Days 138-152: Thailand
Bangkok to Chiang Mai
We have spent the past two weeks in central and northern Thailand and have taken advantage of it’s “first world” resources to re-equip for the months and countries ahead. After 5 months on the road, some of our gear was in desperate need of an upgrade. Not that we were too worn out ourselves, but it was good to “relax” from travel for a bit.
Our last trip to Thailand in 2003 had a lot more “vacation” than this latest trip. If you’re interested in some pretty pictures from southern Thailand, here’s a link to our 2003 trip’s website.
We arrived in Bangkok late at night and we’ll blame Kelly thanking the Thai immigration officer in Indonesian on jet lag. We made our way to the travellers’ ghetto that is Khao San Rd. The place was shocking because we hadn’t seen that many white people in months. And we hadn’t seen that little clothing on people in even longer. We were here during our last trip but hadn’t seen the street in it’s nomal touristy state because the Thai New Year’s (Songkran) festival was going on. The place was filled with throngs of people throwing water on each other for Songkran, but now it is full of streetside vendors selling retro stuff from the 80s and fake IDs. We made quite a few trips up and down the road, but sorry Andrew, we couldn’t find the guy selling watches that spew fire.
Khao San’s neon bar signs are enough to entice anyone in for a Beer Chang.
Speaking of enticement, there sure are a lot of hookers here and pleanty of westerners utilizing their services. It’s a bit of a change from the conservative muslim countries we’ve been in the past three months.
We thought we’d take advantage of Bangkok’s many embassies and collect a few visas for upcoming countries. The Myanmar embassy was pretty easy to get to by river bus. [It was on one of these rides that Marcus commented, “I’m not the tallest person on this boat.” – Marcus had been getting used to being the tallest person around, and Kel was frequently the second tallest at a lofty 5’6″.] It took us three visits over six days to get our hands on a pair of entry passes. On the application form, there were many questions about your physical appearance. For “complexion” we wanted to enter “bronze”, but figured the grumpy fellow behind the counter wouldn’t appreciate the humor. We were a little worried when they compared our passports to “The List” (presumably of journalists and human right’s activists they don’t want hanging around), but we aparently weren’t on it.
The Laos embassy is in the middle of no where. It took hours to get out to it (in the rain) and we had to get “emergency service” to get the visa before closing – which jumped the price. The visa took about 10 minutes to issue, which was long enough for Marcus to have a conversation with a travel agent. He said they provide a visa application service where they do all the leg-work for you for a whopping commission of $1. Doh! We’ll definitely use that next time.
Bangkok has a LOT of shopping malls which is good news when your shoes are falling apart. Kelly picked up a new pair of double extra-wide men’s shoes that fit perfectly. Not to worry, Thai’s have thin feet, right? Nope, these are American New Balance brand. Speaking of shoes, Marcus’ sandals self destructed in Bali. Shouldn’t be a problem since Bali is a tourist mecca for tall Aussies. After visiting all of the posh US brand shoe stores on the tourist strip in Kuta, we could only find a grand total of TWO sandals for Marcus to choose from. Size 13’s just aren’t in high supply.
While returning from a outting on a public bus, Marcus was keen to see how well he understood the bus routes and opted to stay on the bus when all the other tourists got off. When the bus took an unexpected turn, we abandonded ship and headed back on foot. Kelly expressed some question about our location, and Marcus re-assured her that the “Master Navigator” had everything under control. It was at this point that a road with about 12 lanes of express traffic stood between us and where we wanted to be with no lights or cross-walks to stem the flow of traffic. It took us the better part of 15 minutes to get across that road, and Marcus has not refered to himself as “Master Navigator” since. We later found out that the bus did actually go where we wanted to go and that we had just bailed too early.
We escaped errands for a day to visit the former Thai capitol of Ayuthaya (from 1379 until 1767) to the north. We rented some ricketty old single-speed beater bikes and rode around the ruins. The picture postcard sight at Ayuthaya is this Buddha head embedded in the trunk of a fig tree. Nobody knows how it got there. Virtually every Buddha in the place was missing its head, so one rumor has it that a theif dropped it while fleeing the scene and the tree grew around it.
