We did not want to eat much as our agenda consisted of a morning cooking class., however since we were up so early, we went for a stroll and found the cutest shop to enjoy a small breakfast of fruit . The restaurant was full of plants and flowers. Almost like eating in a green house. Lady owner was from Minnesota.
Our cooking class was a small group of 7 of us and our awesome Thai instructor "Oun"
The French mother , daughter and son were lovely and intrigued us with their interesting careers, working for google in Singapore!?..and the two guys from L.A. Were very entertaining!! Often breaking out in Justin Bieber song or telling us travel tales, about what they have eaten --grasshopper and rat?! or stories about being 'aspiring actors' in LA. Anyways we had a fun group, who were impressed that Kristen and mom are 'professional curlers and coach :)
We started with a trip to the market which was full of fresh fruit, vegetables, and ingredients that we would use in our cooking class.
Oun taught us about the various vegetables and bought ingredients along the way. We bought a few of our own treats. Veggies look different here. Ie. egg plants are all shapes sizes and colours here while we have large purple plants.
Once back to his home, his wife of 1 month started preparing small plates of various ingredients. Let the cooking begin!!
We chopped, and mixed, and minced and mashed and cooked all the while laughing and joking as
everyone told stories.
6 dishes! After each dish we returned to the big table to enjoy our dish and visit. We were like one big happy family :) chelseys favourite was the green curry and the mango in sticky rice desert!! ..it's our mission to cook a couple dishes when we get home. Thank goodness we were given a this cook book with pictures and simple instructions.
Oun taught us about cooking and Budism..every thia male must become a monk to earn the respect, and to study Budism. Ranging from a week to years, it is an unwritten requirement. To not become a monk for a period of time is to dishonour your parents. A few choose to devote their life to Budism, while majority continue on with their lives.
Monks live and study in a temple. The community make and offer breakfast and lunch to the monks. Monks do not eat supper. Oun said at first it is difficult to adjust to no supper and they are allowed
some bread but gradually it becomes easy to manage. We are curious why a lot of elderly monks have big bellies since they do not eat much but I guess they sit around a lot. (We noticed that our hotel had three meals prepared at 6 in the morning. mom thought the hotel had made and packed us a lunch to take with us to the elephant sanctuary. We decided it wasn't for us when a couple monks showed up in their orange robe and ate the prepared breakfast) ..lol... That woulda been awkward if we ate their meal. But apparently they are very laid back. When they aren't praying, or studying they chat about everyday life and welcome anyone to chat with them. There are little shrines everywhere and at our hotel we noticed they set out offerings of food and drink in front of the shrine each night. The shrines by the pool had Fanta bottled drinks offered to them?
Budists do not have a designated day of prayer, they go to the temples whenever. They totally believe in Karma and that if you are wealthy in this life it is because of all the good you did in your last life. If you struggle in poverty it is because of how you carried on in last life.
Oun told us that he was a monk for two years before going to culinary school. He got married a month ago and had a big 300 person celebration. Lots of Thai whiskey and dancing :) Thai families appear to be small with 1 or 2 kids only.
Unfortunately the heat and change in food got the best of Kristen and she could not make it thru the cooking class. She relaxed on the couch (the LA boys tried singing to her to make her feel better) while we carried on and made her meals too pack them up in the end to take back to our hotel.
Thai food is made with high heat and gas stoves. You will not see microwaves anywhere here. We had chosen the morning class as afternoon becomes near unbearable but the down side was that it was kinda hard to eat a 6 course meal at 11 am. Once again the LA boys were happy to help with left over dishes:)
After Class was over we waved with promises to cook these Tia dishes at home ;)
back to our AC room where Kristen slept almost 3 hours. C and T to the pool.
Kristen woke feeling much better so we headed out to the Sunday night market. A big open air market where local vendors set up. We went right at 5 to try to beat the rush. At one point the national anthem came on blaring over a loud speaker and everyone stopped what they were doing to stand at attention. We have enjoyed mango shakes, mango sticky rice, mango pancakes, everything mango herein delicious!
By 7 you could hardly move down the street with the crowds of shoppers. Back to the hotel for another early night. The heat takes a lot out of these Canadian gals.
May 2 Monday
The planned zip lining day today was a no go. Kristen's stomach was far too unsettled to handle that. Instead we negotiated a private open air truck taxi to go up the mountain to a temple high above the city. We sat with "Irene" a little Thai lady who is married go a German man whom both run a travel agency .irene helped us line up our day. 1st stop waterfall, 2nd stop temple, 3rd stop a village high up in a remote area of the mountain, 4 th stop another waterfall and then home. Our cab driver spoke no English. 1600 baht = 20 cad person. First stop we got out and he indicated the direction to the waterfall. Got there, it was a pretty area with trees and path ways... but..! Where the heck was the water.. Not a trickle .Okay that was weird but it is dry season. We are sure the next one higher up the mountain will be beautiful. We had asked if we could swim at the falls and the travel agent had said no swimming but still arranged for us to go to the waterfall (for why were not sure?)
The temple did not disappoint. Beautiful view and many gold Buddhas. A big long story behind this temple and not really sure I could do it justice to try to describe it to you. Basically some elephants circled this spot 3 times and so that was how it was decided to build the temple here. We watched Thai people circle the main Buddha 3 times as they prayed carrying a rose on a stick!
