Chiang Mai, Thailand
I woke up this morning to the “cock-a-doodle-doo” of the resident rooster. As I sat up, surrounded by my mosquito net and listening to the river running behind me, I really began to internalize where I am and what I’m doing. I stepped out of my room to another overcast morning, a signature of rainy season, which was decently warm and very fresh. I’m the only one of the group that’s awake right now, and I don’t even know what time it is (actually, our guide just came out of his room and told me it’s 6:30am).
Most people of the village are already awake, cooking, cleaning, and feeding the animals. Not much else is going on at the moment, but as the sun continues to rise and more people wake up, that will change. Right now it’s just nice to listen to nature and the man in the kitchen who is singing a song, even though I can’t understand a word he’s saying.
It’s nearing 7:30am, and now Bernhard and his wife are awake, the sun is breaking through, and breakfast and coffee are being made in the kitchen. I walked around the village a little bit, taking pictures and getting a glimpse of what life would be like living here. It would be busy, but just very different. Just now, a man herded a bunch of cows through the village. Who knows where they came from or where they are going, but that’s definitely not something I’m used to seeing everyday. On the other hand, most people here own motorbikes and zoom around and in and out of the village on them. No electricity, but modern forms of transportation; quite a contrast.
We ate breakfast, consisting of eggs, toast with butter and jam, coffee, tea, and an exotic fruit that’s kind of like lychee.
Soon after, we set off on our trek. The weather was much more cooperative, and would have been perfect except for the humidity. We walked for a grand total of about 3 hours, passing through rice fields and climbing steep hills along the way, before arriving at the elephant camp. Everyone was cheery because they were dry, minus the sweat, there had been no leeches, and the scenery was nice to look at. Upon arriving at the camp, there were four elephants; two in the water and two gathered around a tree. We took off our shoes so that we could put our feet in the water, and spent some time relaxing and watching the elephants while lunch was being prepared. When it was ready, we ate noodle soup with cabbage and carrots. The noodles reminded me of Ramen, but still very good. There was also fresh pineapple, which seems to be popular around here.
After lunch, it was time for the elephants to have a bath. There were all put in the river while bucket of water were thrown on them. We were told we could help, so into the river we went. The elephants were very well behaved and it was fun to throw water all over them and clean their tusks.
Once clean, the elephants were prepared for riding. The have little benches “installed” on them that hold two people each, along with their bags. One of the lawyers and I climbed up to the same elephant. Along the way we discovered that she was a bit of a rogue and had her own mind and agenda. The ride was bit jerky and we swayed a little from side to side, but it was still awesome. The elephants feel very leathery, but also have bristly hair. Ours liked to flap her ears a lot and a couple of times she used her trunk to kill flies that were on her head. It was cool to watch them eat because it showed us all the cool ways their trunks can bend and move. The other two elephants stopped for snacks quite often, but ours didn’t seem hungry/interested.
After dismounting the elephant, we gathered our things and walked about ten minutes more to the village where we’ll be sleeping tonight. At this point, my legs are tired/sore and I rolled my ankle once, so I was glad to see the wood huts. This second village seems to span a larger area than the last one and also has a pretty nice school. The kids are on summer holiday now, so the school is all closed up. The building we’re sleeping in is right next to the river we’ll be bamboo rafting down tomorrow. Luke, our tour guide, has decided to go fishing in the river, while the rest of us are taking turns using the shower (a tin hut with a hose).
Not much happened this evening, but everyone felt refreshed after showering. We walked around the village a little bit and remarked at how interesting it is that there is no electricity here (I am writing by candlelight) but some of the huts have satellites, for radio or cell phones I’m not sure. We did see someone on an iPhone, which was funny and seemed out of place.
We came back, sat around and eventually had dinner. Pretty much the same as yesterday, with the same soup and chicken dish, prawn chips, and rice, but this time we also had a salad with noodles and egg, as well as fresh bananas from the village, which were very sweet and so delicious! All of the vegetables are really fresh and tasty as well.
Luke came over to talk to us about tomorrow’s itinerary, and it’s weird to think that the trek is almost over. Tomorrow I’ll be back in the city center of Chiang Mai, then off to Bangkok after that.
Anyway, tomorrow we’ll wake up and eat breakfast before getting on the bamboo raft and floating down the river (if the water isn’t moving too fast). Then we should be meeting up with the truck that will take us back to town.
We also learned that there are 50 families (about) living in this village and that the school on the grounds provides free education to the members of the five tribes nearby. This tribe also speaks the same dialect as the tribe we stayed with last night. Walking around we had seen a collapsed concrete bridge, so we asked about it and were told that it was wiped out by flooding right after is was constructed, even before anyone had used it.
Before bed we gathered around a campfire, and ended up playing “21” (normally a drinking game where you go around in a circle, counting up to 21. Whoever says 21 gets to make up a rule about that number, until all the numbers have their own rules.). It was really fun to play with people from different countries, and cool to see a commonality that linked us all together.
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