Chiang Mai

Chiang Mai is only an hour flight away from Bangkok. It’s the second largest city and is significantly better than Bangkok in our opinion. We checked into out hotel at Le Meridien around 8 AM and went upstairs to drop off our things. Our hotel was 4.5-5 stars and pretty nice. Chiang Mai didn’t have much going on in the morning so we just wandered until lunch time. We went to eat at a place called Whole Earth which was recommended by the hotel. The food was decent but much pricier than the other places we had eaten (it came out to about $35 for the 3 of us.) The atmosphere was really cute and it was the first time I had to take my shoes off at a restaurant. We decided to just walk around the city. We were given a map by our hotel and we decided to go to Buddha Park which was at one corner of our map. There city is near a river and has a moat surrounding part of the city. We leaned very quickly that the map was not drawn to scale. We ended up walking about half of Chiang Mai in one afternoon. We got back to the hotel went the pool, showered and took naps until we had to wake up for the Muey Thai boxing. We had our concierge order ringside tickets and have them delivered to the hotel for about $20/person. Chaing Mai looks so different at night. We jumped in a Tuk Tuk and were on our way to the boxing stadium. When we arrived, it didn’t seem like they were going to accept our tickets at first because there wasn’t the proper information included, like how much we paid and our seat numbers. We spent about 20 minutes standing outside while the man was trying to contact the concierge at our hotel. Finally we got to go inside. There were 10 sets of fighters for the night. The first set was boys probably around 12 years old. One boy looked like he ha da pretty nasty scar that went down his face. Charles tried to make me feel better by saying that he probably had a better life boxing than the alternative. It was actually hard for me to watch a lot of the boxing because I don’t really like the violence and because some of the kids were so young. Each match began with the boxer doing some sort of ritual and then going to all four corners and bowing to the crowd. There was only one bloody match (the guy was cut on the face) and two knock outs. The big fight was a 70kg American guy (he was half African American and Caucasian) and a Thai guy. The American seemed to be a boxer because there wasn’t much Thai style fighting going on. The match was sort but the Thai guy got quite a beating. Charles has it all on video and will probably post it soon. We got home around midnight and went to bed.

The next morning we had breakfast at our hotel which was pretty good. It was buffet style and included with out stay. We got picked up from our hotel and was on our way to our Thai cooking class. The class was from 9 Am until 3 PM. There were a total of 6 of us in our group, and 2 older Germans and one Korean lady. We started off at the market where we learned about different types of typical Thai cooking ingredients. I also picked up some Thai tea mix at the market, one that the cooking instructor recommended.We carried little baskets back to the school and starting cooking. Each person made 6 dishes and there were 3 options. Since there were three of us, we decided to all make different dishes. We ended up with 3 types of stir fry, soups, eggrolls, curry, salads and dessert. We would make a dish, eat it and then sit for a moment before beginning the next dish. We basically ate from 9AM until 3PM. The old German guy was named Walle and had moved to Chiang Mai from Germany. He had gotten in some sort of accident and was using his retirement money to live off of. He said that it wasn’t enough for him to have a comfortable life and so he decided to pack up and move elsewhere. Never did he think he’d end up in Thailand. He said that he’s able to live well and that the country had a strong German network so he was happy. He also gave me a recipe for Goulash, a German dish that Charles really likes. I asked him if he could recommend a massage place because we had been too afraid to go since most of them looked shady. He said he’d been to over 15 of them and that Friendly Massage place was the best. After our cooking class, we went with him and he showed us where it was at. Chander wasn’t particularly excited about the massage but he decided to get one anyway. When we got there, we saw this big Thai lady and I had mumbled that I’d take the big one b/c I didn’t think the guys wanted her. As fate would have it, Chander ended up with her. Charles and I were downstairs on beds next to each other and Chander went upstairs the big lady. For $4 and hour, we all enjoyed out first Thai massage. When we came out of the room, Chander was sitting next to his lady with an ice bag. Charles and I didn’t get offered an ice bag. I thought it was just funny to see the two of them sitting there together so I started laughing. I could hear the lady try to make small talk with Chander and all of a sudden, I heard her say, “You so charming,” and I busted our laughing. I took a picture of the two of them. Then, the lady used her cell phone to get her own picture. It was just really funny. When we were walking back to the hotel, I asked Chander if his lady told him he was charming. He said “What?!? You heard that?” Yes, yes I did and now I will forever make fun of him. He told us that his lady when massaging him kept saying, “Oh, you’re so strong.” Looks like Chander’s getting friendly with the natives. We got back to our hotel and went to the pool, showered and them napped again. We woke up around 7 PM to go to the night market. The city really comes alive when the night markets opens. There are street vendors everywhere selling all sorts of things. The food at the market in this cafeteria area was surprisingly clean. You had to buy coupons in order to buy food there. We had delicious gelato too. Chander got some pretty cute gifts for his family. I wasn’t really in the shopping mood. We went back to the hotel and call it a night.