A Pai in the sky
Trip Start
Feb 25, 2008
1
7
22
Trip End
May 06, 2008
Pai,
Thailand
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Secondly, i thought i would make some general observations about thailand, as you will soon find out, my stay in Pai was pretty uneventful.
1) it is perfectly acceptable to ride with up to 4 people on a moPED, including small children and DOGs. you may wear a helmet, but dont worry about your offspirng, they will bounce. obviously.
2) it is possible to find cheap accomadation. we saw a sign saying-'rooms, 50 Baht, Clean rooms, 70 baht'- ERGH! what does that even mean???
3) 'YOU BUY' is said quite a lot, as is the demand 'BUY SOMETHNG'- i think its just an encouragement as opposed to a demand..i think
SO the road to Pai is famous for its twists and turns, they say there are anything from 500- 900 in the single stretch of road up to the hillside town. i have no idea how it can vary that much, but i wasnt reall in a counting mood myslef. Despite the stugeron, by the time i got to the top i was pretty green, and not with envy, and not necessarily only metaphorically. i looked awful. and the others took the kind liberty of telling me this. We found a place to stay called Bamboo house, which was a complex of little bamboo huts on stilts (significant part of story). The room was tiny but cheap, we only had to sacrifice our personal space to stay here, all sleeping in a king size bed. which has become quite a habit.
Pai itself is a Hippyish resort, one main street of smoothy sellers, bags and TRES confortable hippy trousers and shorts (called fisherman shorts, of which i own a vair jazzy pair)..
so as i was saying, the bamboo place was nice, it had a bathroom attached and private, which was a luxuary, except it wasnt very private. There were slats in the door so everyone inside the place got to share the toilet experience. and when your throwing your guts up ETC this is not NICE!! for enyone involved. later that day we went for a massage at a place called Mr Hans. the room smelt all herby and aromatic and as the women crunched all our joints (starting, to all of our mortification, with our uncared for, flipflopped feet) tehy giggled like school girls...especially as they wobled our thighs, and bums. More fool them cos one of them farted and we all had a good laugh. AHAHAHA!
That night we returned to the love shack and locked ourselves in. teh place was although OBviously safe, a bit creepy and deserted. we were just discusing this when the pack of stray dogs outside started barking and circling our hut, and also underneath it. they were playing tag or something friendly like that, but it scared the bejueezus out of the others. ie holly and hannah were headless chickenly going 'WHAT IF THEY GET INNN!!!!!!" there was a gap in the bathroom wall at the top which 'one could squeeze through'..not.
the second thing that happened, was that Hannah made a new friend. in the bathroom. holly and i were all tucked up when Hannah let out the most almighty shriek (which she will deny), toothbrush in mouth she shouted 'theres a --og in here'. 'A DOG?' i replied..she shot out of the bathroom and cowered in the corner, 'no, a FRog'. Holly and i went to investigate and found a bright yellow frog, about the size of my palm, on the wall. We named it Jaundice, and we,f rom then on, checked the toilet before going. Jaundice had a friend called Janice, who was a lizard, who was in fact a little perverted, for she only came out to see us when we were sat on the toilet, or in the shower. The time in our jungle home had begun.
The next day i was p[retty sick and lay in bed trying not to move. it was the first lie in i had had in a while. at about 1pm we wento ut for breakfast and met a SOuth African called Rory who was a bit strange in that he took in everything you said, adn consodered it for a disconcerting amount of time before replying. conversation was slow. and about Richard Branson, so nuff sed. Pretty much wandered around not doing anything, Petr and Simone, from teh jungle trek, had come up to Pai to, so we saw a lot of tehm..strangely, althouggh they say its a small world, we bumped into Luke and Leandrou, from school, quite randomly. We all went out for a drink, and Petr made us laugh all night, with his witty antics and tax scams- HE once tried to sell an invisible mobile phone on Ebay, and, as if you are born with a deformation that makes you depressed, the government will pay to change it, he decided to try 'i was born an aristocrat in a poor mans body'- GENIUS. We tried some deep fried crickets, which tasted, not like chicken, but just fried. you feel especially attractive afterwards with wings and legs in your teeth.
The next day we went to an elephant camp (just cant get enough). Went for a trek with them, where you ride Sans seat..ie, bareback save for a measly piece of carpet. Holly and i were on the bull elephant, replace 'bull' with 'most uncomfortabl;e in the world'. his spine was sSOOOO bony, it sat right up your ass. my gluteals were SO knackered and sore by the end. It was a hot day and the sky was clear so it was beautiful, save for our elephant guidey man who kept dedicatiing songs that he was playing on his mobile to me and singing them in a high pitch voice. kinda ruined the ambience. Donald Trunk, our elephant, was a grumpy teenager, wh did nothing that he was told. amusingly, im sure he thought, as we all do when were 17. Youre meant to bathe them in the river, but he wasnt having any of it. After trumpeting a bit he played along. But holly and i got pretty bored, pretty quickly of getting sprayed from the nasal passages of the beast (operant ocnditioning??) and gave up. Hannah and {Petrs elephant was just as tempramental.
Back in Pai we do nothing except for shop. We got discount in a shop that was pplaying crazy euro-house music that we danced around to for a while. i think she wanted to get rid of us.
That night we met Luke and Leandrou again,a nd tried 'Jungle whisky' that had, they said, bark and leaves in it. i was dubious and thought it looked a bit animally, but swigged away at the substance that really ocntained PORCUPINE STOMACH. GAHHH! it didnt taste bad though.
We went back down that 'godawful death road' as ive writen in my journal. i was riding up front, enxt to the driver, who was, disconcertingly, holding on to the wheel for dear life. he drove slowly anyway and all was fine. for me at least........