Saffron-robed Buddhas (with replacement heads) keep watch over Ayuthaya.
One of the temple complexes at Ayuthaya.
Contemporary monument to the Queen (or was it from the Queen?) shimmers in the only patch of sunlight all day at Ayuthaya.
With visas in-hand, we finally left Bangkok and headed north to Phitsanulok for a couple nights to visit the original Thai capitol of Sukhothai (1257-1379). This is the also the place where the Thai alphabet (which we think is one of the most gorgeous) was developed.
Phitsanulok was a fairly unremarkable town except for the riverside market with the Flying Vegetable restaurant. We thought this meant that your veggies are tossed in a wok. But what happened was we ordered a few dishes and a guy would go climb on top of a van a good distance from the cooks (this was all outside). Without looking, the cook would then backhand the wok and the veggies would fly towards the guy on the van, who caught them on a plate and served them up. The youth hostel in Phi-lok was a bit more “exposed” than we’re used to with uncovered windows all over the room. Not prone to public displays of nudity (well, most of the time at least) Marcus opted to shower in the dark rather than put on a show for the other guests.
The other noteworthy thing that happened in Phitsanulok was that we tried kopi luwak coffee. “What? Did you say kopi luwak?! The monkey shit coffee?” Yes, indeed. On our last day in Jakarta we found some 3-in-1 instant coffee packs of kopi luwak with cream and sugar. We bought a couple packs thinking it was a joke, but quite a few web retailers sell this stuff claiming it is authentic. So we brewed up a cup to sample the sweet nectar, but the results were inconclusive. Yes, it was a bit different, but any coffee that had been turned into instant powder and sat on a shelf for months will lose most of its flavor. No, it didn’t taste like shit. We’ll have try again when we can find some actual beans (cleaned, of course).
Marcus contemplates the kopi luwak. Kind of looks like he’s looking for a place to spit.
In Sukhothai, we again rented bicycles for touring the ruins and Marcus practiced his on-the-bike self-portrait skills. Needs a little work, eh?
Cracked Buddha in Sukhothai.
A 9m tall Buddha didn’t sound that tall until Marcus stood next to it.
In case it wasn’t obvious from the cloudy pictures, it is the middle of the monsoon season in south-east Asia. It has rained, at least briefly, every day we’ve been here. Given the hot weather, the showers can be a welcome relief. The weather doesn’t seem to faze the Thais at all. They have developed some amazing moped handling skills. We’ve seen whole families on a single moped with some of the family members eating dinner on the back while in motion. When it does rain, the resourceful Thais do what everybody does and open their umbrellas – even if they’re driving in the pouring rain.
We then made our way north to the town of Chiang Mai. The place has loads of temples and is a veggie mecca with all the monks and hippies about. It was here, however, that we had our first run-in with Strange Food. While perusing the Sunday market we were passed by a pair of gents eating what looked like maggots with a stick. Puzzled, we continued on and saw a table covered with all sorts of fried insects that was doing brisk business. On offer were: roaches, crickets, grasshoppers, bamboo worms, silk worms, and some tiny beetle. You paid about $0.25 for a bag of crispy critters – with optional sauce – and ate them with a pointy stick.
Extra scoop of bamboo worms for me please!
If the above picture doesn’t have enough resolution for you, here’s a
higher-res version to get you salivating. The weird thing was the garbage can on the table, in which the lady would deposit undesirable items from the bug piles. It makes you wonder what could have crawled into the bugs that wasn’t already there. No, we opted not to sample these tasty legged morsels. But we’re pretty sure that some of them have sampled us along the way.
Tags: Thailand
Kelly & Marcus
August 10th, 2005 at 7:13 am
Think I’ll skip breakfast today!
Hugs xoxoxo
August 11th, 2005 at 8:01 am
“We arrived in Bangkok late at night and >we’ll blame Kelly< thanking the Thai immigration officer in Indonesian on jet lag.”
It sounds like there is a great story here?
Great picture of “Kelly” on her bike.
Thanks for sharing your adventure with us here in our cubicals.
Praying for you,
– Bob –
August 11th, 2005 at 8:15 pm
new meaning to crispy critters! glad to hear you guys are doing well!