What goes up must come down!

Mandy: Friday 14th November

Hairpin bends and second hand flatulance on the way back down from Pai to Chiang Mai.

Well that was three hours I look forward to forgetting in my old age! I told you that I had read that the road to Pai had 762 “curves” well that was misleading! they are hairpin bends! Steep hairpin bends! Many of which are on the edge of the mountain side and the minivan goes a lot faster on the way down than on the way up as you can imagine!

We all took our seats and looked sadly out of the window as we left the valley and made our way up towards the mountains. No one really wanted to leave Pai.

There was a young Chinese guy sat behind me singing along (badly) to his iPod, invading our personal space I thought to myself as I watched the driver go around another hairpin bend just about keeping all four wheels on the ground! But now, half way through our journey I think he is a dream travel companion compared to the fellow passenger in front of me who has continually filled the air with a nasty smell! I could use the ladylike word of ‘breaking wind’ but I don’t think it would quite set the scene. I cannot believe he (I hope it’s a he!) continually finds it acceptable to fart in such a small space which twelve or so other people are sharing for such a long time! – 1) it’s not good for people to smell this when they are already feeling nauseous from the motion sickness of the twisting steep roads and – 2) and most importantly; in a continent that does not have a word for constipation in their language (not sure if that’s true!) or a need for a laxative therefore, it is a very dangerous thing to do I would say!!!! I think he must have tried one of those three week old duck embryos in the street market last night! Or maybe one of those dried, flattened squid!

The further we drive from Pai the more I think about the wonderful time we had there.

As we waited for the sunset at the White Buddha on the hill we heard the call to prayer from the mosque in the valley below. Then the banging of a gong by the Buddhist monks below in the Temple of Wat Phra That Mae Yen. It was a beautiful view and relaxing sounds filled the totally still air. The monks we have seen here are old… Pai seems to be a retirement village for monks. We didn’t see any young monks here.

When the monks collect their food from people around the villages and towns in Asia it’s called Morning Alms. We have seen monks over the last month walking around collecting food ‘door to door’ early in the morning carrying these containers.

It reminded me that in Marshfield there is a building called The Almshouses. I had never thought of the meaning of the word ‘Alms’ before. Marshfield’s Almshouses were built in 1612 for the use of eight elderly villagers by the two sons of Marshfield, Nicholas and Ellis Crispe, who had gone to London and made their fortunes largely through the West Indies trade. Originally they endowed the houses with funds to provide a free residence, garden, and £11 yearly. A way to give back something to the community much the same way as people give food to monks I guess.

The food in Pai was very good. There were Muslim women serving the best chilli nuts we have ever had. Indian men selling us the best samosas and deep fried bread strips for breakfast. There was a diverse mix of religions living side by side in Pai. We used to ride down early in the morning to buy our breakfast from the locals on the street stalls. One morning we tried the Chinese congee being served for breakfast. Now I love fresh ginger, chillis and spring onions, in fact we cook with them most nights at home, however I really don’t need them in my rice porridge for breakfast! Along with a hard boiled egg, pork and herbs!

As we sat eating the congee the locals would come out in their pj’s and sit and eat the congee at these plastic tables or take it away in a plastic bag. Such a different way of life than in the UK. Glen isn’t looking his usual happy self as a bird had just pooped on his arm…luckily missing his congee though. (chuckle) You have to put up with these things if you choose to sit in the street under a tree.

Back to the sunset…….As I looked down at the people sat on the steps all looking towards the mountains as the sun slipped behind, it put me in mind of that film ‘Close encounters’ it was as if we were all waiting for something to happen, something to arrive.

I said yesterday that there were no weird characters in Pai apart from the Jack Sparrow guy…. There were a lot of different people there which was interesting. Rastafarians, musicians, artists……Chinese newly weds! But I forgot about the painted statue guy…….. Every evening he would be stood in the street, starting off head to foot painted in a plain colour, some times pink, sometime blue or peach and would stand there perfectly still with a selection of paints and brushes by his feet and as the evening went on he would have all sorts of things and names painted on him. He remained perfectly still. Can’t believe he wasn’t ticklish.

