We crossed the ‘friendship bridge’ into
Thailand, feeling exhausted from travelling for two days straight and also I
still felt feverish so kept popping the paracetamol. Apparently there was a bus
straight from Mae Sot, the border town on the Thailand side, to Chiang Mai
where we planned to go. Unfortunately we had no idea where the bus went from
and what time it left- there was a few reports online of it leaving at 12 or
2pm, and it was 12.30 by the time we crossed the border so we had no idea if we
had any chance. But my fever was getting worse and seeing as we didn’t know
where we had to go, we accepted the fact we would have to spend a night in Mae
Sot. We took a shared rickshaw from the border to the town, and were dropped
off in a fairly desolate road in the middle of the town. Meanwhile, I had
retrieved the Thai Baht which we had left over from before we entered Myanmar,
of which we should have had about 120 pounds worth. However, I could only find
about 20 of this, and although I was fairly sure where I had left it I wanted
to check the rest of my bag in the other places I might have put it. We walked
for about 15 minutes trying to find a guesthouse but there did not seem to be
an abundance of them. Finally we found one, but were told it was full. To save
us both trundling around with our heavy bags for too much longer, Jonno left me
with the bags while he went in search for one that had room.
About another 20 minutes later and he
returned, 2 more places were full but he found one more that said they had a
room for us. We walked 5 minutes further and put our bags down, relieved. But
when we got to the reception desk, it was shut and there was nobody there, we called
down the corridors but nobody answered. Ten minutes later and still nobody had
showed up which was strange because Jonno had told them he would be coming
straight back to check in. So Jonno went off again in search of another guest
house in case we needed to go elsewhere. In this time a member of staff from
the hotel showed up so I checked in, and was given the option of the air
conditioner or non AC room. When I asked to see the non AC and was shown a room
with an air conditioner unit on the wall, the man told me that if I wanted to
pay for the AC room he would give me the remote. I figured we could try without
and demand the remote if we needed it. After a thorough search of my bag and
still no sign of the missing Baht, our only guess is that it had been stolen
while we were in Myanmar, as there were a few times it had been in one of my
bags that I had left at the reception at hotels between check out and one of
the buses. Anyway, there was not much we could do about it so had to accept
this was money we had lost.
Jonno returned and as we were both very
tired, we spent a few hours resting before venturing out for dinner. Jonno had
been craving a Pad Thai for the past week so this was what we went in search
for. However, no Pad Thai in sight and there wasn’t many options at all for
restaurants. We found one that had noodle soup, and even though we were very
bored with noodle soup we didn’t have the energy to hunt further.
After a much needed sleep and a few night
time trips to the shared toilet which included jumping over cockroaches along
the corridor, I was still feeling awful the next day and decided the best plan
was to recover before moving on to Chiang Mai. So the whole day was spent in
fitful sleep, and Jonno making trips around the town to bring me back fruit. We
researched it and apparently there was a few places to visit if we hired a
moped so we thought we could stay another day and see what is around before
leaving.
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| Multi-purpose shrine and cat house |
The following day, a little better but not
feeling up to any day trips, we took a walk to try and find the bus station to
book our bus ticket for the next day, and were sent on a wild goose chase to
various bus parks and random roads. I felt pretty rubbish so Jonno carried on
the search, to find the bus booking place about a minute away from where we had
been turned around by a lady boy in a shop. I went to sit outside the guest
house to get some fresh air, and ended up meeting a guy we spoke to in Mawlamyine
in Myanmar, and a few other people on the way in and out of Myanmar. A few of
the people trying to enter the country had asked me if we had any problem
crossing, and I wasn’t too sure why until another set of people said that the
road we had taken out of Myanmar had been closed because there was fighting.
Apparently the government and the rebels had been in dispute over ownership of
the road, and people had been killed in the fighting. Luckily we had managed to
avoid any of the conflict, but it explained why a lot of the guesthouses were
full as there were lots of people waiting until it was safe to cross the
border.
