Dave Sohigian

Chiang Mai is located about 400 miles north of Bangkok, away from the sprawl of the city. We flew here on Januar 17th and stayed at a local guest house while we started our search for longer term accommodations. We planned to stay in Chiang Mai for about 6 weeks, leaving the first week of March.

Why Chiang Mai? Because we had heard it was a nice small town, friendly to foreigners (“Farangs” as they are known in Thai) and because our travel agent from Portland, Chad Ellingson, now lives in Chiang Mai.

Chad grew up in Corvallis and now live in Thailand most of the year. He teaches English at the University and knows the local scene, speaks some Thai and looks good in a helmet

On our first full day in Chiang Mai he took us to a wonderful waterfall near the city.

Chad demonstrated that the waterfall was not only beautiful, but also great for recreation when you jump off the rocks next to it into the pool below

or slide down the rocks into the pool

It looked so fun that Dave decided to give it a try (see video of Dave sliding ).

Caleb also thought about doing the slide. He sat at the top and thought

and thought

and thought and then decided to push off (see video of Caleb Sliding ). It was a brave choice and a rite of passage for Caleb.

Anna had fun in the cool water as well, using bags to move water around into little pools

The next day we found a place to stay – a nice condo outside of the city (we are not exactly roughing it). We are starting to settle into a routine, travelling around town by Santheaw

and tuk-tuk

We often go to the markets at night

Where you can buy anything from knockoff sunglasses and watches (see anything you recognize, Robby?)

to fruit

to little dogs

and getting foot massages

Food is another big part of our experience in Thailand so far. We have found a great Thai restaurant close to our apartment. Jen and Nok 4142 cook up amazing meals and put up with our horrendous Thai skills. The meals below are Thai Omelet, Phad Thai, and Phad Saew.

And many other amazing dishes, too many to name…

,,,

Most dishes are about 25 to 30 bhat (the US dollar is worth around 34 bhat right now).

Elephants!

After settling into our place, we decided to take a 1 day package tour to see the elephants North of Chiang Mai. The tour started early with a trip to an orchid farm

and then it was on to the elephant camp for the tourist show. The show was both amazing and ridiculous. The elephants were huge

and incredibly well trained

They demonstrated how they were able to move timber

which was once the full time job of these elephants and their trainers (called “manhouts”) not long ago. In fact, when the government put a stop to the deforestation of the jungle, the elephants were put out of work (think “Mike Mulligan and The Steam Shovel”) and ended up heading to the cities to beg on the street (imagine an elephant and manhout sitting on street corner in Bangkok). The Thais are tolerant people, but I suspect that the elephant dung to to be a bit much and someone figured out that tourists will pay good money to see the elephants perform.

Their skills went far beyond moving timber. They have learned to useful ability to hula hoop

play instruments

paint (they were not Michelangelo, but then he did not have to paint with his nose)

and play soccer

Fortunately they were not able to juggle, so Dave and Caleb still have job security.

We fed the elephants after the show

and then it was time for an ox cart ride

past some lovely rice fields

on our way to the elephant platform, where we were loaded on to the back of two elephants

and made our way down the trail.

Caleb and Dave were on a big male elephant (lets call him “Jumbo”)

while Anna and Meta rode a smaller female (let’s call her “Bitsy”)

the ride was comfortable, although a little shaky (see video of elephant ride ) and eventually we got down to the river, where the elephants went in for a dip.

It turned out that Jumbo was a bit ornery – when we came to the stands selling bananas for feed, he would reach into the buckets and steal bananas. He got a pretty sound thrashing for this behaviour (from the manhout), but clearly he like the bananas more than he minded the manhout’s stick.

Next it was on to the river on a bamboo raft

which Anna had the chance to pilot

As if all that was not enough for one day, we headed north by car for a visit to a Hill tribe, known as the Long Neck People. We are not sure where their name came from, but perhaps someone will figure it out and let us know…

The Karen Long Neck Tribe come from Myanmar (Burma) and are one of several indegenous people who live in Northern Thailand. They place bands around the neck of women, starting at a young age, to lengthen their necks. The longer the neck the more beauty they are thought to have.

They make their living through weaving beautiful cloths.

We enjoyed our visit to these calm and quiet people and we were glad to know that the money that we contributed went to their welfare (they are refugees from Burma where they are often persecuted).

The ‘Do, Part Two

Dave had been getting tired of his roots showing on his platinum blond hair:

So it was time to do something about it. Bleaching constantly is expensive and the fumes are noxious. So he went the cheaper route of getting it buzzed off: