Sharon and Jacques’ Excellent Blog

I have to say that it was good to be back in Bangkok after the less travelled paths of Vietnam and Cambodia. We had a great meal at the airport really cheaply which was a total surprise and a welcome one at that. Our flight from Cambodia to Chiang Mai was uneventful all our luggage arriving in one piece except for my lost hat in Cambodia (left it behind) and my lost MP3 player which I left on the plane. Despite alerting them to the fact that I had lost it as soon as we got to the gate, it strangely didn’t turn up.

Sharon had arranged for us to spend about a week in a long stay apartment. We arrived at the building after a bit of a struggle and checked out the room. The room was large and spacious with a separate living room rather than a single room. Unfortunately the bed was the hardest in all of our travels. I have slept on the ground with more comfort than that mattress. It was so bad, that after 2 days Sharon complained and they put a piece of foam under the sheets and it was slightly better.

Chiang Mai is at a bit of an altitude (500m) and is in the shadow of taller mountains so was much cooler and generally wetter than other places in our travels and the cool was welcome. When we arrived at noon, we decided to go stock up on supplies at the local 7-11 of which there is one on every block. I event discovered they offer catalog shopping including a complete clothing line.

At the back of the 7-11 (called 7-20 in Cambodia), we found a Slurpee machine. It dispensed green looking goop and Coke. Sharon decided to try a bit of the green looking goop and declared that it tasted awful and switched her glass to the Coke side of the machine.

I was busy browsing something else and then I heard this loud pop accompanied by a crash and some choice words from Sharon. I turned around to discover that the slurpee machine had been plugged up and had exploded all over Sharon covering her with Coke slurpee.  Sharon was distressed, I burst out laughing. The people working at the 7-11 were chagrined and offered water and napkins to help clean up. Fortunately nothing more than Sharon’s pride was hurt and I was still laughing as we walked out of the 7-11.

I felt that Buddha was equalizing the balance in the universe and getting a bit of revenge. Sharon is not exactly the most reverent person in some of the temples and he was just letting off a little steam (or slurpy as the case may be). Here are a few examples:

• Wanting me to photograph her head as it poked above a Buddha missing its head
• Comparing her physical state with various Buddhas and their state of decay
• Getting totally jaded after seeing so many Wats (I also had this problem) despite the fact they were all remarkable
• Coming up with very creative rhymes about Buddha and the people who had created Wat Pol. Ask her and she will happily recite it for you

Sharon vehemently disagreed with me but no Slurpee machines have exploded on me so I stick with the facts as I see them.

Transportation in Chiang Mai is entertaining. Along with the usual tok toks and metered cabs, they have covered trucks that you can flag down and will take you most places in the city for about $1. Much cheaper than the taxis and tok tok drivers are just plain crooks. The 1st words out of their mouth about cost is at least 3 times the most expensive cab ride so we just don’t even bother. The only drawback is that the roof is set for Asians so I have to hunch over with sitting on the padded bench seats.

Yesterday we went on a tour that included an elephant show, rafting down a river, elephant riding, ox cart rides and finally a visit to the local butterfly and orchid farm.

The elephant show was amazing to say the least. The elephants performed the following feats:

• Ringing a bell to start the show and raising a flag
• Walking on 2 legs
• Doing handstands
• Playing soccer and kicking balls in the goal
• Painting by being guided by the mahout including a picture of two elephants mating
• Bowing to do the traditional Thai greeting
• Gave roses to girls in the audience

You could buy a bundle of bananas and sugar cane for about $1 and feed it to the elephants so we watched that and watched the elephants hoist mostly women up for various pictures. After the show, we went on a relaxing bamboo raft ride down on a river. The tour group that we were was very entertaining and our tour guide had an excellent sense of humour. Sharon instantly bonded with a loud obnoxious (and claimed to be shy) German lady and the whole bus was laughing along.