There were alsorts of people in Pai but no old white single men with Thai ‘neices’ in tow like in Chiang Mai, I’m glad to say.

We hired a motorbike for eight days and as we rode around visiting waterfalls and enjoying the countryside we realised that although it was burning hot in the sun the air was cool. As we rode past trees and their shadows it was like diving through a thermocline, which gave us some respite from the sun.

When we were in Bangkok we visited a museum and saw a display of barbaric weaponry. I am not sure why there was a need to physically hurt your enemy in Asia; most often neighbouring countries. All they needed to do was cut off their mole hairs for instance. Those long hairs which I have mentioned previously in Vietnam and recently in the Pai blog. The hairs I have since read are considered good luck and so to cut them off would mentally hurt your enemy surely. Job done!

Like I said in my last blog, we have met and spoken to lots of people here. An English girl and her father we travelled up in the minivan with for instance whose claim to fame as we found out, after bumping in to them over dinner one night, was that they are friends with the Euro million winners from 2012! the only thing I could come back with was the fact that my parents knew the Wiltshire guy whose Thai bride and family murdered him! Not sure it has quite the same impact.

We met another lovely couple who have invited us to stay with them in their country. Sadly they were not from Fiji (wink) just joking Kerstin and Nino (smile) we look forward to seeing you in Berlin next year. God if we keep adding countries to our itinerary we will never get back to the UK at this rate (wink!)

On previous blogs about my unhealthy interest in washing (and drying) in countries we visited last year I wrote of people I felt sorry for as they had their washing slung over trees to dry. Well I do not feel sorry for them anymore. I now realise that in such humid countries you need to put your washing out in full sun, wherever that means hanging it, otherwise it will never dry no matter how posh or big your clothes airer is! (Smile)

We didn’t mention the hot spring in Pai did we. Well seeing (or should I say feeling) is believing. The water was amazingly hot! I did think that perhaps the earth would open up at any minute and we would fall in to a cavern of molten lava as we stood next to it to be honest (there goes my annoying imagination again!)

The young Chinese women dress well when they travel and go on day trips, almost child-like. With big colourful bows on their heads and little innocent floral dresses, or very often white dresses and outfits you might expect them to go to a wedding in. They talk loudly like children do too, without any awareness of others or the time of day!! They ride motorbikes…badly! And they have bad flatulance as I have already established. But I do not mean to sound racist. I hate people who generalise. I am definitely not racist, although I have unfortunately come across a little like Prince Philip during the last month. Especially in the Guest House in Yangon. I didn’t mean to but the wrong things kept slipping out. Like when they continually gave the breakfasts to the wrong people around the communal tables I would hear myself say “we all look the same to them!” Glen was not impressed!

Life was simple in Pai. Wonderful food, beautiful scenery and a slow, trouble free pace of life. No hard sell from people in the shops and stalls here, no horn beeping, no shouting, no hassle. We will always remember too the huge butterflies, (at first it felt like we were staying in a butterfly farm, the sort they fill with humid air at Zoo’s and the like and have thick plastic strips at the doorways to keep the butterflies and humidity in) There were lizards of various colours and sizes, lovely red and violet dragonflies (which I fell in love with again) and then there were the slugs with spiky horns that hurt if you accidentally stepped on one in bare feet!!!!! (sorry Glen had to document that comment lol!)

So here we are, back in Chiang Mai again for one night …………..Did I tell you about the giant rat I saw going up the stairs in one of our favourite restaurants in the Chiang Mai when we were here last time? (Smile)

We noticed that the trees were littered with the Chinese lanterns that had come down after the festival!

P.s. Just got back from our meal in town having bumped into Luciano, the ‘free hugs’ man. We had an interesting conversation with him about his time in India, his accident and how people change once TV enters their life etc and then Glen went in for a hug (smile)