January 11, 2006
My New Year
New Year’s Eve was pretty…OK. After searching for something to do and people to hang out with for a day, I finally ended up at The THC Roof Top bar across from Tha Phae Gate where Chiang Mai’s organized festivities were held. It was a lot of fun running around and talking to different people, 99% were travelers or on short holidays, but I was bored and tired soon after midnight and headed home.
Marc and Daniel of Child’s Dream had a bit of excitement when they returned home New Year’s Day. They found my colleague Tai’s glass desk shattered, her papers all over the place and even some damage as far away as 2m from her desk. Apparently, some gun loving fools were shooting into the air and one bullet came down on the Child’s Dream house/office, penetrated the roof and smashed through Tai’s desk! It looked like a large bore rifle bullet to me, but I’m no expert on firearms.
Over the next few days I did some work for Child’s Dream, bought a new camera (a Canon EOS 350D) to replace the stolen Sony (DSC-T1), and walked around town learning how to use it. This is my first SLR camera and it is very cool. The only thing I don’t like about it is that I can’t afford it and had to charge it to my UBS Mastercard…where the balance will sit for several months. But, it’s really cool! The picture here is of a anti-Free Trade Agreement protest in Chiang Mai this week. I like how they organized the protest march at Tha Phae Gate across the road from Chiang Mai’s brand new Starbucks.
It’s a crazy world…
I’m off to Mae Sot on the 1145 direct A48 bus today to see the town again, visit friends, and hop across the border into Myawadi, Burma for a day trip.
Posted by stu at 03:53 AM | Comments (0)
December 27, 2005
In and out of Chiang Mai
My stay in Chiang Mai turned out to be short and eventful. First of all, Tai from Child’s Dream, offered me a free ride up to the border town of Mae Sai. That would mean quick and easy access to Burma, so I agreed to go along. Secondly, my beloved Sony DSC-T1 digital camera was nicked from my back while browsing the night market. That’s why there are no pictures on the last post. I spent my three days in Chiang Mai just catching up on emails and preparing for my trip north.
Posted by stu at 09:29 AM | Comments (0)
December 25, 2005
Flight back 'home' to Chiang Mai
Tuesday morning I took a negotiated 15,000 kip communal taxi truck ride alone to the Luang Prabang Airport to catch my US$80 10:10am Lao Airlines flight QV 637 to Chiang Mai. A tuk tuk would have been 10,000 kip, but I thought 15,000 kip was fair since it was a proper truck. Once at the airport the driver tried to pull the old “’Fifty’, not ‘fifteen’” scam on me. How many times does a traveler have to hear this kind of shit? How many give in? I was having none of it and angrily called him a thief on the spot, told him to piss off and walked away after leaving the agreed 15,000 kip on the rear bench of his truck. You’re not supposed to do that kind of stuff in Asia, getting rude and hostile, but the driver was blatantly trying to rip me off and my mood was less that relaxed about it. (Traveling under threat of scheduled departures does that to me at times.)
Once in the terminal I soon discovered that I was the first to arrive. So I sat down by the window, read the ever informative Vientiane Times, and stared out the window. My flight was late and soon the other Bangkok Airways Chiang Mai bound flight passengers were filing into the Gate 1 departure hall, including Jimbo. We spoke briefly but then my twin-turboprop plane finally pulled up. The mechanics started tinkering with engine number one on the ATR-72 which delayed things further. When we finally boarded the aircraft at 1100 this American woman in her fifties has conveniently placed her carry on bag in my foot space on at seat 14B. (Those small 
regional turboprops have tiny carryon compartments.) I asked the flight attendant if the bag could be placed elsewhere in the cabin, which got the American woman incensed. “It’s only a short flight!” Maybe I’m not the perfect gentleman at times, but this bitch was being totally selfish, inconsiderate and presumptuous. She hadn’t even bothered to ask if it was OK with me to take up the space. Finally she offered to switch seats with me so that she could keep her precious bag near her, and I had my leg room for the hour and some minutes long flight. She clearly was not happy with me and didn’t even thank me later when I picked up her pen that she dropped. Grrrr… Oh, I should mentioned that she was pretentiously dressed in high-end traditional Western-Laotian fusion clothing, which made the situation just a bit more ridiculous.
