bye bye, chiang mai
Tuesday, February 19th, 2008wow, i’m a poet and didn’t even know it. hehe. lame, i know. i’ll stop. =)
it’s hard to believe that i’ve been in chiang mai for 3 weeks now! time flies when you’re having fun, i guess. i feel like i really lived here, you know? it’s definitely been a great experience. this morning i woke up early and made sure everything fits into my new bag. yup, i ended up having to buy a new one, despite promising myself i wouldn’t shop… originally we had only planned on being here for 12 days, 10 of them at the meditation center where we’d be wearing only white, so i had only brought “real clothes” to last a few days. i ended up buying a few more things along the way once i realized i was staying a few weeks rather than a few days, hence the need for a bigger bag.
bargaining for my new “le sportsac” bag last night at the night bazaar was part of the fun… the first price i was given was 1200 baht ($40!), which i knew to be a rip-off, since they probably cost next to nothing to make somewhere in china and there are more than a few stalls selling almost the same items. so i strolled around a few different vendors, telling each one the lowest price the one before had given me, to get them to drop their price. (it also helps to be buying more than one of something, but that would defeat my purpose.) eventually i wound up at a stall near anusarn market which had the exact pattern and style i wanted. the young girl started at 800 baht, i acted noncommittal and ready to walk away, and we settled at 400. i walked home with my new bag, reflecting on how inflated the prices become once you’re identified as a foreigner.
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malia