New Feeling

I have been trying to have at least one new experience per day and in the past week, they seem to have really accumulated. Some highlights:

1. ART! Thanks to my friend Otto for showing me around some galleries in Chiang Mai. I didn't realize how much i missed being around art. There was also an art and culture festival going on at the time so there was much to see. And i discovered an amazing little place called Fern Forest Cafe which is a lush haven in the middle of the hot, polluted city.

2. Cricket. I never would have believed that i would be going to an international cricket match in Thailand but there we were. Karen's brother Janni has been visiting from South Africa and they really wanted to go watch cricket. I desperately tried to understand what was going on but frankly, there wasn't much to understand. I noticed many old men getting drunk (possibly to make it more interesting?) and watched as the players batted around the ball and trotted from post to post. Still, it was an interesting atmosphere and they had good vegetable samosas there.

3. Headstands! Hialry and I went to yoga on Tuesday and got to practice our headstands. Hilary did her first one unassisted! I'm so proud of her. And i managed to stay up for about 5 minutes with the help of our teacher William. We're going back again this Tuesday and we will also check out a poetry reading.


4. Snake Liquor. Why is this so popular in Asia?? Well, my friend Amy was returning to springfield and we took her out for her last night in Thailand. She asked the bartender to give her a special shot and she ended up with some sort of whiskey with snakes distilled in it. Apparently it was from Laos and the Thai people believe it will give you strength in bed. All i know is that it literally tasted like death. I would also like to note that no snakes were killed in the process of making this liquor. The people wait until they die and then put them in the whiskey. Appetizing eh?


5. Kick-ass accomodations and food. We went to Sukothai with Karen and Janni who had never been there. We stayed in this place called Cocoon Guesthouse which is like a jungle-garden menagerie with cool little rooms decorated with Thai antiques. Seriously, they had peacocks, turtles and deer at this place...in the middle of Sukothai! We found a cool restaurant called Terrace and Trees. We got to sit up in the terrace and look over the garden full of twinkling fairy lights. It was a new place so the service was very unorganized (they brought us the wrong food and i almost ate meat!) but when we did get our correct food, it was amazing. Janni, who is a cordon bleu chef proclaimed that it was the best food he'd had in thailand. Hilary and I got jungle curry which just about burned our tongues off and left us feeling crazy after eating so many chillis. We loved it so much that we went back again the next night. The waiter gave me a rose made out of a paper napkin!


6. Old Cities and Frenzied Parades. We had a blast riding around Sukothai on our bicycles. The next day, Hilary and I planned to go to Mae Sot (a town on the border with Myanmar) but it fell through. We decided to go to these other old ruins that an old thai man had recommended to us. The place was called Sisachalai near Sawan Khalok. Once again, we rented bikes and rode across this rickety wooden bridge that reminded me of Indiana Jones and the temple of doom. The old city was gorgeous and there were notably less tourists. We strolled around and took picutres, climbed up very steep steps to enjoy the views. After awhile, we noticed that there were many Thai people loitering about the grounds. They tried to explain that it was some sort of festival were they would pray to the Buddha. We saw a parade coming down the road and heard a brass band playing Thai music. All of the people in the parade started dancing like crazy. They were drinking some sort of rice whiskey. There were adolescent and teen boys almost breakdancing to this old-fashioned music and very very old grandmas getting down like never before. All the people were wearing these funny hula skirts and straw hats. They grabbed Hilary and I to join the procession. When we started dancing, they all cheered and screamed. Then all of a sudden,there was a huge fire truck with a hose spraying water over everyone in the parade. We walked/danced towards the temple in the old city and proceeded to go around the main vihara 3 times. The people had given us hula skirts and hats to wear and we were just dancing away while soaking wet. They called the festival "Bu-ut Phra." Eventually, we had to leave because we didn't want to miss our bus back to Sukothai but it was an amazing to get to be part of a celebration that foreigners don't usually see. I will upload a video of this on photobucket.



Anyways, new experiences left and right. That's what life is all about chai mai?