Chiang Mai (part sorng)

Wow! What a couple of days! Chiang Mai is reputed to be one of those places that backpackers/travelers will find themselves staying in for longer than they expected. We were no exception at all to this rule. Chiang Mai is fantastic. Slightly bigger than we expected, but we would say Raleigh-ish in it's healthy cross between availability of everything you could ask for and lack of big-city feel.

We spent a few more days here and got ourselves in to some great adventures along the way.

First, we decided to splurge on a cooking class (liza, you would have loved it!!). It was an all day affair, and began with us being hustled in to the back of a pickup truck with 8 other sleepy looking westerners. Once everyone was gathered up from their various guesthouses we headed off to the market. Our guide gave us a full lesson on all the various ingredients we'd be using for the day (there are 4 types of basil used in cooking, did you know that?) and then set us free to explore the market on our own for a few minutes while he did the day's shopping. A bag of dried kiwi, rolls of huge sausage and one dead rat later, it was time to go.

Back at the kitchen, we started cooking like crazy and didn't stop (except to get tipsy) until late afternoon. It was incredible to learn to cook all the dishes that we've been eating on our trip. We cooked and ate (I know we'll forget something): red curry, green curry, pad thai, coconut soup, HOT and sour soup (the guide was out to get miah on this one), tiger's tear chicken salad, holy basil stir fry, spicy glass noodle salad, spring rolls, sticky rice and baby coconut dessert and coconut milk with bananas. yummmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

To be honest, it's pretty hard not to make friends with the folks working around you in something like this - you're working side by side all day together, laughing at each others mistakes, and lending a hand here and there. So we got to know a few of the people in our cooking class, and decided to try to meet at the big loi kratong festival that was happening in chiang mai. [enter sinister theme music]. Little did we know the grave danger we put everyone in with that innocent gesture.

Loi Kratong is sort of like a war zone. with out the 'sort of'. Think of the fourth of july with about 25 times more adolescence fueling everyone's actions and no real control as to the 'variety' of fireworks sold and combusted. The advertisements for the festival show smiling people sending their Kratong (a little boat with flowers and your hopes for the year) down river, but the reality of the situation was more like Michelle and Leslie running to the riverside, trying not to lose a shoe in the mud to drop their boat as quickly as they could. All this to avoid the four year old that was throwing lit fire-works at their feet (much to his glee). It seemed as if the entire city had congregated on the riverside and everyone was trying to send off as many fireworks as possible in any direction they could find space. Part of their amusement must be watching the Westerners covering their heads and practically running for their lives. There were thousands of meter in diameter hot-air balloons that everyone was launching in to the sky that were so beautiful and filled the evening with what looked like a new set of stars... those that weren't shot down by bottle rockets. Michelle put it best, Loi Kratong is a PTSD nightmare. To anyone in our cooking class out there that tried to find us at the bridge and lost a limb in doing so, we're deeply sorry.

Don't get us wrong, though, death-defying excitement aside, Chiang Mai was a wonderful place, and we had a blast while we were there.

Hope everyone's well,
TeamWander