Chiang Mai. Again.

I love Chiang Mai and want to live here. Sadly enough I'm flying back to Bangkok tomorrow then home the next day (boo!). So I've been trying to pack in the fun while I can: thai massages and spa treatments galore, drinking and carousing, thai boxing, having custom clothes made on the cheap, eating mango & sticky rice and banana roti, temple ruins, and of course shopping shopping shopping.

For those of you that I've promised gifts for, be warned that I will be giving you a quiz based on my blog that you will need to answer in order to get your gift. For example, do I prefer Singha or Chang beer? The answer to this one of course is Singha.

Over and out.

Kanchanaburi (Bridge over the River Kwai)

is a pretty cool place.

There's a few museums about the death railway (during WWII the Japanese used Allied Forces POWs and Asian slave laborers to build a railway connecting Thailand and Burma, in appalling conditions (disease, torture, starvation, no medicines etc.) The exhibits were quite moving: there were excerpts of diaries, drawings and painting sdone by former POWs and photos. These men were all literally skin and bones and being forced to work 12-14 hour days in the tropical heat. Cholera and dysentary were common.

We went to Hellfire Pass (a particularly horrible part of the railway) and walked through parts of it. Before you go out, they tell you to make sure you are wearing comfortable shoes and have plenty of water for the 40 minute walk. Meanwhile, the POWs generally didn't have water or shoes for that matter.

Before Hellfire Pass we had gone to Erawan Falls which is a 7 tiered waterfall that has pools for swimming. We only made it up to tier 4, which had huge rocks you could slide into the water from. All over the park there are signs telling you to "be silent". Which is very difficult when you're in the water and there are these huge fish nibbling at you! It was pretty icky. Eventually, I gave up on the water and went exploring.

I came upon this family of monkeys playing in the water so I sat and watched them for a while. They were so cute: jumping off trees and rocks into the water, wrestling, swinging from branches and general monkey business. Then 2 monkeys had a go at it on top of a huge rock. I believe this particular monkey suffered from premature ejaculation, as it was over in about 2 seconds (and Intelligent Designers say we're not descended from monkeys ha ha).

Played some Connect 4 last night in a bar. Was mercilessly beaten. But not as bad as at the pool table later. It's hard to play pool here, the tables are 3/4 the size of snooker tables, and they play by English Rules, which I can't remember.

I can't believe I have to go home in less than 2 weeks.

Kanchanaburi (Bridge over the River Kwai)

is a pretty cool place.

There's a few museums about the death railway (during WWII the Japanese used Allied Forces POWs and Asian slave laborers to build a railway connecting Thailand and Burma, in appalling conditions (disease, torture, starvation, no medicines etc.) The exhibits were quite moving: there were excerpts of diaries, drawings and painting sdone by former POWs and photos. These men were all literally skin and bones and being forced to work 12-14 hour days in the tropical heat. Cholera and dysentary were common.

We went to Hellfire Pass (a particularly horrible part of the railway) and walked through parts of it. Before you go out, they tell you to make sure you are wearing comfortable shoes and have plenty of water for the 40 minute walk. Meanwhile, the POWs generally didn't have water or shoes for that matter.

Before Hellfire Pass we had gone to Erawan Falls which is a 7 tiered waterfall that has pools for swimming. We only made it up to tier 4, which had huge rocks you could slide into the water from. All over the park there are signs telling you to "be silent". Which is very difficult when you're in the water and there are these huge fish nibbling at you! It was pretty icky. Eventually, I gave up on the water and went exploring.

I came upon this family of monkeys playing in the water so I sat and watched them for a while. They were so cute: jumping off trees and rocks into the water, wrestling, swinging from branches and general monkey business. Then 2 monkeys had a go at it on top of a huge rock. I believe this particular monkey suffered from premature ejaculation, as it was over in about 2 seconds (and Intelligent Designers say we're not descended from monkeys ha ha).

Played some Connect 4 last night in a bar. Was mercilessly beaten. But not as bad as at the pool table later. It's hard to play pool here, the tables are 3/4 the size of snooker tables, and they play by English Rules, which I can't remember.

I can't believe I have to go home in less than 2 weeks.

Krabi. Sea Kayaking.

Today I went on a sea kayaking tour and it was tons of fun. Because I was by myself I got to share my kayak with the tour leader, Bao, which was a total bonus because I only had to paddle when I felt like it. And Bao was telling me more information than the other kayaks, so it was like having a super exclusive tour.

We started off going through caves, then went through this mangrove forest canyon which was gorgeous. There's all kinds of wildlife in the forest, including monkeys. So when we got to a certain part of the river, we had to bang our oars on the kayaks and make monkey noises to get the monkeys to come out. Finally a tribe of monkeys came of visit us and we fed them watermelon. They were so cute. And there were baby monkeys hanging on their mommy monkeys. One special monkey named Bon, rode on our kayak for a little while.

After that we went up to this freshwater spring to go swimming, we were the only westerners there and this area of Thailand has a fairly large Muslim population, so we just swam in our clothes like the locals, as the Thais are modest people, and it is considered impolite to show your shoulders & wear short shorts, let alone be running around in a bikini (although they're used to westerners doing it).

