We spent the day at the ruins at Old Sukhothai, the first capitol of Siam. They are spectacular. The site is so large that you have to rent a bicycle to get around. Except for a palace and a modern monument to the first king of Siam, the ruins are all temples. It's not clear if there were also houses at one point in this portion of the city (there are plenty of grassy areas where other structures certainly were), or if this area was something of the "religious district" and the people lived elsewhere. In any case, the entire site is visually stunning. We nearly filled up the camera's entire memory card by 2:30. I'll post a couple below, but the Sukhothai gallery has more.
Carrie: I also wanted to note that I had my first run in with a squat toilet. Though its entirely possible to get by without using one, its part of the Thai experience. First off I had to pay 3 baht to use it. Approximately one penny. I don't know if its more ridiculous that one has to pay, or that one has to pay mere penny's worth.
The stalls are normal, with the little slide to lock the door behind you. And the toilet sits a few feet off the ground. It's got grippy parts on either side of the hole. In fact there could be a really neat abstract picture juxtaposing a squat toilet with a dinner plate on a placemat. Visually they're about the same size and you put your feet where the silverware goes.
Tanja told me you're supposed to face the back wall, but years of conditioning made me face toward the door. Maybe that's why it felt like my feet were WAY too far apart. There is no flush mechanism, which I wasn't prepared for. I kept examining all sides of the "bowl" and glancing suspiciously at the bucket of water with the floating tupperware bowl in it. No way I was gonna touch that filthy thing. In the end I left without flushing at all. There was no soap at the sink either.
The buses that run out to the ruins are more like modified flat-bed trucks:
After some food and shopping (for ourselves, for once!), we started looking for the bus home. We were told that the last buses depart at 5pm, and it was about 4:40, so we started walking along the road where they travel so that we could look in shops while waiting for the bus.
After about 15 minutes of walking and not seeing a bus, we started to get mildly concerned. Right after we passed the area with shops, we saw an extended-cab truck 100 feet ahead backing up in the road (yes, in the road, not the shoulder...but this is par for the course in Thailand). We had no reason to think that this had anything to do with us, so we kept our easy pace in his direction while he went backward in ours. When we met, he rolled down his window, asked where we were headed, and told us to hop in.
[E: OK, Mom, I know that right now you're yelling at the screen "you didn't get in, right?!" Remember, though, that Thailand is home to the nicest people on earth and that the list of things we have been given by gracious Thais includes: a bag of oranges, dinner complete with soup and a cold salad dish, two Buddha pendants, two bracelets, bottomless glasses of Coke and whisky, and a Christmas present (which, oddly, turned out to be a hand-towel, albeit a quite nice brand new one). Getting a free ride didn't seem out of the ordinary whatsoever. We never thought twice about hopping in.]
After we got in, he introduced himself as Samart, a mechanical engineer working in Bangkok; his title, according to his business card, is "chief senior engineer for product development," although he didn't look a day over 25. We talked a bit about our travels and why he was in Sukhothai. Turns out that this is his hometown and that his wife still works here.
(Carrie: I would like to interject here, that up until this point Eric and I have been bad mouthing Sukhothai, dirty and industrial and bleh, certainly no Chiang Dao. But as soon as Samart spoke so proudly about his city, we started chiming in with how fantastic it was. And with sincerity. It's hard to dislike the place when it clearly means much to him.)
We asked him if he could suggest a good restaurant, and he showed us a place owned by a friend of his, which is located right by our guesthouse. He even hopped out of his truck to tell his friend that we would be coming in tonight, then backtracked to take us back to the guesthouse. That's when he gave us his card, wrote his personal phone number on the back, and told us to call him if we need anything.
We just can't believe how nice people are here. It's great.
Carrie: We did end up eating there, and while the food was excellent, we were the only ones in the restaurant. Two girls watched the Disney channel while their grandfather watched a soccer game with headphones on. The very sweet grandmother noticed that I was all paranoid about mosquitoes (65 is plenty thank you) and she brought over a smoking "mosquito coil" to keep them away. All without speaking. It was very sweet.
