ChaingMai

So last week I went to the north of Thailand with Srunya, our exchange girl from 5 years ago, and her family (her mother, father, and younger sister Pim). We left on Wednesday October 14th. It was a long drive there, 13 hours in the car, though we did stop occasionally. We left their house at 7:15 (only 15 minutes later than I was told). At around 8:30 we stopped for breakfast, I had boiled rice which is a very common breakfast thing in Thailand (or it must be because that is always what I’m offered for breakfast). While we waited Srunya and Pim played checkers with beer bottle caps and a piece of cardboard for the game board. They played it in a way that I’ve never seen it played, so it was interesting to watch. After we drove for several hours we pulled over in Ayuthaya, which was the capital city over 300 years ago, to buy a very famous dessert. The dessert was made up of sugar noodles (which have the texture of hay) and something like a pancake. Once you got past the texture of the sugar noodles, it was very good. We stopped two other times in various locations along the road (they have stand in the middle of nowhere where sell things) and bought 14 of those large green things that remind me of giant green grapefruit and guava. Besides the few bathroom breaks we had we didn’t stop until we got there at 9. After we arrived at Srunya’s friends house we ate dinner and they all talked until after 10:30. After that I went to bed because it had been a very long day.

Thursday October 15th, 2009

For breakfast we had boiled rice. After breakfast we headed off for the day. We were staying at Srunya’s friend’s house in the mountains, it was so beautiful, so the day’s activities were in the mountains not in the city. The first thing we did was go to a monument for an old king from over 300 years ago. The kings loved roosters so there were over a 100 plastic roosters surrounding the monument. After we left the monument we went to some caves. It was fun to explore the caves, though it was just as hot underground and in the dark as it was outside and we had to fit through impossibly small spaces. We took a ton of pictures because Thai people love to take picture with everything and everywhere. When we finished spelunking we went and RODE ELEPHANTS! Srunya didn’t want to go with me because she said she was too scared so Pim went with me. It was awesome and the view of the mountains was so amazing!!! I don’t know why Srunya was scared because I loved it! After our ride we were given bananas and we fed them to the elephants (even though the elephants had been eating the whole trip). I hope that I get to ride an elephant again, it was so much fun. We returned to the house after that and ate lunch, they wanted to take me to some fields but it was raining so we had to stay at the house. I studied some Thai and then Srunya said we should take a short nap, which turned into a 2 ½ hour nap (it would have been longer but her mom came and got us to tell us it was time for dinner). For dinner we had shrimp and a famous northern Thai sausage. When I went to take the sausage they all looked shocked and Srunya told me that it was spicy, but I ate quite a bit of it and I didn’t think that it was very spicy at all, so I’m proud of myself. After dinner I didn’t do anything special.

Friday October 16th, 2009

We had breakfast at 8, more boiled rice, so that we could finish up the activities in the mountains before we headed into the city. The first thing we did was go water rafting. The view was so gorgeous, the mountains are amazing (I know I’ve said that so many times in this but it’s hard to describe them!!). They had an extra stick (that is what they use to paddle) and so Pim was playing with it, though she was making things harder for the man steering and getting us all wet. Eventually she stopped and we all took pictures with the stick. After we returned back we said goodbye to Srunya’s friend’s dad who had been our tour guide and then we headed to the city. The first thing we did in the city was track down our hotel, which was fun because we had to pull over every five minutes and ask someone to help us, and took us like 30 minutes to find. After we had settled into the hotel we went to the zoo and aquarium to see the famous pandas. It was a little disappointing because we only got to see the baby on a TV screen, but the adults were so cute, I just wanted to cuddle them! We had a police escort through the zoo so we never had to wait around for anything (we don’t know why he was so nice to us but we didn’t complain). The aquarium was cool, but nothing really special like some of the other ones I’ve been too, but the zoo was one of the most AMAZING zoos ever! I was a little disappointed because we didn’t get to see many animals because they really didn’t want to, but I got to see the flamingos so I was happy about that! The zoo itself was part of the mountain, so that was really cool. After the zoo we went to a market and bought some Northern food for some snacks and I bought a ton of desserts. We then went back to the hotel to wait for dark when we could go to the night market. When it was night we went to the night market and I bought some really amazing souvenirs and actually found a Thailand spoon, something I’ve been looking everywhere for! I tried some Guava juice, which was so disgusting I couldn’t finish it so I bought some water instead. I also bought some banana and chocolate pancake like thing that was really good (I later realized that we never ate dinner and all I’d eaten was some snacks and desserts! Oh well!). When we finally returned to the hotel it was close to 11 so we all went right to bed.

Saturday October 17th, 2009

We ate breakfast at the hotel. They had noodles and boiled rice and other Thai food, but they also had Pancakes and bacon and sausage so I had a little of both types of food. After breakfast we headed back for Bangkok. After a long period in the car we stop at a hot spring. They had a pool that you put your feet in, so we sat there for a while. The water was so hot that just setting your toe in it for a second felt like it was burning! After the hot spring we drove for another long period of time then stopped at a waterfall (it cost 10 baht for Thai’s and 100 baht for foreigners, which I thought was ridiculous). The waterfall was amazing (wonder how many times I can say that word, I think I will have to look up synonyms before I write again). I first got full of mud, then I fell into the water so I was really wet (I never stayed dry or clean for very long on the whole of the trip). We took a lot of pictures at the waterfall too, and then we continued on. We arrived back at their house at around 12. After we got back I got ready for bed, but then had to take and burn all of my photos to CD’s using Srunya’s computer because that piece on mine is broken because of the thing with Bashayer! I finally got to bed at 2 but couldn’t sleep until after 2:30 and then woke up at 7.

That was my trip to ChaingMai, I hope I didn’t forget anything but I can’t be sure because after the first two days I didn’t write in my journal so I am having trouble remember everything. I hope that you all enjoy this piece, I don’t know when I will post again. School starts again on Monday Octover 26th, so I will be busy again soon. I am still free this week for those of you who want to try and catch me!

ChaingMai pics on facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=118731&id=535566988&l=72ed36080c