Not Thai-ered - Week #2

So apparently I'm an epic failure at writing up-to-date blogs... but that just means that I'm having too many adventures to stop and write all of them down as they are happening.  Orrrr it just means the internet in our hostel is sketchy, maybe a combination of the two.

Well a LOT has happened since my last post, but I'm just gonna keep going chronologically and recount week #2 and see how far I get after that.  Most of the week consisted of exploring the area around our hostel, attending the first real week of classes, and getting to know each other.  Everyone in the program is amazing, and I am looking forward to getting to know them better in the upcoming weeks.  Learning (which is a VERY loose term in this case) to speak Thai is probably the hardest class, even though it's not technically graded.  Our teacher Nan, a bubbly, energetic, cute young Thai english teacher, keeps encouraging us to incorporate Thai into our daily lives.  Therefore the next morning I tried to to order the chicken rice soup in Thai - "Caaaw tom yum gay kah?", this was met with a blank stare, an awkward silence, and ended with the waiter shuffling away and me feeling uncomfortable.

I ended up with something completely different than what I had attempted order, but oh well - maybe better luck next time.  So far my attempts at speaking Thai have have had varied responses:

1. Blank stares
2. Giggling followed by blank stares
3. Smiles while they look around to their fellow Thais as if nonchalantly asking "What the hell is she trying to say?"
4. A combination of all of the above

It seems like some people, especially at the market pretend that they don't know what you're talking about even if they do in fact understand you.  Especially those frog ladies I was telling you about in my first post - you can practically scream MAI CHAI GODDAMNIT (which basically means not yes) followed with a "kha" - to be polite despite the yelling of course - and they just stare at you like you're from outerspace and then thrust more bracelets and frogs at you.  Frustrating...  

So one of our finds amidst our exploration of Chiang Mai the first week was an eccentric little roof top bar called "THC" which stands for Tribal Heritage Conservation - so they say, I think its just a clever name to attract traveling hippies and stoners into their bar.  We were enticed in by the sounds of reggae and the brightly colored prayer flags.  Since it's on the roof you go up all these crazy flights of stairs and through passage ways where most people have to duck their heads (not the midget 5'4" girl of course - much to the amusement of the fellows I was with).  Once to the top, you take off your shoes and can choose a place to sit on the ground among the various brightly colored pillows and low tables.  It had a great vibe to it and a beautiful view, since it was at sunset.  Definitely I place I'd like to return to...

The following Saturday was the first of our field trips coordinated through the program.  We traveled around the local Chiang Mai area and toured various factories that produced items such as ceramics, silk, silver, jewelry, and so forth.  While it was interesting to see how things were made, we quickly learned that "factory tours" is a loose term that more accurately described a clever marketing scheme to entice naive tourists into their souvenir shops.  One glorious part however was the double decker bus we used to travel around from place to place - it had curtains, air conditioning, and seats that reclined back almost all the way - veryyy nice :) 

My favorite stop was probably the silk factory, we got to see the different stages of how silk is made, from the silk worms to cocoons and then eventually the lovely stage where the cocoons (and little wormies inside) are essentially boiled alive while their respective cocoons are turned into silk string.  Kind of gnarly but the finished product is beautiful silk.

