So a brief 18 hours after our outstanding welcome to Thailand, I was welcomed to travel by some sort of fantastic bug (personally thinking it was bacillus cereus if only because it was one of my favorites in first-year micro, and I definitely had reheated rice...
24 hours of glory, that you can ask me about - including a very embarrassing incident in the Bangkok airport on our way to Chiang Mai, again worth the story, probably not good fodder for online posting! I recooperated in our guest house, while Matt went exploring and in search of Gatorade. He visited some great Wats, and saw the Emerald buddha, and I half-opened my weary eyes to look at the pics.
Thankfully, I was recovered within 24 hours, and back to my old self (ie, eating the street food, that probably got me into trouble in the first palce). We enjoyed a day exploring Chiang Mai on our own, then a day of cooking school, where we learned 6 wonderful dishes...looking forward to sharing some tasty treats when we get home.
We met up with our friend, Chuck, Friday evening and a wonderful weekend with a personal tour guide began. I first met Chuck in 5th grade at Epiphany, when he was newly arrived in Seattle. Our paths crossed again in med school - both having taken several years off before heading back to school. Chuck has a fantastic fellowship in Chiang Mai, and has 10 months in Thailand conducting a few clinical research projects - the coolest of which involve working with people in Northern Thailand, improving their access to medical care. Having been in the region for 9 months, he was a fantastic host, taking us to amazing eateries in back alleys, where we tried Shan and Burmese food, as well as tradtionally Northern Thai cuisine. After a jam-packed weekend, we left Chuck, to get a little work done, and we headed on to Hanoi, Vietnam.
