Two Steps Forward...

Distance Traveled:   12,600 kms (BNE-MEL-SYD-BKK-PKT-BKK-CNX)

Flags Collected:   0
Time Difference: -3 hours (from Brisbane)

Soundtrack:   I have been getting into bad 80s stuff this week for some reason

Currently Inspired by:   Buddhist Monks.  Cool guys.  Did you know they can't eat anything that isn't served / offered to them by someone else? They are not allowed to pay attention to their bodily requirements by buying or preparing their own food.  I am yet to find one to feed, but am on the hunt!

Stacks:   Heaps of almosts. I nearly fell off my elephant, getting on. Slipped on the bamboo raft getting on AND off and got my shoes soaked and covered in mud (I may have to throw them out), and have tripped on uneven ground several times just walking around.  It's only a matter of time before I end up on my butt.

Words written:   1,532 (I know, I know, but it's hard!)

Well the floating markets outside of Bangkok were certainly an experience!  I loved them, despite the smelly canals, flooded homes along the way, flooded stalls, and tippy, low-sitting boats.  Totally different and surprisingly relaxing.  It's something I would recommend to any westerner traveling to Bangkok as a bit of an eye opener (and to get out of the city).  Try as hard as I might, I can't get my Western sensibilities around anyone actually CHOOSING to live along a canal.  It must contain some kind of appeal that was not immediately obvious.  To see all the photos in my Bangkok album including those of the floating markets, click here.  Unfortunately I was completely shopped out by this point, in terms of temper, finance and suitcase room, so I only bought one colourful Thai-style dress and some postcards :)  It doesn't take much for me to get over shopping really, given that I don't enjoy it... ever... Sometimes I feel like all there is to do in Thailand is buy crap at markets!!  Of course that's crazy.  There is a lot of stuff to do here, such as playing  "Dodge The Flooding", "Guess The Mystery Meat", "Say No Thank You To The Same Person As Many Different Ways As Possible", "Answer Intrusive Personal Questions", "Argue With Taxi Driver", and of course the ever entertaining and my personal favourite: "Conversations With Porcelain".

I hope you realise I am trying to be be funny.  I love it here, really.  Chiang Mai is definitely my favourite place so far, not in the least because it's the first place where I have felt that the people in the service industry haven't just been being surface polite and professional while actually being horribly resentful towards me (and all western travellers).  They are more genuinely cheerful and friendly.  I'm not being paranoid... my instincts are pretty good.  And I'm fairly certain that no matter how friendly I am or how much I tip everyone for so much as breathing in my general direction, I am no more to these people than a fat western "have" to their "have nots".

The elephant safari.  Wow.  Firstly let me say that anyone who tells you an elephant is a comfortable, expedient or in any way pleasant smelling mode of transportation is having you on.  But how unbelievably incredible they are.  Gentle.  And SMART!  I mean, I knew this already, but to actually see it up so close is one of the best experiences I have ever had.  It's ridiculous really.  For something like $75 AU (which is very dear for a tour here) you get picked up from your hotel, driven for about an hour to this indescribably beautiful training camp where you can feed them bananas and pat about 10 of the elephants for half an hour.  (Oh I forgot - first you stop off at an orchid farm and butterfly farm!)  Then you sit and watch the elephants file into the river with their mahouts and have a scrub and a bath.  For a short video of the bath, click here.  After that, you watch them do a show where they work in group to shift some logs around and pop them in really neat piles, then the mahouts drop their hats on the ground and the elephants pick them up and walk them over and put them back on their heads so gently!  Then one of them stands near an easel and they handed her paintbrushes one after the other, and she painted a tree with flowers and grass, as per the picture below.  I mean... WHAT?

For more pics of the elephants as well as the orchid and butterfly farms, click here.  You could buy an elephant painting for 600baht ($20) but I have way too much stuff and thought it would probably get wrecked anyway.  I have the picture of the pic!  SO, after the show, you then go up to this platform and climb onto your elephant.  As the group was uneven because I was on my own, I got my own elephant while everyone else had to share.  I was most grateful I didn't get squished up there with some stranger!  Also I was at the head of the column, so I got to blaze the trail, so to speak.  My elephant was the oldest and smartest, which made me feel like looking back at everyone and saying "Nyah, Nyah".  The first portion of the ride went for about an hour, along a ridge next to the river (it's incredible the tiny spaces in which they can manouevre!) and then down into the jungle, along a freshwater creek bed.  The canopy of trees above made the air look and smell incredibly green, and there were these tiny metallic dragonflies that glowed when they hit patches of sun, darting around like tiny blue fairies.  Honestly, it was like the enchanted garden or something.  Silent, but not oppressive at all.  I had to pinch myself several times, because my brain just kept looping "I'm riding an elephant through a jungle in Thailand" over and over.  We stopped then at a small village and chatted and bought some stuff from the locals before climbing back on and going back the way we came, which obviously took another hour. Click here to see a short video from the ride. Then (yes there was more to it!) we stopped for a delicious lunch of several traditional Thai dishes with rice, noodles and fresh fruit before jumping on a bamboo raft, and rafting gently down the river for about 45 minutes, seeing elephants along the banks all the way, before pulling up and getting back on our bus and coming back to the hotel.  For $75.  Isn't that ridiculous?  I was sooooo tired yesterday I couldn't write, so am going to make a herculean effort this afternoon after my massage.  I only have this kind of low desk and little piano stool so my knees are up around my ears and I get pins and needles in my feet from sitting too long.  I guess I am going to have to get used to writing in uncomfortable circumstances!!

I have been most fortunate in my timing as Bangkok was expected to get hit quite badly with floodwater today or tomorrow.  I have missed all of the flooding due to luck rather than skill, but the outcome is the same!  I was planning to spend a few days travelling south overland back to Bangkok but am not sure if this will be possible now.  Still investigating.

Til next we speak
*LOVE*
N