Chang Mai - Long Live the King!

  Chang Mai, Thailand
Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Our train to Chang Mai was not unbearable, but we will say it was difficult to bear. Due to the high number of tourists the seats were booked out far in advance and we were stuck in the coach seats instead of the sleeper cars. We did get food provided, which was nice, but they did not turn off the lights ever which was not nice at all for an overnight train!
Chiang Mai is a favorite place for people to visit in Thailand. Not only is the climate cooler and the town less hectic than Bangkok, it has many fun activities for tourists to participate in. For you who know Tanzania you could say it is Moshi to Bangkok's Dar es Salaam.

Our days were pretty full with activities and when we needed a break from it all our excellent guesthouse had both BBC and Al Jazeera English to watch.

One highlight for me was taking a Thai cooking class for a day. It was great - not only did we learn about the ingredients, we tried many basic but favorite Thai recipes. I managed Phad Thai, Red Curry, Spring Rolls plus a lot of other dishes.

Cooking with Gas!

They even give you a nice color cookbook to take home. Once we get back to Seattle I will visit some shops in the International District and I will try to see if I can do it at home. They sure tasted delicious there. I even managed to save some for Julius so he could try when I got back.

One activity that sounded kind of cheesy but was actually loads of fun was the visit to the Elephant Park. Here they train Asian elephants to do all kinds of interesting tricks and after the show you get to take an ox cart ride, ride an elephant, eat a buffet lunch and then cruise down the river on a bamboo raft. All these activities are in one village and the place runs like a well oiled machine. They process loads of tourists every day and you don't have to queue up at all. The show had elephants kicking soccer balls, playing harmonicas, bizarre stuff. We bought some bananas and sugar cane to feed to them after the show but one elephant spotted them under my seat, came over and stuck his trunk where I was hiding them under the bench. Before we knew what he was doing he had picked them up and stuffed them in his mouth, much to the delight of the crowd. There is no stopping a determined elephant.

Our favorite part was riding the elephant. We had a very cool "driver" who got down and let us take turns sitting on his spot on the elephant's neck. I was a bit nervous that I was going to fall off but Julius loved it. He rode there for most of the trip. We gave the guy a big tip because none of the other drivers were letting their passengers sit there. Savvy villagers built tree houses at elephant height and sold more bananas and sugar cane. Julius handed them off to the elephant while we walked along.
The bamboo raft trip was quite peaceful and they let Julius steer the boat. Villagers in boats also sold coconuts so we could drink the water out with a straw.

We had breakfast one morning at the hotel with a woman about Mom's age. She told us that she was going to a big botanical festival she heard about that was going on outside the city. It sounded like fun to us so we went the next day. The place was truly an event. We went on a Sunday which made the crowds even bigger. In all there was about 60,000 Thai people there, most wearing their royal polo shirts since the festival itself was a celebration of the king's 60 years as head of the monarchy.

Orchids at the Botanical Festival

Not only were there competitions for orchids and other flowers, there were also many demonstrations on the different agricultural projects that the king and others implemented around the country. It actually helped us realize why this king was so popular. Since the king here is not actually the head of the government, he can just focus on helpful projects that benefit the poor and the farmers. He started a lot of non-profits that helped the farmers process rice and sell their goods for fair prices. He apparently has a big interest in agriculture. That is why a botanical festival was how his anniversary was celebrated.

Thai Marching Band

All the pavilions and booths had some sort of information on how the king helped the Thai people and heaps of lavish praise. One farmer who was quoted in a pavilion said "The King came to our village and spoke to us about trying different crops and to stop growing the opium. We followed his advice and now we are very successful, making more money than ever before. Thank God the King came to visit us. Long live the King."

We were impressed by the number of tourists in Chang Mai, both young and old. One phenomenon we noticed in Chang Mai especially are the older American or European men with much younger Thai dates/girlfriends. One bar we went to to watch a soccer match was almost half those couples. To each their own, I guess. Both looked quite happy in all the cases.

Unfortunately we had another 2nd class night train ahead of us in seats. Everything else was booked up to Bangkok. To add insult to injury our train was three hours delayed! This gave us time to catch up on postcards and blogs but it is still no fun to start a train ride at midnight. This time I was armed with socks and eyemasks so we were prepared. I even got a few winks of sleep before rolling into Bangkok on noon the next day.

Check out our Chiang Mai photos on our Smugmug page. The Royal Botanical Festival also has its own page.