The taxi ride from the airport to the hostel seemed to take a lifetime. There was traffic and their stop lights literally seemed to be red for 5 minutes or longer; and everyone just sits there and waits. I mean, in a traffic jam no one tries to crazily get by or cuts each other off. It's really controlled, respectful and quiet. I mean...no one honks their horns!!! It was the quietest ride I had had in over 3 months...and clean!!! OMG there are no piles of garbage all over the place...these two things literally put me in shock, though didn't help my feeling of anxiousness. I was so exhausted and just wanted to get to the hostel and the not moving and my driver just staying in the centre lane and not moving into a lane that was moving faster was making me anxious. I looked at the time on the map 29 minutes.....27 minutes.....30 minutes.....29 minutes.....29 minutes....29 minutes. We were at 29 minutes for 29 minutes lol. I finally made it where Anouschka and Nick and a beer waiting for me!
Anouschka had mentioned "taking it easy," but that never happens the day/night you arrive to a new country....you need to celebrate! So after a beer and a long over due shower....OMG.... a shower with pressure and hot water! I felt like a new woman and was ready to check out the famous Khao San Road!
Our first stop was food and OMG!!! It was fantastic....in fact...the food here is just fantastic all around. It's literally a food lovers heaven here. Every 2 steps there is a food vendor on the street....during the day the street is lined with them and you can literally just snack as you are shopping with freshly made chicken skewers, spring rolls, pad thai, meat balls, sweets....honestly my stomach has been a little too happy since arriving here. Anyway, back to Khao San Road.
I wasn't sure what to expect but it definitely showed me a good time. Music, street dancing, alcohol at the bars or you can just buy them at the 7 elevens and walk along the street. Oh and the 7 eleven's here are the best! There cold food section is amazing... you can buy packaged onigiri and pack them in your bag for a snack, there are rice bowls and grilled cheese sandwiches you can heat up there....again heaven for a food lover.
We partied all night. We drank beer and did deals on the buckets. A friend of ours almost got arrested for peeing down an alleyway but was lucky enough to get off with just a warning.
We attempted going to a ping pong show but got there and changed our mind so we went back to Khao San and continued the festivities.
One of the things that gets me is the bugs. When we first went out we were sitting eating dinner and people come up to you trying to sell things which is fine but then one came up and offered us fried scorpions and spiders!!! Ughhh .... OMG I am arachnaphobic
Anouschka was tired so we walked back around three but I still wanted a drink so I found a road with a bar and sat down with some guy and talked for awhile and then I sat with another guy from Czech Republic who spoke no English.... I was drunk enough to ask the Thai people if they spoke Czech lol....even with my translator he didn't seem to understand.
Most of our days were spent wandering the streets and eating the amazing food. We went shopping on our second night...well tried to anyways. We came across this store with amazing clothes so we started pulling stuff of the racks and wanted to try them on. There was no change room so we had to change in a little area of the shop. When I was going in one of the skirts fell on my foot and I lifted it so it wouldn't touch the ground and the guy yelled at me. He then proceeded to tell me I couldn't try everything on.... "it's a place to buy not try!!!" He said. "Don't you want my money?" "Okay....you only try 4 pieces...you choose one. If you no choose one you can't try anymore. You buy here, not try." I was asking him why he was being so aggressive with me, told him to calm down. When I chose my 4 pieces he then checked to see that the skirts were different styles as I couldn't try the same style in a different colour. When Anouschka came to join me she had a beautiful jumpsuit she found inside of the shop (we were in the outside part). When I went to go inside they told me I wasn't allowed...that it was a different shop! "She has stuff from in there, why I can't I go." He just started yelling at me. I was really starting to lose my patience at this point but I bit my tongue. Just as I was about to try on a skirt Anouschka started pulling her tank top down and the guy lost his shit swearing at Nick. "Fuck you fuck off...you can't do that in this country. Fuck off fuck off!!!" "LETS GO!!!" Said Nick. We took the clothes and tossed them onto the table, the lady who worked there just looked at us like we were being rude. The guys screamed at us as we left "I kill you, I want to twist your neck, fuck you, fuck you!!!" Totally sucks, we really wanted the skirts and shorts, we were ready to spend money in there but apparently he doesn't want people spending money in his shop. We went and got the most amazing foot massages instead, however my feet still had Goa dirt on them, even after showering a few times lol....let me tell you how exciting it was to have a lukewarm shower with pressure...I was like a new woman. Anyways, I apologized about my feet. "No worry." He said as massaged in between my feet cleaning the dirt away as he did so ... it was amazing.
The WiFi here has been great!!! It has been so amazing to actually work...I get excited to work because I love what I do and now have a great connection with just the WiFi from my Thai SIM card. It's been great. It was bad in India, especially Goa, I ended up losing one of my contracts with a school because the connection was so bad. I usually just teach in the dorm room, on my bed. The other night when I was teaching everyone walks in the room and I am saying "lamb...lamb...lamb. Great job mom no please let me hear her do it. I really need her to s speak. Can you say lamb....lamb...thats right you circled the cow, moo...but can you say lamb...lamb." When I finished the class everyone looked at me and said "lamb, lamb, lamb." You gotta love dorm rooms!!!
Next we were off to the floating market. You can take a boat through and shop around and order food from other boats who sell fruit or cook soup and meats right there on the boats. We walked around because there was too much boat traffic so we enjoyed the shops and the best Tom Yum soup (now my favourite meal) from a little woman in a boat pulled up to the side of the walk way. We sat down on little stool and just enjoyed. After an hour and a half of wandering and eating we got in a motor boat and went through the little village on the outskirts of the market. It was a really wonderful day!
The next day Anouscha and I took a night bus to Chiang Mai and Nick stayed in Bangkok to meet up with a friend. The bus was great! It was $24 for a 12 hour bus ride, you get a bottle of water and Oreo's, a dinner stop - FREE dinner!!! Seats that go all the way back, lots of leg room and a free taxi ride from the bus stop to our hostel!!! WINNING!!!
So now we have been in Chiang Mai for a few days and have had a really lovely time. I have met up with a friend I met in Ibiza and havent seen in 17 years. I met up with Ben (we traveled in Peru and Ecuador together) and haven't seen each other in 4 years so it was really awesome to catch up with him.
We got free hugs from the man giving out free hugs just outside the old town walls.
We have ended up in a great hostel dorm. We get along really great with our dorm mates and we are meeting them in two days in Pai. However we have had two different sets of people have sex two nights in a row in the bunk next two us. The first night it was just the bed creaking last night I walked in and turned on the light and well.... I still have the image in my head and don't really think you guys want the image so I will just leave it there.
Now, we have to be up in 5 hours as we are going on a two day jungle trek with waterfalls, elephants, hot springs and more. I'm super excited.
- My Beautiful Life -
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