Onwards to the village where there were clothes and trinkets for sale everywhere. It rose higher and higher up the mountainside as we walked. Tracy attempted to keep climbing but the heat and incline got the better of her knee. K and C kept going and felt it was something T needed to see up higher so C asked a white guy on a motorbike if he would take T on the back of his bike to the top and back down. He said sure. Somewhat hesitant I climbed on. He was friendly, in Thailand shooting a commercial for hotels.com and originally from LA. The top was pretty with lots of flowered shrubs and trees. Little village children played in the mud content with the finding of a plastic spoon, and an old dish to make a soup with water, grass and mud. Another older girl ran around in flannel pants and long sleeved flannel shirt. It must be 40 degrees today but higher up the mountain was somewhat cooler.
Back down and in our open air cab we headed to the final destination which once again was a dry waterfall. Really....I guess rather than asking if we could swim at the waterfall we should have asked if there was water at the falls!
Travel in the back of these vehicles allows one to watch all the traffic behind you as it is totally open. Motorcyclists rarely wear helmets and the ones that do don't do up the straps. We saw passengers on the bikes sometimes sitting sideways not hanging on, texting, playing the violin. Little tykes ...very young on the front of the bike with no helmet. Nothing here would surprise you.
Back at the hotel for cool down at the pool and reading. C and T have always been readers but reading for enjoyment not so much for K. She has been hooked on a book since we left! Out for supper to Los Elvis. A pretty cool spot with a more western menu where we noticed all the patrons were white.
Thought we deserved another massage on our walk home . When the three of us walked in the Thai worker quickly made a call and within 5minutes three women showed up on motor bikes in street clothes. Clearly not dressed the part and not a lick of English . The lady who massaged Chelsey was fast and all over the place. I did not hurt, and I reminded myself that This was costing $9. Lesson learned that if your masseuse is called in 5 minutes prior on her motor bike then maybe she not even a massage but rather a friend willing to help out the business?
Back to hotel where we managed to stay up til 10 tonight. Looking ahead we made a change to a hotel where we originally booked a no AC room. Absolutely not possible with the temperatures in the 40s plus humidity.
Goodby Chiang Mai. May 3 Tuesday
Slept in til 7am. We were all pleased with that accomplishment. Coffee on the patio. Ok well the deck is very teeny tiny so 2 is the most that can sit out there at one time. Still enjoyable. Packed our bags and then headed out to find a used book store to change out our books and then have some breakfast. A quick stop at the market allowed k to pick up dried mangoes and rice cakes - her safe go to with still an unsettled stomach. All around Bangkok and Chiang Mai there are dogs and cats wandering about. They are skinny and unkept and some don't have tails. They are harmless but at the same time we avoided them. No one pets them. Open air cabbie to Arpt and off to the south islands.
Flight was smooth arrived to Surat Thani (pronounced sura tanny) a little ahead of schedule. Booked a combination transportation of bus/boat to get to the island of Koh Phangan. Got the last one of the day out so paid 800 baht per person instead of 700. Always a reason to increase cost....ha ha. We saw the 2 tiered luxury bus roll up to the Arpt and Kristen said she was pushing thru to get the top front. Chels and I would load backpacks. We have found the oriental people to be very pushy and will shove their way rudely to the front instead of standing in line. Only way to combat that is to push back :) and since we are Canadian throw in a few "sorry, sorry," we loaded this luxury bus and thanks to k had prime seats. Enjoyed a 1.5 hour ride to the Lomprayah Pier. Got off and were quickly moved down a long long cement pier to load our motor boat. My girls , always conscious of my back have taken to relieving me of my large backpack even though I feel strong enough to manage. So k has my pack on her front and hers on her back while I carried both small packs. C is in the lead ever conscious of the need to keep up. They moved us along quickly and loaded us on a speed boat with 3 large motors and bus style seating. All 9 of us. We started out by 615 pm and you could tell the crew did not want to doddle. We watched the sunset with our music in our ears as we flew across the water. Darkness settled in quickly and now I understand the urgency!
First stop at Koh Samui pier where we picked up more passengers and then off again at high speeds into the sunset. A total of 1.5 hours later we pulled up to our pier Thongsala. Off the boat and told to quickly move down a long road to get to the taxis. Herded into the back of an open air cab again, we are told 150 baht each to the Rin beach resort. We disagreed and they come back with 300 total. Sure lets go. Our crazy ride began down winding and hilly roads. Pitch dark, tired and feeling a little nervous in the back of this truck driving wildly down the road, suddenly he pulled over and the driver jumped out, came back to us and started motioning to get out, lifting our bags and saying out out. Our leader, Chelsey asked "what's happening"and the driver said "very busy gotta go back. You ride with another taxi." Moving fast we quickly are put into the back of another taxi. Our new driver is hesitant where to take us. We pulled out our reservation and he seemed surprised?? Whatever, just get us there. A good half hour later we pulled up to a hotel where a young boy told us to WAIT! He returned with his mom, dad and younger toddler brother to check us in. They couldn't speak much English at all but must have said "sorry,sorry, sorry" 30 times while we checked in. I told them they should be Canadian! They were loud, and rammy with the young boy translating everything to his mom. Finally the dad hikes up my backpack and says ""follow". He took us to a bungalow and we piled in and unloaded. 10 hours of travel had gotten to us and our stomachs were empty. Off we went to find supper. Not far away we found spaghetti and quesadilla. Pretty good. Back to our bungalow. Girls were asleep before their heads hit the pillow. Finally safe and sound!
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