foreigners). We say and learnt about the different types of rice, herbs, spices, vegtables and noodles. Then we got a chance to wander and take pics. The place was filled with lots of different stalls with great and strange smells coming from every direction. When we returned back from the market we started off the day with a Thai tradition of Meang Kum (A Welcome Snack)where we took a betel leaf and created a pocket and filled it with chilli, peanuts, ginger, coconut, shallots, lime and sweet palm syrup and then you say welcome and eat the whole thing. It is a sensation in your mouth of hot, sweet and sour...I did like it but maybe I had put a little too much chilli in mine.
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| Fresh fish at the market |
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| Our cookery teacher |
Right so now we started on the cooking. We started with our first dishes being the noodles. I did Pad Thai and Neil did Pad See uw. We were given our own chopping board, cleaver and space and then went about cutting the ingredients (onions, chilli, garlic, kale, tofu etc) and getting it all ready before we headed to the Wok to cook our dishes. The way were were taught was great and easy to remember especially when seasoning the dishes with oil, fish sauce and oyster sauce. Once we cooked the dish we got to to do the best thing which was eat it. Me and Neil tried each others...if honest I liked mine a lot more then his! Next was the appetizers I did Spring Rolls and Neil did Papaya Salad. It was nice to watch each other do our dishes, yes I got to see Neil cook (see pics) he was very good. I got to roll and fry my Spring Rolls and then we got to eat again (already I was getting full..not sure how I can manage all the food) again we tried each others, Neil was spicy and mine again I thought was great....I will be making them once back people!!!
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| Handmade spring rolls Sir? |
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| Look at me - cooking! |
Then we spent a while preparing all the rest of our food – a soup, a stir fry, a curry and a desert. We got to make the curry paste from scratch but because there were three of us making Massaman paste, I didn't really get to do much, just chop all the bits up. Bindya was the only one making green cury paste so did it all on her own. The teacher said she was good at pounding the ingredients together. Bindya said it was because she had to think of something that made her angry, so just imagined my face while pounding the pestle and mortar. We made some of our favourite dishes such as chicken and cahsew nut (for Rachael!) and the dish that has become our Thai favourite, chicken with hot basil leaf – it is very hot but we had got used to it. The curries were a bit thin, more like a soup and the deserts weren't great. I made sticky rice and mango and Bindya made deep fried bananas which would have been really nice if we'd had better bananas – these ones were a bit too starchy. Overall it was a very fun day, we learned loads and I am now an expert cook...
We then left and headed to a book shop where we spent some time looking at all the books we wanted to buy, but have no room to carry in our 35litre bags. As it was Neil's birthday soon I deceided ti get him one he really wanted. We then walked for a bit towards Simon's office passing and visting a few more temples. This is where I get annoyed at the lack of common sense that other tourist have, especially women who visit temples in shorts and vest tops with no sarongs or scarfs to cover up and be respectful. It has signs everywhere and about the do and don'ts of a temple but still they just don't care. Ok enough of the ranting again, we headed to Simon's office and past what look like a festival taking place near his work. As Pen was hungover from the night before it was just Simon at work and so us 3 headed to the festival to find out what it was before we headed home. Here we were faced with cheap beer and a stage where lots of young girls and boys did dances with Thai pop music and what I have to say as funny costumes which made the girls look older then they were and the boys camp. T would have loved the moves and costumes and so we filmed sections of each for her and for all your entertainment. Simon was excited by the girls dancing and was also taking pictures and video footage. I dont know what to write so I think I will let the video do the talking.......
That night as we were stuffed from the cooking course we stayed at the house, introduced Simon to the Inbetweeners, drank beer and Pen cooked up some lovely noodles.
The next day was our 'adventure day'. We got picked up in town by a Sawngthaew (covered pick-up truck used as a bus) who then drove around picking up the other people. At one point we'd been driving for about an hour and we realised that we were pretty much back where we'd started – I think the driver had forgotten something. There were seven other people in our group, some Aussie kids, an Aussie couple, a Vietnamese woman and an Italian bloke called Egon who was quite insane. We had a bit of a chat with them but settled in for the drive which took a couple of hours – not the most comfy seats. We did a brief stop at some village. This was the 'Cultural Visit' of our tour – we saw some roadside stalls selling tourist tat and a couple of 'Longneck' people – none of them actually had the long necks with the rings around, they were just wearing funny hats.
Cultural visit over, we headed up to where the elephant treks were. We were starting to realise that this was all pretty low budget stuff we were doing but it was fair enough as we'd chosen the cheapest option. We got up onto a platform and clambered onto our seats on top of the elephant. It was pretty tricky to stay in our seat and it was only later that I realised we were the only people without a bar at the front of our seat, preventing us from falling out. Our poor elephant kept putting her trunk up to us, expecting us to have bought some bananas or sugar cane for her but, like I said, we were doing the budget option. We went down a hill, around and back up again. At one point the Aussie couple offered to take a photo of us, so we passed them our camera but then their elephant went off and we weren't able to get close again. Luckily they kept taking a few pictures of us and we got the camera back later. Overall the elephant ride was a bit depressing to be honest. They didn't look happy. We had a bit of lunch and went to see a baby elephant which had been born the night before. That was pretty cute to say the least. We finally bought some sugar cane to feed the mum but she wasn't interested which is fair enough considering she'd been up all night in labour.
