Wat a Weekend!

It's 9 pm on Sunday evening, and we're in the office of the Angkoriana Hotel in Siem Reap (that's SEE-em REE-ip for you grammaticians in the audience) - Cambodia! Definitely never thought I'd find myself here. Internet is expensive here (well, $2/hour), so unfortunately this post will not provide the detail of our last two days in Chiang Mai. As it is, you're probably looking forward to a simple column and not another novel. :)

Friday - Trekking in Chiang Mai

We spent Friday on a day-long Trek through the countryside around Chiang Mai. We started with an hour drive to a small elephant camp, from which we rode for an hour up and down some hills. We sat in a makeshift bench, while our leader, a native Karen villager (more on this later), guided the elephant by sitting on its head and barking orders. The tribal language is very gutteral - the elephant knows to go by something like "hwwuuuuuaeeee!" They're remarkably agile animals - up and down with little trouble, making its way through mud, and so on. We got a chance to feed them bananas - the elephant swung its trunk over its head and pointed right at us, and we simply stuck a banana in its nostril! Ours was not too happy with us when we ran out, though; it snotted mud on us! Highlight of the elephant ride was the little baby elephant accompanying its mother and father through the walk. Baby animals are always, always cute!

We arrived then at the Karen village, and spent some time walking around meeting the villagers. Thailand does not have many indigineous tribal people left, but those that remain are concentrated largely in the north, mostly because they fled the wars in next-door Burma a number of years ago. It's fascinating to see how they live now: they still build their huts on stilts, speak their native tongue, and generally avoid mainstream Thai life. But they have electricity (not for a television or widespread lights, but for the fridge at the general store), coke and other common western items, and, of course, frequent contact with us obnoxious Western trekkers. Allie had read that the villagers enjoy receving things like candy, pens and paper (which they don't have), so we got a lot of smiles when we gave these things out to whomever we came across. It's a little shocking to see people still living this way in 2005, especially because, while we were there, we kept thinking about how we'd tell all of you about them on this newfangled Internet thingy.

We went from the Karen village to a beautiful little waterfall in the nearby national park, where we swam a little and relaxed, then hiked about 30 minutes to the Hmong village. These people are truly primitive. They sleep one family to a 8x8 space, and many families share one bamboo hut. They're still hunter-gatherers, with a little added income earned by selling their crafts to us visitors and at the urban Thai night bazaars. Compared to the Hmong, the Karens are technological gods - that's how unspoiled their way of life is.

The trek ended (after a light lunch) with a fun, pretty but uneventful ride on a bamboo raft down a nearby river. More interesting than that - and, as Allie says, the highlight of the day - was our interaction with the only other people trekking with us: a nice, newly married couple from Oman. Oman, for the geographically challenged, is on the Arabian peninsula, and is not known for its kindness for our, um, tribal ways. But these two were very friendly, and we spent a lot of time talking about Omani culture, differences with American culture, Islam, and relatons between the Islamic and Western worlds. Allie marveled at how the wife could hike and ride and operate in the heat while wearing a long skirt and a long-sleeved blouse, with a scarf on her head. At the end of the day, we traded e-mail addresses and agreed to send each other pictures. They invited us to visit in Oman (the husband is a marketing guru at a beach hotel), but I think that will have to wait...

Saturday - Exploring Chiang Mai

We finally slept in a little; we'd been waking up at absurd hours, from the jet lag. Being Saturday, Allie insisted that we go to temple. So that's what we did, Thai style of course. We visited Wat Phra Singh, which is known for another of the three "Sihing" Buddhas. We learned later that the Sihing Buddha represents the stage in the Buddha's life before he attained enlightenment. While at WPS, we experienced our first real monsoon; up until then, the rains had come only when we were safely inside. Sure enough, after waiting out a 15-20 minute deluge, it lightened up for the rest of the day. We had our mangosteens to keep us company. :) Oh, and we also were blessed with Buddhist holy water by a monk, who wished us "long life and happy." Can't argue with that!

The other wat (which means temple) we visited was my favorite yet: Wat Chedi Luang, which features a 600-year old broken chedi that stands some 60 meters high. Unlike a lot of the structures at other wats we'd seen, the chedi here was not adorned with gold or jewels; it was a simple yet beautifully elegant brick and stone structure. It was once 90 meters high, before an earthquake in 1545 toppled it to its current height. It is striking and gorgeous, a real piece of history. We just marveled at it, with its broken beauty. You'll see pictures later, and that'll help you understand just how spectacular the sight is. While at WCL, we got to talk for a while with a local monk, who taught us a bit about Buddhism and life as a monk. It was a nice way to sit for a bit and learn about everything we're seeing. Like many Thais, he was quite friendly and eager to practice his English.

We strolled slowly through Chiang Mai for the rest of the afternoon, finishing by walking through a local market where the Thais (and not so much the foreigners) shop. We bought more mangosteens, looked at various clothes (nothing exciting), and headed back, where we spent the rest of the evening. On our way, while passing by one of the cute galleries on our street, a shopkeeper offered us fresh fruit from her table, just because. The fruit here, by and large, really is delicious. Some we like more than others, but more than anything else it's fun to try all of these foods that we don't get back home.

At night, after Allie woke up at 11:15 pm, we headed back to the night market, only to find it closing down. She had time to successfully drive some hard bargains for a few pieces of jewelry (where'd she get those talents from?), and then we found a makeshift massage center still open. For 30 minutes, we were pampered once again - Allie got a foot massage and I got a standard neck and back massage. These people are magicians - and it was well worth the $3 we spent. :)

Sunday - Travellin'

Didn't have a chance to do anything today, unfortunately. Had just enough time in Chiang Mai to pack up and tell our hosts how much we loved their bed and breakfast. The feature of the day was the Mad Dash Through Bangkok Airport: our flight out of Chiang Mai was delayed an hour, mainly because they had only two check-in counters for énough people to nearly fill a 747. So we had just over an hour in Bangkok to get our checked luggage, run the distance between the domestic and international terminals, check in for our flight here, pay the departure tax, clear customs (how do you saÿ "this customs officer is a turtle" in Thai?), and run to our gate. Of course, it being Thailand, our flight wasn't leaving on time - news we would have appreciated, say, a half hour before. Ok, no biggie, so we exercised a bit and sweat a lot and we made it!

Haven't ventured out into Siem Reap tonight, because we want to be fresh for tomorrow. What little we saw, we noted that this isn't QUITE the place that Thailand is. There are lots of foreign tourists, but Cambodia is simply poorer than its neighbor. The airport is simple, the town seems simple, and the development is limited to supporting the tourism - that's about it. I imagine we'll find more of what we've seen once we get into the main drag (our hotel is a few blocks away), but we'll also probably find more differences that will make Cambodia unique on this trip.

So tomorrow we're off to the temples at Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom. We've hired a local guide, a former English teacher whose knowledge and services have been lauded on the many travellers' forums that we consulted while back home. She's super friendly, and has some fascinating stories of her own about life here under Vietnamese and Communist rule. She had to learn English in secret, then had to learn Russian to get a job as a teacher - just in time for Communism to fall. We're super excited to see the temples here; everything we've heard is that this is truly one of the most extraordinary historic sites in the world.

I can't promise that we'll write again from Cambodia, but we'll give it a shot if it's possible. At the latest, we'll check in Wednesday or Thursday from Bangkok, where we'll spend a day before moving onto Malaysia. Toodles! :)