The next day was our first free day to do whatever we wanted - some people chose to take their scooters to a small town called Pai a few hours away, while others explored what Chiang Mai had to offer.  As for me and two friends, Arielle and Julie, we decided to try our luck hiking up approximately 12 km to a temple called Wat Prathat Doi Suthep.  It's at the top of this mountain, at the end of a curvy road that  can easily be accessed via song tow (the red taxi trucks) or scooter.  So naturally we decided to attempt to hike there instead - good idea in theory, not so much in action.  Although we had heard from various people that there is indeed a trail to the top, we didn't have any specifics as to where it started.  We asked multiple people at the bottom of the mountain if they knew how to hike to the top (of course this was done primarily with poor sign language and some ridiculous charades that involved lots of pointing to the top of the mountain coupled with exaggerated marching in place motions) and did not get much of a response.  Most people didn't understand what we were asking, others said it was too far, and most just said "taxi taxi" - apparently hiking to the top isn't a popular past time for Thai people.  Stubborn and determined we decided to hike part way up the road to a cut-off for a waterfall/national park and ask the park rangers there.  To our excitement, the rangers told us that there was indeed a trail but that we couldn't take it because it was too dangerous.  We tried to figure out what exactly "dangerous" meant to a Thai park ranger, trying to act out falling, too steep, slippery, tigers, etc apparently is a very comical sight and was met with laughter from the rangers.  Oh well.  So we hiked up to the waterfall anyways to see if we could figure out our own way up.
The waterfall was small but beautiful, and we felt accomplished for at least making it SOMEWHERE of consequence.  After exploring for a bit we came across a trail that had a sign with a big "X" on it.  A few minutes later a group of rangers and white people (an anomaly at times) came down the trail, we asked them if there was a way up to the temple and they said there was but it was currently closed because two people slipped and fell on a trail that was adjacent to the waterfall and one was severely injured and the other died. So THAT'S what the initial ranger meant about the trail being too dangerous.  Drat.  Discouraged, sweaty, and hot we turned around to hike 2 km back down to the road where we started.  We did procure vague directions of another way to hike up to the top from one of the white people who spoke English, but that that point over 4 hours had passed and we had not made very significant progress.  We finally conceded defeat, hailed down a song tow, bartered so that we could pay half price (we had hiked part way up the hill afterall), and made it to the top.  The temple was beautiful, but much more modern and tourist-y than I had initially expected.  It was built 700 years ago, but has been renovated many times throughout the years.  Apparently the Thais do not believe that historical temples do not lose any spiritual significance with extensive repairs and modern materials.

Hot, discouraged, hungry, disgruntled, and defeated.  Waiting on the side of the road for the next Song Tow :(

Looking goooood.  REAL good.  Hiking shoes + sweat + headbands + dresses = pure classiness

Hmmm. Uncomfortable. 

Buddha!

Gold scaffolding and all. 

and finally:

Always remember, when in doubt put helmets and yourself and leave your baby to fend for itself. If it falls off, too bad. Survival of the fittest at its finest.  Haha.

Well, till next time!  Stay uncomfortable, stay classy.  

Bangkokroaches

Mmmmm... lovely.  

Not really in bangkok, but the name's too good to pass up.  The bugs here are INTENSE.  Enough said. 

Can't Thai Me Down!! (tehehe)

Heyyo!  Alright, so I realize I've already been here 4 days and have yet to start an oh-so-cliche travel blog, but better late than never right?  I'll try to be more diligent in the future...

So instead of creating another "Darcy Goes to Thailand" or "Darcy's Thailand Adventures" or another equivalent I decided to mix things up a little bit and call mine the Uncomfortable Traveler.  Why might I call it this, might you ask?  Well, let me explain.

1. I've never traveled abroad before
2. Barely any signs are in english
3. Not many people speak english
4. Butchering the thai language is ridiculously easy (saying 'ma' with different tones magically turns the word grandma into horse... yikes)
5. It's over 100 and super humid every day
6. People drive on the wrong side of the road/car.  
7. A majority of the bathroom facilities are squatter toilets (google it, much less awkward than trying to explain it)
8. etc etc etc

So, as you can see we have the IDEAL makings of some FANTASTIC yet awkward, uneasy, and of course - uncomfortable experiences :)  I don't mean uncomfortable as a bad thing, just an inevitable.  

SO - anyways, moving on to what has actually been going on the past few days.  Let's start at the beginning.  I left the San Francisco Airport at 1 AM on March 27th.  The customs man told me I was incredibly gorgeous and had never seen a better passport photo - I felt uncomfortable.  Here you can see me handy dandy money/passport belt.  Good idea in theory, except when you have to wear your most valuable possessions pressed against to your body in 105 degree heats... you guessed it, clearly uncomfortable.  Makes for some pretty crunchy money and  passports....  The flight actually went by pretty quickly and before I knew it I was arriving in Taipei.  I had a 4 hours lay over, which I spent a good portion of it roaming around a somewhat confusing airport trying to find my gate and giggling at the funny signs that were poorly translated into english.  For example, "I miss my hometown, Taiwan really good!  Taiwan go go go!"  