The flight was pretty uneventful after all that drama but my window seat (14A) view was obscured by the increasing post-rainy season haze and fog. Soon we touched down in Chiang Mai and while taxing to the aircraft parking spot, the pilots shut down engine number one before we made it to the gate. That was a bit spooky as they had been tinkering with the same engine back in Luang Prabang. I jotted the tail number (RDPL-34137) down and will be curious if there is some fatal accident in the near future. I can be morbid that way.
Once I cleared immigrations, grabbed my rucksack, and breezed through customs I was fortunate enough to stop a tuk tuk making a drop off as soon as I made curb side. Showing him my Child’s Dream ID card with the address in Thai seemed to kill any potential desire in him to take the silly farang for an expensive ride and he offered me a reasonable 70 Baht (less than US$2) fare to the Child’s Dream HQ office on Patan Road near the ‘super highway’. Groovy.
All is good, and it is great to be back in Chiang Mai. It is almost like coming home. Pamela is letting me stay in the spare room at her flat near Chiang Mai University, which is very kind of her.
Posted by stu at 09:17 AM | Comments (0)
October 16, 2005
Saturday Night Fever
Saturday was a big Child’s Dream night out: Mark, Daniel, Ursula (CD’s Treasurer from Zurich), Heidi, Pamela, Gene (Pam’s visiting American friend) and I all went out in the Child’s Dream VW Bus for a nice Thai dinner at Baan Raai.
Afterwards, we headed for our favorite starting point, SanS-O’s which was very crowded with farangs. We quickly made our way to Warm Up where we ordered our first liter of Piper 100 whiskey and chatted about all sorts of stuff. After two or three rounds of drinks it was time to hit Rodeo, a wild club that has live cover music by the house band and singer acts until about midnight when then the tunage switched to a respectable ‘90s and later dance stuff. When the music switched, “the Golden Girls” (as a friend of Marc’s remarked) Heidi and Ursula went home with the rest of us staying on in full party mode. Rodeo’s cliental is very interesting. There were two other farang guys there (separately, apparently), our little mixed group, and the rest were local Thais. The fascinating aspect was the broad spectrum of masculinity to femininity in the guys and the shear number of katoeys in various states of transformation—-all getting crazy. This one katoey with big, fake breasts was dancing on a table and showing off her silicon wonders to the crowd with pure joy. At 2am, the end of legal drinking in Thailand, the club closed up so we headed of for a small, illegal karaoke joint called Relax. We were finishing off our second bottle of Piper 100 by then and really started to get sleepy about 4am. Time for bed.
Posted by stu at 04:20 AM | Comments (0)
October 09, 2005
Veloland Thailand
So we’ve decided to start from scratch regarding Pamela’s scooter lessons. Saturday afternoon, after the Terry Fox stroll-a-thon early that morning, we met at my guesthouse and found a bicycle rental-and-clothing tailor shop that let Pam a small mountain bike at 20 Baht (US$0.50) for two hours. We then walked the bike to the back sois of the new town just south of Tha Pae Gate Road. After our first twenty meters or so some Western guy walked by and clapped in admiration of either Pam (for learning how to ride a bicycle) or me (for having the resolve to teach a grown woman such a task.) Within ten minutes she was riding by almost confidently herself, proving the old saying “once you learn how to ride a bike you never forget”. 
Twenty some minutes later we took a review break and had some coffee, juice and a cake at the very Germanic Bake & Bite Bakery on Loi Kroh Road. Thinking Pam was fully in control, and more importantly that my latte needed my attention more than she did, we agreed that she should set off around the block by herself. After about fifteen minutes I became worried and stepped outside to wait for her. Five minutes later a torrential downpour started and I became a bit more panicked. A few minutes there after and I grabbed a tuk-tuk to drive around the neighborhood looking for Pamela—unfortunately, he did not speak much English and we had to stop and ask a ladyboy buying some food at a concession stand for translation help. A full trip through the ‘hood saw us back at the bakery where we found Pam. Whew—another trip to the Lanna Hospital Emergency Room was averted!
So, we head of in search of a few beers to debrief and organize her next steps. The plan now is to get her out on a long bike journey (2 hours or so) at some speed (20kph.) I’m thinking then we’ll move onto a scooter, but something more like a 50cc model rather than the 125cc we started out with.
Cross your fingers.
Posted by stu at 01:55 PM | Comments (2)
Terry Fox Walkathon
Saturday morning, bright and early, Pamela, Heidi and I head for the 2005 Chiang Mai Terry Fox 10k Marathon/ 2.5k walk. For 200 Baht we entered the ‘race’, got a free T-Shirt and were potential winners of some enticing raffle prizes. Heidi quickly half forgot about us as she met up with some Swiss friends. That left Pam and I to stand about waiting for the start of the race watching people do calisthenics. 
