Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Abroad Trip Day 6

Today has been a very long day. We woke up at 5:30, breakfast at 6 and on the bus by 6:30! We went on a guided tour of Northern Thailand. Our final destination, the Golden Triangle, is a 4 hours drive from Chiang Mai. We took lots of breaks. We stopped at a hot springs about an hour into our trip. We put our feet into the hot water. You have to just plunge it in. If you tippytoe it, you will just burn your feet. If you dunk them, the lowest layer of water along the rocks is cooler, and your calves have less nerves, so it doesn't hurt as much. I bought a pair of pants and a bracelet. This is my bargaining proud moment. They told me 850 baht, which is ridiculously peeng (expensive). I counter-offered with 150 which is ridiculously cheap. They went down to 750, and I went up to 200. They said no, I said no. I walked away, and they said “Ok! 200!” Win for Catey.

Then we went to a Seven Eleven. I used an ATM for the first time here. 5000 baht for $170 and a $5 ATM charge. I then bought a bunch of snacks, like cookies and candy and soymilk. The soymilk and cookies hit the spot. The candy (dried mangos, and hard plum candy) was a major miss. The dried mango tasted and felt like fingers, and the plum candy wasn't bad, but it was Old People Candy. You know, the candy that old people have in their house that only they like so the kids won't eat all of it.

Anyway, back on the bus until we got to Chiang Rai, where we switched to seelaws because we were going to two villages. The first village was an Akha village. They build their houses out of bamboo, and they're elevated. It was really cool to see, but the kids and grannies followed us around, pestering us with bracelets they wanted to sell us and begging us to take pictures with them for a baht. There were a lot of cute dogs, though. And chickens.

The second village was a Yuan village, who originated from China. Their houses are also bamboo, but are built on the ground, not a platform. They also sold things, but didn't follow us around as much. They sold us sticky rice for 5 baht. Sticky rice is a sweet rice patty/taffy that is grilled, served with sugar, and wrapped in a banana leaf. You don't eat the banana leaf. It is very delicious. They decorate their houses with large dead bugs, too. Luckily, we haven't seen any of those bugs. Just mosquitoes and little biting bugs. I am still bug-bite free, however!

We got back on the bus, and headed north again. We stopped for lunch at the Golden Triangle on the Thai side, which was an international buffet. I had Myanmar chicken curry and Thai pancakes, among other things. It wasn't bad, but it also served chicken a la king, and sauerkraut.

Then, we got on speedboats to cross the Mekong River! I sat in front. They're low river speedboats, with a car engine for a motor. Toyota, to be more specific. Very very fast. We went upriver to No Mans Land, which is the area in the river between Burma/Myanmar, Thailand and Laos. We did not go to Burma, but we did go to Laos to the market that has sprung up there. The specialty there is snake whiskey. Or scorpion, or turtle or tiger penis, etc. Basically a bottle of whiskey with a dead animal (or part of a dead animal) inside of it. I didn't try any, but a lot of people did. Gross! They also sold a lot of opium pipes there, because of the regions history with the opium trade. Also, a lot of knockoff brands of clothing and jewelry, etc. I didn't buy anything in Laos.

After we crossed the Mekong again, we piled back on the bus for a long trip back to Chiang Mai. We stopped at a wat on the way, and Artie showed us how to make offerings to monks and temples. A monk there blessed us, gave us simple white yarn bracelets for protection, and we were on our way again.

4 hours later, we all got home and crashed. Very late night.

1 comment:

  1. You made me laugh out loud. Have you eaten fingers? How do you know what they taste like? And also, maybe old people like their candy. Tastes change as we age. You won't always like skittles and pull apart licorice.

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