I have NO idea what the advertisement was for but I found it incredibly amusing.  A few hours later, a 4 hour flight, and 8 bracelets later (arts and crafts on planes really makes the time fly) I found myself safe and sound at my final destination of Chiang Mai.  It was hot, humid, and incredibly beautiful.  The dozen of us or so that arrived on that flight all piled into a taxi called a 'song tao' (I think...), 

which is basically a covered truck with bench seats designed to hold about 12 or so people. You can also stand on the back ledge of it and hold onto the bars kind of trolley style, I love the things you're allowed to do here since the notion of suing and liability is ridiculous 

We are all staying at a international hostel called Uniserv which is affiliated with Chiang Mai University.  Upon arriving, a few of us decided to go to mall which is a few blocks away to purchase cell phones (100 minutes and a brand new phone for 700 baht, 20 bucks, not a bad deal!) and get money since American money is accepted most places.  The mall is 5 stories, and is kind of a mix between a supermarket/grocery store/pharmacy/electronics store/bowling alley/everything else.  Some of the floors basically consist of kiosks and are eerily empty - awkward.  After that a bunch of us decided to check out the Sunday Night Street Market.  They sell EVERYTHING here - clothes, food, art, movies, shoes, bracelets, masks, hats, bags, and everything in between.  I learned here that virtually everything is negotiable in Thailand... and they don't take no for an answer very easily.  There are these women donning beaded hats and brightly colors garments that come up to all the tourists, poke you with little sticks, and then take these little statues shaped like frogs and run the stick along the frogs ridged back which makes kind of a croaking noise.  They really aren't that remarkable but these ladies seem to think that the tourists will love them of something.  Even after telling them no you're not interested they just stand their uncomfortably close and stare at you.  It's interesting...

      The next few days consisted of orientation, wandering around Chiang Mai, and attending school for the first day.  I'm taking business negotiations, environmental psychology, thai humanities, and an online class of business strategies.  We also have a mandatory class of learning thai, which is EXTREMELY difficult.  It's fun to try and learn but very easy to butcher.  Luckily, most of the people appreciate you trying to speak their language even if you're not doing a very good job at it. 

     I went to my first yoga class in Thailand. It was vinyasa and a really good time.  The teacher spoke english decently well and was helpful when we didn't understand her.  I also learned that yoga teachers in Thailand are definitely not afraid to touch/adjust you whenever/wherever they feel like it.  The yoga class ended with a long savasanah, a cold towel soaked in eucalyptus, and a massage that was dangerously close to being felt up - felt really good, but borderline uncomfortable. It was definitely a fun experience, I'm hoping to get to go back soon.  

     We all went to a full moon party last night at a placed called the monkey club - it was RIDICULOUS.  It was packed with people, black lights everywhere, sand on the floor, and buckets (yes, literal buckets) of alcohol everywhere.  There were guys who I assume worked for the place (they could have just been randoms for all we knew, but who cares) painting people's faces/backs/arms/bodies as soon as we got in, so naturally being the tourists we are we all had to get them.  I got a sweet gecko painted on my shoulder.  We all danced, drank, and were merry.  However an odd note when it comes to partying in Thailand - the people were don't dance at all.  They play club music but just stand around... kind of uncomfortable...  All in all, a great night though.  

I don't have too much to report at this time, other than it has been an amazing experience so far and I cannot wait to see what the next three months will have in store for me.

Some random facts/observations:

• There are stray dogs everywhere ( one even wandered into our classroom)
• Geckos cling to billboards at night (for the heat I assume)
• People don't seem to obey the traffic laws whatsoever and it seems that a red light only appears to make people drive faster
• More people drive scooters/motorcycles than cars
• It's not uncommon to see a truck with 15+ people in the back of it or a scooter with 3 or more people on it.  
• Instant coffee = poison. Ickkk.  
• Dinner for breakfast is common (fried rice and soup mmmm)
• People smile a LOT when they talk to you
• Apparently you can get thrown in jail if you say anything bad about the king - this law applies to foreigners too.  
• There are some really humorous signs

More pictures....  

And finally: 

No smoking, no dogs, and no meat?  Hmmmm interesting.  I think I can handle that, I'll have to remember to leave my t-bone and filet mignon at home next time.... drat.  

Alright, well 'til next time - keep it classy, keep it uncomfortable :)