At one point a young girl from approached and interviewed the three of us for a public radio station in Canada. Some how I don’t think our less than enthusiastic responses from an American, a Swiss and a Singaporean are going to make the cut.
So, after what seemed like ages, the 10k race got underway. Very shortly after our walk-a-thon starts. Pam reminds me of the story she tells of her first and only marathon experience: the trailing ambulance picked her up saying that they could not follow her any longer as they needed to finish things up. This would later turn out to be very close to the truth for our walk—Pam and I were the very last two people to finish the walk, sans the five children holding up a Terry Fox banner and the ambulance. The leading contestants in the 10k run actually finished before we did! 
Whatever. It was for charity and we have the T-Shirts to prove it.
And the Canadian ambassador was there!
Posted by stu at 08:08 AM | Comments (0)
October 05, 2005
Emergency Room Visit
My new colleague Pamela asked me to teach her how to do 360s and double cart wheel jumps on the ever popular scooter. The first day she was ready for lessons, Pam was wearing a slinky dress and flip flops—not exactly stunt girl material. So the next day, with Pam dressed more appropriately in her best NGO outfit, we had our first lesson. Thinking it would pretty straight forward, as Pam is a sophisticated, knowledgeable, and confidant woman, we set out during our lunch break for the unused (because of some likely corruption plagued construction) portion of the Lampang Super Highway just north of Chiang Mai near our office. The plan was to keep it simple. Pamela was to stick to just a few controls: the steering, throttle, and brakes. After confirming her helmet was secure I gave Pam the thumbs up to mount the bike.
Before even grabbing both handlebars, before getting her bum on the bike...she injured her self.
Pam was mounting the scooter from the right side when her left leg pressed into the burning hot muffler. She yelped, quickly stepped back and then touched the newly inflicted wound with her finger. The skin slid away like the frost on the side of a newly poured beer in an ice cold mug. Truly, one of the most revolting sights I have ever seen. After conferring with each other, we headed back to the office for the sure-to-exist, later to-be-disappointed-in first aid kit and advice of our workmates. The first aid kit was old, dirty and mildly incomplete. For the most part our coworkers were unconcerned. Daniel even showed us his several year muffler burn old scar that was still visible. We all agreed that the wound needed cleansing so Pam washed it down in the shower and I poured Iodine on it and then placed some gauze pads on it secured by three different sizes of Band-Aids. It was then I noticed how large it was and suggested that we make for the hospital. Against the rest of our team mates advice, we sought professional help.
As we pulled in I realized that it was only 500m from where the burn actually occurred. Pam registered with the Lanna hospital, who knew her from a previous visit--they even gave her a hospital ID card in anticipation of seeing her again. We waited for a few minutes and they took her vitals—blood pressure and weight. Pam asked me very quickly to step up and see if I though the scale was reading a few kilos too high. "Oh, yea, it seems to be reading two kilos too high" I say. "I was thinking it was more like three kilos" she replies. I keep forgetting never, ever discuss body weight with women. Never.
Next we waited in the Emergency Room waiting area for a short time before being summand into the actual ER by a nice doctor. Pam recites the story of her injury with a few technical interjections by my self (I am, after all, the first responder…making me more qualified than Dan Brown to lead FEMA me thinks.)
A nurse cleans the wound, the doctor inspects it, and then Pam is wrapped up in new bandages. The doctor points to a nasty scab on her knee, which was injured a few weeks ago during a fall down some stairs in Egypt, asking about how that is going. The scab is sort of a light moldy green color but Pamela says "oh, just fine."
Pam then introduced her swollen ankle and inquires about its seemingly slow healing process. "Don’t worry, it will be fine soon" the doctor says.
Out we go, after much thanks, to the pharmacy/payment seating lounge. Fortunately, we move through there very quickly. After exited the hospital, we realized that our moped was gone! "Theft!" was our first though…but apparently I parked the scooter in the wrong place and the coppers moved it. Whew...glad we didn’t have to explain that to Marc and David back at Child’s Dream, who loaned me the bike.
After only about two hours we get back to the office, have lunch, and recite the hospital story to everyone. Laughing all around, everything is OK. But now Pam gets serious about starting her lessons again in the evening--got to give her credit her.
