Chiang-Mai

hmmm...

Midway through a two day cooking course, and having just gotten back from a two day, one night trek through the mountains here, i'm completely exhausted. Chiang mai, in the north of Thailand, is pretty cool though, and even though i feel like i'm going to drop i'm enjoying it.

For the trek we walked for about 9 km along ridgelines, etc. to the top of the local mountains and a village of the white karen tribe. After trudging up the hills all day, i kind of wanted to lie down, but got talked into playing soccer with the local villagers on the rock hard dirt field. 3 hours later I was kind of having trouble walking. Soccer was very fun, despite my total lack of skill, because of my size difference with the local people. Ken described it as "watching godzilla wade into a herd of japanese tourists" every time I tried to get the ball - most of them got out my way to avoid my flailing limbs and lack of coordination, but i still didn't have a chance of touching the ball... The traditional thai version of football is played on a volleyball court with a net, but with soccer rules (meaning only your feet can touch the ball), so everyone in thailand is ridiculously good with their feet.

Apart from the sore feet, also rode an elephant (which makes really big poop) and forded white water on a bamboo raft. The rafting was pretty fun as the guide on our raft was a sick sadistic bastard who kept on viciously splashing the girls on the other raft and yelling "no wet? no fun!". Good times, despite a couple near misses on the rocks and me almost falling off the raft a couple times (I was standing on the back trying to help steer with the other pole).

Found out the white karen tribe we stayed with is named because the unmarried women in the tribe will wear full length white dresses to highlight this fact... makes things easier for the fellas, except that only the women can make marriage proposals, making it a very matriarchal society... Our guide hadn't been asked to marry by any girls yet, and the impression i got was of the guys having a pretty carefree existence and waiting for the girls to take most of the iniative.

Anyways, returned to chiangmai via a waterfall and another 9km of walking (downhill this time) and collapsed in bed. I was pretty sure i had birdflu for a while (especially with the @#$!ing roosters that woke us up at 4:30 am and were wandering around the village) as I had a fever and felt like a sack of crap. Woke up the next morning feeling slightly better (more like the ebola monkey than patient zero) and made for the thai cooking class to spread my viral particles.

The cooking class was amazing, and ridiculous, as you have to eat whatever you cook and we were trying 6 dishes a day plus dessert. Won't bore you with the details, but hopefully demonstrate my new skills, and new tolerance for ridiculously spicy food... The stuff that had our tongues hanging out and smoke coming out our ears was "too bland" for the thai staff there to help us eat.

So, i'm now plump, tired, and somewhat more knowledgable about thai food and culture - not bad for a non-stop 4 days north of bangkok. The next step calls for a night train back to bangkok, and preparations for the return home... by this, of course, I mean trying to drink the country dry of rotgut rice whisky and hideously insult all the locals on the king's birthday (the 5th).

Until next time, hopefully not from the depths of a thai prison,

Chris