Chiang Mai, Thailand
This morning I woke up at 8am, packed up my things and went downstairs for breakfast. I had hard-boiled eggs, fruit, and wontons. I took my time before heading back upstairs to gather everything. Once I deposited one of my bags behind the counter and checked out of my room, all I had to do was wait for my guide to show up. Three other girls joined me, and I saw that easy was only carrying one bag, while I had two. I rearranged my stuff again and got things in one bag, depositing the other behind the front desk counter with the first one. Our guide came and picked us up and we all piled into an open-air pickup truck. We rode for a few minutes before stopping at another hotel to pick up the remaining two members of the group. In all, there was me, a girl from England, two originally from Ireland but now working in England, and an Austrian couple who had just come from traveling through northern Vietnam and Laos. I am definitely the baby of the group, but not too much younger than the group of English lawyers. Of the couple, the wife teaches English to children at a Russian school, while the husband works as a computer scientist.
Once all on board in the back of the truck, our first order of business was to go to the local police station to check-in, so that they can track us and make sure we all arrive back safely. With that finished, we drove yet a little bit longer before stopping at a local market to pick up the food we’d need to make meals on our trip. The market had all sorts of fruits and vegetables, some packaged goods, and fresh fish (so fresh that some were still breathing in their final breaths on the tray they were being kept on).
Back in the truck, we finally took off, really on our way. We came out of the main city center and into a more rural part of the town. Everything was so green: hills, bushes, and trees, and also seemed never ending. Spread throughout the landscape were a mixture of stores and markets, some rundown shacks, and a couple of temples. As we climbed higher, it was really nice to have the wind in my face and to be able to look out and take in the scenery.
We stopped at a little place for lunch, which was prepared with the help of our tour guide. We started off with a really good soup, followed by fried rice with egg, tomato, and bok choi, and some very tasty, fresh pineapple. I had a very good share of rice because I liked it so much and also because I knew that we probably wouldn’t be eating again until after trekking for a few hours.
Again in the truck, we drove up a steep hill for about 10 minutes, before finally getting out, gathering up all of our stuff, and beginning our climb. We were told to go heavy on the bug spray because we were going to be walking through brush and the forest floor. We were also told to look out for leeches, which proved to be a major problem. They found their way on and into our shoes, so we had to stop every five minutes or so to pick them off.
As gross as the leech experience was, the forest was equally breathtaking. We climbed uphill for quite awhile before stopping for a water/picture break and leech check. After an all clear, we began again, and that’s when it started to rain. It only sprinkled on us at first, even though there were some mighty thunder claps, because we were under the cover of all the trees. Once we found our way out of the trees however, we got dumped on. We pulled out our rain gear to cover our backpacks, and our resourceful leader tore off pieces of banana leaves for us to use as umbrellas. It was wet the rest of the way, which made the trek a bit difficult because a lot of it was downhill at that point and very slippery and muddy.
In total we walked for a bit more than a couple of hours before descending on our destination, a Thai village. My quads were burning and my knees and ankle were a little upset with me, but it was worth if for the experience.
In the village there are a handful of huts, all different in size and shape. We stripped off all of our wet clothes before we were shown where we would be sleeping. All of us are in the same room, and each has a separate mattress, a quilt, pillow, and mosquito net. It will be comfy enough for the time we are here.
Looking around, I can see a cluster of chickens, a couple of pigs walking around, and roosters who won’t stop making noise. I can also see people making dinner in the cooking hut and around a fire. Kids are running around, some trying to stay dry while others could care less. A couple of girls are weaving something on homemade looms. As for us travelers, two of the lawyers, Laura and Claire, are playing a game on a piece of paper, the Austrian couple are talking and looking through some papers, and the last lawyer girl (her name I can’t pronounce) and I are reading.
It will probably be a quiet night tonight, before we get up and head off tomorrow. We’ve just been served some “prawn chips” that are a little spicy but very tasty. It looks like dinner will be rice, grown on a farm in the village and harvested by the tribe members, soup, a chicken/vegetable dish, and some kind of green bean/tofu dish in a peanut sauce. Everything that’s being cooked is made from stuff we bought from the market earlier today.
After dinner, which everyone really enjoyed, our group just sat around the table, quietly, before deciding that pretty much the only thing left to do was get ready for bed. It was completely dark out, not leaving us with any other options.
Our group leader wanted to go over tomorrow’s game plan, and he actually got into some history and facts about the group of people we are staying with. They have been living in this village for hundreds of years, and little has changed since then. There are 290 people and they still go out and hunt, bringing back buffalo, deer, cows, chicken, and frogs, among other things (pigs, snakes). They farm rice, corn, and tobacco, mostly to eat, but some to sell. The biggest change is that the kids go to school now, but the “local” school is two hours away. Each tribe has their own dialect, but everyone also knows Thai, which they only use when others are around.
No comments:
Post a Comment