Krabi.

I'm down in Krabi on a huge beach and have decided that I'm officially sick of the beach. I got a pretty bad sunburn on our snorkel trip yesterday, so I think I'm going to head up north again soon.

It's rather ironic that I got a bad sunburn, as my friend Dora had gotten one and I was lecturing her on "proper suncreen use, including reapplication" then a couple hours later I'm just as burnt as she is.

I had an absolutely hellish trip down here. I took a night ferry from Ko Tao, which was just about as bad as being on some sort of immigrant boat. There was just the bottom floor of the boat with tiny sleeping mats of suspect cleanliness packed in on both sides. I'm pretty sure that I was being bitten by fleas all night. but the best part was in the middle of the night, all of a sudden, there's a big crash and the boat stops, some girl starts screaming and everybody is jumping up. Turns out we had hit a fishing boat (no one was hurt and no boats sank). Then the police came and whatever they were doing took about an hour, it was kind of entertaining once we realized we weren't going to sink.

I found out after that from my mat-neighbor that night ferries sink on a semi-regular basis.

Then we arrive in Suret Thani at 5:30 am and it's still dark out. So there's people to meet everyone at the ferry and herd us into various minivans. So we stop at a "bus station" and wait there for a 1/2 hour. Then they load us into the back of pick up trucks and then dropped off everyone except me and this German guy at another "bus station". Then they drive us out to this other deserted bus station and drop us off, and there's no one around. I'm glad I wasn't by myself as I would have totally started freaking out. Around 6:30 other people started to show up then at 7 our real minivan to Krabi came and we loaded onto it and made it here.

It's extremely humid down here with no breeze and no shade. My room is kind of a shithole. But I think I'll try to go out to Ko Phi Phi today then go on a sea kayak trip tomorrow, and hopefully see monkeys in the wild (and no, I will not be using any flash photography).

Some British girls I met on Ko Tao are supposed to be arriving here tomorrow, but I don't think I'm going to wait around to hang out with them. It's back up north for me, as I've decided to do a side trip to Laos.

Ko Tao. Still.

I'm still on Ko Tao, I'm finding it hard to leave, although I'm doing so on Tues. night. I'm going to Krabi.

I went with a couple girls I met on a snorkeling trip up to the "party beach" Sairee Beach last night. It was fun, but hardly a wild party. We met up with some Greek guys who bought us drinks all night. Yay! We're all going to a supposed "huge party" on our beach tonight, but we'll see how that goes.

My friend Dora (roommate from Elephant Park) arrived today. We bummed around at the beach then rented a motorbike (as she is skilled in motorbikery) and went up north to a secluded beach with lots of rockery. Only on the way there we had a slight altercation on the bike. We were going up a steep hill and the bike wouldn't shift gears and it popped a wheelie and we went flying off the back and the bike fell over. We didn't even get scratched so it was actually hilarious. My only regret is that there was no one there to video record it for America's Funniest Home Videos. Now I'll never meet Bob Saget, life is so unfair!

I had the best spa day yesterday (that "budget" thing isn't working out too well). I got an Aloe Wrap, Herbal Sauna, Facial and Thai Massage at a gorgeous spa for less than $50 US.

I also learned a valuable lesson today: Outside of the spa, they have a monkey
reserve. I was taking a picture of a monkey and my flash went off. Monkey no like flash! He reached through the cage to grab my camera, when he touched my hand I screamed and dropped the camera. It was kind of funny, but then I felt sad for the poor little monkey.

Picture time!
Feeding the elephants.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Baby Elephant Ora playing in the mud pit we helped dig.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ellie Poo Patrol.

 

 

 

 

 

 

One male elephant mounting another. Unfortunately this attempt at hot gay sex went unfinished.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cricket Eating Beforemath.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cricket Eating Aftermath.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Janhavi and I on our snorkeling trip.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Islands beyond Koh Chang from Snorkeling Trip.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fire dancers at night on Ko Chang.

 

 

 

Ko Tao.

I suffered a 6 hour bus ride then arrived for a ferry at 5 am. The ferry didn't leave till 7 but fortunately they let us on the boat to sit and wait and were kind enough to show us The Island. What a crappy movie. I fell asleep during the middle of it.

Ko Tao (Turtle Island) is gorgeous and I'm staying at the quiet end, so there are no techno DJ wars at night. It's very relaxing so I think the day after tomorrow I'm going to have to move to the action end of the island.

I went on an intro scuba diving course today, and although overall it was good, it wasn't really fun per se, too much work. I don't really care for being underwater that far and we weren't even that deep. So I guess it's a good thing that I didn't sign up for the open water certification right away. I will just stick with snorkeling.

But also I guess there's not that much motivation to go through all that trouble as there is so much to see snorkeling.

And I was talking to a guy in my course who gave me a great beach where there are sharks everywhere. Although not the dangerous kind.

Wow! What a boring entry. Sorry about that!