We were on the raft with the Germans (two ladies, Sharon and I) and were ahead of the other rafters in our group. All of a sudden the blissful calm is broken by one of the Mexicans in the group starting to sing and Sharon starts singing along as well. I wasn’t impressed having to put up with hours of Sharon’s singing (she’s convinced it’s just a matter of time before she’s discovered; I think committed is actually the term she’s grasping for) and gave her a quick swat to the head. Didn’t make any difference and they switched from Mexican, to Italian to French. After about 15 mins of terrible singing and some muttered threats, silence prevailed and I went back to studying the jungle.

I’ve noticed very, very few birds in South East Asia in general. It could be that they are only out at dawn and dusk but you see many more birds along the side of the road and on wires in Canada. I’m not sure if it’s due to hunting or the birds just hide.

After the bamboo rafting finished, we took the bus back up to the elephant camp and saddled up. We got a younger elephant that really wasn’t pleased to be doing this and his mahout had to cajole him the whole time interspersed with banana fuel to keep him going.

Elephant riding is not a smooth affair. They sway hugely from side to side. The “saddle” we were put in had a convenient bar just like in an amusement ride to hang onto and you needed to. If you didn’t sway your spine got bent in the most interesting and painful positions. At one point, the mahout jumped down and Sharon moved down onto the elephant’s neck and I moved in to the middle. Much less swaying in the middle and I had the whole mount to myself. The mahout asked if I wanted a picture and I handed him my camera. He immediately started snapping shot after shot clearly enjoying my camera and was reticent to give it back. He even walked up to another mahout to show him taking pictures of us. After at least a dozen pictures, he started walking alongside us.

The route that the elephants had to take was surprising. We started with a river crossing with the elephant in front of us holding the Germans taking a large dump while crossing. It’s a site I will never forget, huge balls of elephant shit plopping down to be washed downstream. It’s good that we rafted before doing the elephant rides.

Next there were stairs up a mountain at about a 40 degree grade that the elephant gamely plodded along (at least with a lot of encouragement). The elephant never lost its footing once. Going downhill sharply was also an experience and the crash bar really helped for something to clutch onto for dear life.

The elephant ride lasted about an hour and I was glad that it was over. I was a little battered from repeated forced contact with various bits of metal from the mount and all the swaying. The Raj can keep elephants as their transportation as far as I’m concerned.

At the end of the elephant ride, we walked through a hill tribe village (basically poor villagers trying to sell us handicrafts while the guide explained that they weren’t considered Thai citizens because they used slash and burn agriculture and had too many kids) and then boarded an oxcart back to the elephant camp. The ox car riding was smoother than the elephant and came complete with a large umbrella to keep the sprinkling of rain off us.

As soon as we got out of the mud, I discovered that shocks were an important part of a comfortable ride and hard wagon wheels didn’t cut it. I could feel every groove, pebble and bump in the road. Blissfully, it was only 15 minutes of bovine goodness. As I staggered back to the bus, people were comparing which ride they liked best. I voted silently for the AC bus and was glad to be aboard again.

Our departure was delayed for about 10 minutes then a small procession came up to us carrying coconut drinks that had been bought by a very kind man and his family from the UAE. He had a 10 month old baby with him and she was generally very well behaved. It was a strange group to say the least. We had 2 ladies from Malaysia all wearing head coverings as well as the lady from the UAE carrying a baby and wearing a full burka. There was Sharon and I, the 2 Germans and the two Mexicans and the zany Thai tour guide.

We travelled about 45 minutes to an orchid farm. He had an option of going to see a monkey and snake show and everybody opted for the orchid farm as it had been a long day already. Sharon hates snakes and snake parks, I hate monkeys so I was happy to go with the flow.

The orchid farm was beautiful with thousands of orchids in bloom of about a dozen different varieties and colours. They also had a butterfly aviary and we wandered through that. They breed butterflies and we could see evidence of caterpillars and pupae.

After 30 mins of orchid farm, we went back to the hotel after a long day. We decided to go and get a massage and have dinner. I narrowly avoided killing Sharon and she marched my ass up and down Chiang Mai looking for just the right spot but I’ll save that for the next post.