The next day we took the bus to Chiang Mai,
a fairly uneventful journey, and arrived there at about 4pm. We checked a map
and noticed that the town had a square network of small roads in the centre so
headed towards that. We found a nice guesthouse and treated ourselves to an air
conditioned room. However we didn’t have much time to rest as we had been told
there was a Sunday market happening (it was a Sunday) and we didn’t think we
would be there another week so we had to take the opportunity. We ventured out
into the ‘Sunday walking street’ and were met with market stalls on both sides
of the street, selling clothes, food and souvenirs. After battling through
crowds and making a few purchases, we found the Pad Thai that we were so
craving and went back to the guesthouse for an early night.
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| Sunday market |
The next day we spent exploring Chiang Mai-
and the conclusion is that it is another town to cater for the needs of
tourists- there was a McDonalds, a Starbucks, lots of western bars and travel
agencies offering ‘authentic’ and ‘off the beaten track’ tours to ‘become an
elephant mahout(trainer)’ or visit the ‘long neck’ tribe which I had heard some
not great reviews about. Jonno did need to top up on his supply of contact
lenses so we went to one of the Thai optician chain stores. He also wanted to
check his prescription was the same so he asked them for an eye test too. He
disappeared into the eye test room only to emerge a few minutes later with the
huge metal glasses frame that they can slot various lenses into on his face,
and they asked him to look at the road and see if his vision felt the same when
looking out onto the road, a very accurate measure. He wasn’t quite sure, so
instead we managed to bring up an eye chart on one of our phones, I held it and
he stood a few metres behind to see if he could read it. There we were, in an
opticians, having to do a makeshift eye test. Anyway, after doing a marvellous
job at being opticians, we decided that we didn’t think his prescription had
changed and ordered three months worth of contacts after some haggling, and
were told that they should be ready in a few days.
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| The streets of Chiang Mai |
By this point my fever had calmed down but
I was still feeling weak and my skin felt prickly and itched like crazy, which
was keeping me awake at night, so the following day we decided it was time for
a visit to the doctors. But first, Jonno was also not feeling very well with
his head problems and wanted to try a chiropractor to see if it was his neck
that was causing it. We found an address of one, and followed the signs to a
small road next to a hotel. We went into the door the sign was over, and
entered some kind of workshop/jumble sale, with random dusty bits lying around
everywhere. We asked tentatively for ‘chiropractor’ and one of the men behind
the counter stood up and lead us upstairs. Apparently he was in fact the
chiropractor, and the room he took us to was like an attic room with one bench
in the middle. After he had cracked Jonno as much as he could crack but no
mention of any major problem or further treatment, we were on our way and went
to find the doctors. The first surgery we found had people queuing out of the
door it was so crowded and we were told they could not see any more people, but
there was another doctors down the road. So off we went to find this other
place, and when we arrived there was a mere ten people waiting. We took a seat
and waited for a while, until I was called up and gestured into a small room to
sit on my own and wait for the doctor. He arrived a few minutes afterwards, did
a few tests and told me I had dengue fever (for the second time possibly, I
never got the first suspected case confirmed by a doctor) and the prickly
feeling was due to having low platelets. He then stuck a large needle in me and
gave me yet another concoction of drugs, charging me 40 pounds for this
wonderful experience.
Since the Thai massage we had in Bangkok I
had been considering the idea of doing a Thai massage course,, as it was
something new and interesting I could learn and it is a bit like someone else
doing yoga for you so it has many of those benefits too. I had heard that
Chiang Mai was the best place for massage schools so went in hunt of some of
the schools to look at the options. We searched around a little and after going
through a few quiet alleyways we came across a place called ‘Wandee Massage
School’. When we tentatively opened the door, a small cheerful Thai woman
appeared and introduced herself as Wandee the teacher. As this was currently
the low season for tourists she currently had no students, so if I wanted to
learn I would get the bonus of one to one tuition. She recommended five days
should be enough for me to learn the basics of Thai massage. Jonno was happy to
have a few lazy days so I signed up to start 2 days later.