So at about 1830 we head back out for the Super Highway construction zone and restart the instructions. Trying to keep it simple for her, the bike is in second gear (hard to get a jerky start) and we focus on just a straight journey. I’ve got my camera out ready for some funny pictures and was thinking it would be sort of care free. Ooops…I’ve completely misjudged the situation. For a moment it was almost inevitable that she would plow quickly into the curb and sparsley vegetated dirt mound behind it. At the end of our 15 minute lesson, I’m pushing Pam on the scooter (engine off) with the idea of getting her comfortable (at a minimum) with the steering and rear brake. (Note the bandages on Pam's leg.)
No go.
Pamela then suggests that we try to start the lessons off with a bicycle. I think training wheels are going to be difficult to find here. Seriously! There are 7 year old children zooming about on scooters here! Slight burn induced emergency room visits are not the norm in Chiang Mai, let alone training wheels on bicycles and mopeds!
Anyway, we head of to review the day’s events at a bar near Pam’s flat called SanS’ O which we both like—outdoor deck area, great view, and nice staff. Pamela seriously wants to continue so I’ll be there to help...and report the likely follies.
Tune in next time!
Posted by stu at 08:21 AM | Comments (3)
October 03, 2005
Child's Dream
So far, so good with respect to working with Child’s Dream—the NGO that was a big part of my motivation for this trip. After a week of getting to know my new colleagues/friends Marc and Daniel (founders), Heidi, Tai, and Pam things are going really smoothly. Specifically, I’ve been able to actively and positively contribute something (which is really important to me), we all get along well enough, and everyone has helped me keep a varied diet for lunch. (Bad joke: I've had the same damn thing for six days in a row.) The team is also highly motivated and focused yet easy going and relaxed. Six/eight weeks are probably not going to be enough.
For the most part, we get about town on mopeds (first choice), tuktuks (second choice amonsts us volunteers) and as a last resort CD’s 1970 VW Bus. While taking pictures of the flooding near the office Tai, Heidi and I met on the road.
Helmets are madatory and if you are caught without one (as a Westerner) you are subject to a 'fine'. TBT500 seems about middle of the road (pun...ha ha) but if you know a bit of Thai then TBT100 would be reasonable. If you an arrogant prick (E.g.: injure teh cop's face) about it all, then you could expect TBT1000 or even a trip to jail.
Posted by stu at 02:50 PM | Comments (0)
October 02, 2005
Floods and Fools
So we have had some flooding over the past few days. We got warning of them Wednesday, saw the sandbags go up and water rising sharply with some flooding Thursday, full on flooding Thursday and Friday, and receding waters Saturday and Sunday. In the picture gallery there are many photos. Friday night I ventured out to the Night Bazaar area of town near my hotel. It was still as much as 1m underwater. For the most part people were in good spirits and very cheerful. These merry lads were walking down the main Night Bazaar drag.
Saturday I stayed away, but Sunday morning seemed like a great time to check out how things were going. So after heading down towards the flower, etc. market along the River Ping I was stopped by a big pool of water just north of the Iron Bridge. Many cars, trucks and mopeds were going through the water so it seemed safe to do so myself. Ooops. Halfway towards dry land my Honda died in about 25cm of water. After pushing it the rest of the way, trying to let it dry out, and attempting to start it back up I was getting desperate. That is when people started to help out.
Within 30 minutes there were maybe five people inspecting and tinkering with my moped. Within 45 minutes there were over a dozen folks, including a traffic police man, working on my bike in the middle of the street—only one of which spoke English. Finally, after over an hour and a new spark plug, I was on my way…of course following deep bows and “thank you”s from myself. Some day I’ll figure out how to pronounce it properly in Thai.
Moral of the story: 1) Thai people are really nice-n-helpful and 2) one should never drive their scooter through deep water if they don’t know how to fix it.
Posted by stu at 02:25 PM | Comments (1)
September 28, 2005
You will be assimilated
This here is the World Famous Chiang Mai Night Bazaar. (Nothing to do with Infinity Broadcasting, mind you.) Here I’ve picked up some TBT200 Teva knock-offs, a really nice and cheap TBT170 cotton shirt, some cute outfits (TBT200 and TBT280) for my groovy nieces, a Thai SIM card for my phone (TBT200) and this picture of the Starbucks invasion. Sadly, it is a very popular place.
Posted by stu at 03:25 PM | Comments (2)
Past few days in Chiang Mai
Over the past few days I've been getting into the Chiang Mai commuting scene. This bike here is my transport to/from work and about town. The first day was quite hair raising—the controls of the bike are a bit awkward, my knowledge of the streets of Chiang Mai were limited to what was visible while driving on a tourist map, and the totally new rules of the road that need fast learning.
