Markets, massage and food

Markets, massage and food sums up my Chiang Mai experience. They were all great - a feast of the senses! I loved Chiang Mai and hope to go back there again some day. Perhaps I'll go and refresh my massage skills by doing a 10-day course in Thai massage in Chiang Mai. We did do a lot of Thai techniques on the diploma course that I did in Leeds in 2001. I wish I'd used and developed my skills!

Thai people are great too - although I know that this is a gross generalisation. But if national traits can be said to exist, then Thais are so good humoured that even bartering becomes something to be enjoyed. Our last night in Chiang Mai, as we were walking through the Night Bazaar one of the street vendors - a young man - approached Paul saying 'Tuk tuk?' Paul's response of 'No thanks' was met with 'Taxi? ... Massage? ... Oh come on!' We both glanced back at him to see him shrugging his shoulders and laughing.

On the subject of massage, I aimed to get one a day, as advised by Cate in Byron Bay. I didn't quite achieve that even though on some days I had both a head and shoulder massage and a foot massage, separately. I used up my remaining baht at Bangkok airport, before I left, by having first a 45 minute foot massage (in the Chang Massage Spa on the 4th floor of the main concourse) and then a brief, 15 minute, head and shoulder massage at Gate 15 in the departure area.

The worst massage was the one we had in the place around the corner from SK House, which Aisling mentioned several times - although she didn't ever go there herself. My massage - from a blind woman - wasn't too bad, once she'd got into it and stopped acting like she couldn't be bothered. Paul's massage was painful though and when he fed this back to the guy massaging him - as requested - the guy said 'it's good for your back'. Next day I noticed that his back was covered in blue-black patches of bruising.

On the day after the trek we had lunch with Aisling, Fernando, Marius and Lindi. Marius and Lindi were leaving that day to return to Bangkok, where they had to go to the South African Embassy to request temporary passports so that they could continue their travels on to Cambodia and Laos, as planned. A bag containing their passports and tickets had been stolen whilst they were on the overnight train from Bangkok. As it turned out all six of us had travelled up on the same train. Paul and I got first class tickets though, being told that there were no second-class tickets left. This meant that we had a cabin to ourselves, with a lockable door. Marius and Lindi were anticipating problems and delays in Bangkok, although they were remarkably philosophical about it. I checked their blog the other day and learned it took only 3 hours before they got their temporary passports.

In an earlier post, I mentioned that Paul and I were going on a Thai cookery course. The course, was run by Hoi and Joe of Gap's House. We met some more interesting people, had a thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining day of cooking, and eating, and each came away with an evening meal - which we ate later on, beside the moat - a fair-sized recipe book and a certificate from the Gap's School of Thai Culinary Art . The course included a trip to the market in the morning. By early afternoon we'd cooked four or five dishes, which we ate for lunch. On the strength of this experience Paul has decided to forget his ambition of being a rock star and become a Thai chef instead. I'm getting some great meals - even better than the ones he cooked before!

Gap's house seems like it would be a good place to stay on a return visit to Chiang Mai. We weren't that impressed with SK House. The room was clean to start with, but wasn't cleaned again even though we left the sign on the door requesting room cleaning. The bedding - though clean and smelling strongly (if not pleasantly) of highly-scented washing powder - was torn and stained. By the end of our stay there a cockroach had taken up residence in the bathroom and caused me to shriek by scuttling towards my toes as I sat on the loo.

In spite of the growoing shortcomings of SK House, we were both sorry to leave Chiang Mai. Bangkok wasn't so bad the second time around though. We got back there early on Thursday afternoon, on a flight from Chiang Mai. After booking back in to the Bel Aire Princess (on Sukhomvit soi 5) we went to the Khao San Road. It was a good journey travelling by Sky Train and ferry: train from Sukhomvit to Nana then the ferry from Saphan Taksin to Phra Arthit, passing a lot of Wats on the way, including Wat Phra Kaew and the Grand Palace. We had visited there on our first day in Bangkok, which seemed like a long time ago now. We spent the afternoon looking around the markets and around the Khao San Road, which is in the backpacker's district. Turning the corner of a stall we came face to face with Anne and Jeanette who had started out on the trek with us in Chiang Mai. They were flying home to Manchester that evening.

On the morning of Friday 9th I had my last Thai breakfast of noodles, then left for the airport. Paul's flight was about 12 hours after mine so he had some more time to spend looking around.

My flight out of Bangkok airport was delayed for about an hour due to an impressive storm over the airport - thunder, lightning and a deluge of rain. Apparently it was dry in Bangkok.

The flight back to the UK was uneventful. I watched four films, ate two meals and went to the toilet four times - once after each film (they were that bad!). What else is there to do on a plane.

The only truly notable occurrence on the plane was that one of the two lads that I was sitting next to thought I was Australian! He asked if I was going to the UK to visit friends. When I said I was going home he looked a bit puzzled. Later on he asked where I lived and how long I'd lived there, following my response with the comment that 'you've not lost the accent.' It was my turn to look puzzled as I hadn't mentioned being a southerner originally. He was from Norfolk himself. All was made clear when he said that he thought I was an Australian. I'm sure that Mark and Kim will find that very amusing.