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| I think this dog has had too much protein shake |
Jonno was still feeling pretty rubbish and
we wanted to eliminate any serious causes, so we found a private doctors and
asked them to do some general tests to check on his health. They poked him a
bit and took some blood and aid they would check for various things and let us
know if they discovered anything, at 100 pounds the initial tests were
definitely not cheap but at least it might give us an idea of what may be
causing his problems. As we had hired a scooter and had the rest of the day to
kill, we took a drive up to a popular temple on the top of a large hill.
Nothing spectacular about it, but it had some nice views on the way. We also
found a sign to another waterfall, which again was a fairly standard waterfall
for the area but it gave us a chance to have a walk around.
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| View of Chiang Mai |
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| Another shiny pagoda |
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| Someone has parent issues |
On the way back to
the guesthouse, we stopped at a night market and had a wander around there. We
were getting hungry by this point and we spotted that in the middle of the
market there were quite a few outside restaurants with sizzling domes in the
middle of the tables, where people were cooking their own food. Intrigued, we
investigated closer and it seemed easy enough- there was a buffet of raw meat
and vegetables, you chose your food and once you have cooked it on the frying
dome, its ready to eat. We could do that. So we were given a table, the
waitress lit our dome and off we went to get our food to cook. We returned with
a selection of items, placing them on the cooking area and waited for the magic
to happen. However, we soon realised it wasn’t as easy as it looked. The meat
which wen at the top had to be balanced carefully or it would slip down. And
without oil or anything to stop it sticking it was creating a burnt layer over
the dome. The dome also wasn’t very quick, and we got bored of waiting so were
pretty sure food poisoning was imminent. And the bottom of the dome had a moat
of water around it which we think was to boil vegetables (that’s what we did
anyway) but this needed constant monitoring for topping up so it didn’t dry out
and was also agonisingly slow. And then there was the eggs we had picked up
from the buffet. How were we expected to cook the eggs? While I went for
cracking the egg over the top of the dome which resulted in a burnt mess over
the dome and most of it running down into the water, Jonno tried to hard boil
his in about 2cm of water which after about ten minutes was only slightly
better than raw. Anyway, the whole process was a struggle and we were
definitely getting laughed at by the staff and other diners but it was an
experience anyway.
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| The threat of food poisoning makes the meal more enjoyable. Notice the egg cooking technique. |
The following day was the start of my
massage course. Sure enough, I was the only student and was presented with a
workbook and a pencil. Wandee instructed me to lie on the mattresssed area, and
started to massage me. Great, this was very relaxing and not much work at all!
However, it was my turn next. I had to try and do the same sequence on Wandee
with some bad sketches and some of my scribbled notes to help me. When I would
put my hands in the wrong place she would grab my hands and put them in the
correct place, and when I got it right she would make an ‘uuugh’ noise in
approval. Her catchphrase was ‘strong and smooth’, and after a few hours of
trying to maintain ‘strong and smooth’ my thumbs were aching and I was mentally
drained from concentrating so much. But it was great to learn something new and
at the end of the day I went back to meet Jonno and show him the techniques I
had learnt. The next day continued in the same fashion, I learnt more of the
sequence and then practiced it again and again. At the end of the second day
Wandee said she thought it might be good for me to have a day off to take it
in, and we would resume again the day after.
The next day was Sunday again, so after a
relaxing morning we took another trip to the Sunday night market. We had been
noticing that many of the hotels and buses in the area had signs up demanding
that ‘no durian’ fruit is to be brought into the premises. This confused and
intrigued us; why would a fruit be banned in certain areas? In amongst the
other market stalls was a place that sold durian so we let our curiosity get
the better of us and bought a small amount. It was wrapped in plastic, and when
we unwrapped it we realised why it was not allowed in many places. The smell
was foul, like rotting raw onion, and the taste was pretty similar- it had a
mushy texture and tasted of creamy raw onion. I have no idea why anyone would
choose to eat it, and after suffering a couple of mouthfuls each we threw it
away. However, the aftertaste would not go away so we had the added torture of
being able to taste it for hours afterwards. Definitely won’t be eating durian
again in a hurry!
I returned the next day for my last three
days of the massage course, and was joined by one other girl from Japan which
meant we could practice the massage techniques on each other while Wandee
adjusted and corrected us, and to show us where to put the pressure would every
so often interject with a marker pen to draw lines on us (most of the time I
forgot I was covered in pen and leave the school with red lines all over me).
What I didn’t realise before is that the whole Thai massage sequence takes a
long time. Most of the time it is shortened as most people don’t get more than
an hour of massage, but from beginning to end it takes somewhere between 3 to 4
hours. It is hard work to go on for this long and wasn’t easy on my poor
thumbs! On the last day as I was going through the whole sequence, a girl came
into the school asking if she could have a massage for one hour. Wandee started
as if she was going to ask the girl to come back later, and then changed her
mind and turned to me and asked if I was able to do it. Even though I wasn’t
feeling at all confident, I took up the challenge and went with some of the
bits I knew better, and even though the feedback from the teacher was I should
have ended it slightly differently, I did really well overall and the customer
said it was great too. She handed over some money to Wandee at the end, who
passed the money over to me. My first paying customer! It was only 2 pounds but
that was enough to buy myself a celebratory drink that evening!
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| Look how tall I am! Last day of the massage course |
We left Chiang Mai the next day, and got a
minibus to Pai, a more rural town about 3 hours out of Chiang Mai. We had heard
a lot of people raving about this place and wanted to see why. We arrived at
the bus stop in the middle of the small high street, and soon found a cosy
little bungalow for a decent price. We soon discovered that Pai is a smaller,
more chilled out Chiang Mai but basically offers the same things. An abundance
of restaurants, a few bars, a small night market and lots of travel agencies to
book activities like trekking and elephant riding, the majority of it being for
tourists. But we figured we would give it a couple of days as we needed to work
out our plan from there.
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| Scenery in Pai |
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| An advert for a restaurant and cooking school |
With Jonno still not feeling too good, we
took the opportunity of a few days in a chilled out place to relax and
recooperate. We found an outdoor public swimming pool which was nice for a few
hours, and the balcony on our bungalow was the perfect size for my yoga
practice. When Jonno felt better we even went on a few runs together. We rented
a scooter for one day as one activity that was recommended for Pai was to
explore the surrounding areas, so off we set. After taking a few wrong turns
and circling the town about three times, we came across a big Buddha statue, a
fairly disappointing waterfall, a bleak china town area and a viewpoint with
free green tea (which was not really free- there was an entrance fee) where one
tourist was harassing a cat and tried to keep him from walking away by holding
the scruff of his neck so she could get a nice picture. We also tried to get to
another waterfall which was down a dirt track and when we parked up and saw the
sign for the waterfall pointing directly into the river, we realised this maybe
was a waterfall which was not accessible in the rainy season so had to give up
on that idea.
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| Definitely waterfall with caution |
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| Another waterfall |
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| Cat being held captive against its will for a photo |
After a few restorative days and feeling a bit more energised, we
decided we were ready to leave Thailand and continue our journey onto Laos.
There were packages advertised by the travel agencies with combined bus and
boat travel to Luang Prabang, one of the main cities in Laos, so we figured we
might as well book that and take a few days on a slow boat down the Mekong
river.
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| A nice way to spend a few hours |
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| Our friend who we promptly un-friended when we saw he was into cannibalism..the dirty bastard |
We left Pai the following day, took a
minibus back to Chiang Mai where we changed minibus to take us to Chiang Khong
where we stayed overnight. The bus had made a dinner stop at a fancy
hotel/restaurant so we figured the accommodation which was included in the
price ticket might be a treat, but when we arrived at the guest house at 1am we
were greeted with a grubby room with extremely solid beds. We didn’t have much
time to enjoy the filth though, as we had to get a few hours sleep before our
7am wake up and 8am departure. From there we were taken to the Thai-Laos
border, waited around for a while for us and the rest of the group to sort out
our visas and we had arrived in Laos!