Firstly, the bike is an old Honda Econo Power moped with a semi-manual gear box. (I like to call it ‘Tiptronic’, just like Porsches have.) It’s got some power, the brakes work, but the idle is a bit too low and the engine stalls at traffic lights every now and then. There is a front basket which I used to put my backpack while riding, but now my paranoia of theft has killed that.
Chiang Mai is an old ass fucking city. Over the past few several years the population, people’s economic buying power, and of course traffic have all boomed. My impression is that the authorities have since converted many streets to one way fairways to help things out. Many streets. This means traversing twice the distance theoretically necessary, forced going directions you don’t want to go, and getting lost frequently. But, hey, it’s all good!
Traffic behavior is pretty interesting. Physical, government-defined rules are pretty much considered ‘advisory’ by most drivers. This includes lanes, passing rules, stop signs, and traffic lights. That said, there is an unwritten, generally courteous order to the flow of traffic. As fast as you can is not the rule, but the exception. Bigger doesn’t not result in automatic right of way. Any significant open space between you and the vehicle in front is soon filled from behind and the sides. Horns are only used when someone behind you thinks you are wasting the opportunity to go faster and be more courteous of other drivers by pulling to the side so they can get through.
All this does not seem to make it really dangerous, per se. But other habits do—such as families of three, four and even five all riding a single scooter; talking on mobile phones, holding umbrellas with one hand, and the occasional sneaky habit of driving against traffic if it is convenient.
Posted by stu at 02:36 PM | Comments (0)
September 25, 2005
Checking things out
Today was spent checking out the general area near my guest house know as 'the new city'. Stop one my walkabout was a little used and new book store on Chaiyapoom Road. The first thing I noticed was that they had a full page dedicated to Naom Chomsky! Cool, huh?
After picking up two books, a forgettable SciFi book and some non-fiction on aircraft safety, I headed back to the hotel for a splash in the pool, a few chapters of reading, lunch and a nice nap. Once up again it was time to buy a gadget to help get the pictures from my camera to my laptop. Then it was back to some walkabout fun down where the famous Chiang Mai Night Bazaar is. After a few hours and a 1L Beer Chang at a little tourist joint, it was time to head back for the hotel. Just after crossing Loikhor Road Lane 4 along Sri Donchai Road, I was startled by the collision of two mopeds just 2m behind me. A family of three, including a small 3-ish year-old child, hit the rear tire some woman turning left across traffic. I turned quickly enough to catch everyone tumbling off the mopeds. Fortunately they were all at low speed by the time they hit--nothing more serious that falling of a bar stool. The little girl started to cry after about five seconds but quickly gave up after she realized nobody was paying her any attention. Cwazy sheet, mon.
Posted by stu at 01:03 PM | Comments (3)
September 24, 2005
And on to Chiang Mai...
OK, after a fairly terrible journey north to Chiang Mai, I am finally settled in. Once I left Bangkok, my mobile phone went missing along with my LP Chiang Mai and Northern Thailand book, one of the CHF199 Meindi trekking shoes broke, and the train ride became quite tedious after six hours, painful after nine, and finally arrive an hour late after twelve hours of fretting. Stu, believe it or, was super grumpy by the time he made it to CM. Blah.
Once arriving, it was off to the first guest house that would have me--The Royal Guest House. This has turned out to be an unexpected uplift to my fortunes. While the TBT250/night room is very basic (no air conditioning, five flights up with no elevator) the rest of the premises is great. The food is good and cheap (TBT110 for coffee, OJ, and a bowl of fruit, yogurt and muesli. Yummy! There is also a little pool out front of the open air reception area/bar/restaurant. Oh, and the beer is only TBT40 each--or just about USD0.97. Life is good.
Today I met up with Marc and Daniel from Child's Dream for some coffee and to drop off the 8KG of goodies from Switzerland that have been weighing down my pack: two Compaq laptops, three tubes of Tomi mustard and a single tube of Tomi Mayonnaise. We also discussed the logistics of my stay which seems good so far, chatted about Thailand, Hong Kong, Singapore, Swiss people in Thai jails (lots) and the general drug problem in this part of the world. They also promised to loan me a motor bike for getting about town and a old Nokia phone. :D
Tomorrow I hope to explore the city...more to come.
Posted by stu at 02:12 PM | Comments (0)