After lunch was our 'trek'.. The guide didn't really explain what was happening so we didn't know if we had to change into our swimming gear or anything as we were meant to be going up to some big waterfall and pool. We hiked up a little track for half an hour – very picturesque – and the waterfall was pretty too but we had nowhere to change into our togs so just sat and soaked our feet.
We walked back again. The best bit was the whitewater rafting. It wasn't too mental as the river was quite low but still looked pretty exciting at some points. The rafting guide spent 5 minutes telling us how to follow the rafting instructions. He pointed at Bindya, as she had long trousers on, and told us 4 or 5 stories about people who died or broke their necks while rafting with long trousers on. After the pep talk we all got in our rafts. Most people had 6 in each raft but ours was just us, the Taiwanese woman and Egon. Whenwe weren't going down the rapid bits, we had to paddle, obviously. The only people who would follow our raft guides instructions were Bindya nd me though. We were getting increasingly annoyed with Egon who sat there doing bugger all while we broke our backs trying to paddle to raft along. At one point we got stuck on a rock going down a particularly lively bit. Water was pouring over my legs into the raft and we couldn't move out of it. I was trying to push off from the rock and the guide was telling us to lean over. Egon fell on top of me, trapping me on the floor under his body. I was shouting, 'Get off me you &^%$!' but he wasn't listening. We all got pretty badly soaked. Overall though it was great fun and we will definitely do it again. At the end of it we got out and got onto bamboo rafts. These are simply long, flat rafts made from bamboo. I got to stand at the front and punt us along. Everyone else sits on the raft, which is normally a couple of inches under water. We all got soaked again. On the way back we all had a bit more of a chat about stuff and we were back in no time, although about an hour late – we found Simon and Pen sat waiting for us outside.
Thanks again to the Garvans for their wedding present!
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| Our transport |
Cultural visit over, we headed up to where the elephant treks were. We were starting to realise that this was all pretty low budget stuff we were doing but it was fair enough as we'd chosen the cheapest option. We got up onto a platform and clambered onto our seats on top of the elephant. It was pretty tricky to stay in our seat and it was only later that I realised we were the only people without a bar at the front of our seat, preventing us from falling out. Our poor elephant kept putting her trunk up to us, expecting us to have bought some bananas or sugar cane for her but, like I said, we were doing the budget option. We went down a hill, around and back up again. At one point the Aussie couple offered to take a photo of us, so we passed them our camera but then their elephant went off and we weren't able to get close again. Luckily they kept taking a few pictures of us and we got the camera back later. Overall the elephant ride was a bit depressing to be honest. They didn't look happy. We had a bit of lunch and went to see a baby elephant which had been born the night before. That was pretty cute to say the least. We finally bought some sugar cane to feed the mum but she wasn't interested which is fair enough considering she'd been up all night in labour.
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| Baby elephant looks mental |
After lunch was our 'trek'.. The guide didn't really explain what was happening so we didn't know if we had to change into our swimming gear or anything as we were meant to be going up to some big waterfall and pool. We hiked up a little track for half an hour – very picturesque – and the waterfall was pretty too but we had nowhere to change into our togs so just sat and soaked our feet.
We walked back again. The best bit was the whitewater rafting. It wasn't too mental as the river was quite low but still looked pretty exciting at some points. The rafting guide spent 5 minutes telling us how to follow the rafting instructions. He pointed at Bindya, as she had long trousers on, and told us 4 or 5 stories about people who died or broke their necks while rafting with long trousers on. After the pep talk we all got in our rafts. Most people had 6 in each raft but ours was just us, the Taiwanese woman and Egon. Whenwe weren't going down the rapid bits, we had to paddle, obviously. The only people who would follow our raft guides instructions were Bindya nd me though. We were getting increasingly annoyed with Egon who sat there doing bugger all while we broke our backs trying to paddle to raft along. At one point we got stuck on a rock going down a particularly lively bit. Water was pouring over my legs into the raft and we couldn't move out of it. I was trying to push off from the rock and the guide was telling us to lean over. Egon fell on top of me, trapping me on the floor under his body. I was shouting, 'Get off me you &^%$!' but he wasn't listening. We all got pretty badly soaked. Overall though it was great fun and we will definitely do it again. At the end of it we got out and got onto bamboo rafts. These are simply long, flat rafts made from bamboo. I got to stand at the front and punt us along. Everyone else sits on the raft, which is normally a couple of inches under water. We all got soaked again. On the way back we all had a bit more of a chat about stuff and we were back in no time, although about an hour late – we found Simon and Pen sat waiting for us outside.
Thanks again to the Garvans for their wedding present!
Chiang Mai 1 Temples and Rock in Roll
Chiang Mai 2 Cookery School
Chiang Mai 3 – Adventure Day
