11/09/08 9:31pm / 7:31am US
We started off the day with a two hour drive to Doi Inthanon National Park which is the highest point in Thailand. Naturally Felicia fell asleep after driving for 20 minutes. On top of the summit is a military satelite station and the usual gift shops. The second coolest thing up here besides the view was a "No Pissing" sign showing a stick figure man with dribble dots coming from "you know where". I should have taken a picture!
After the summit, we headed down the road to see the King's and Queen's temples which look to have been recently constructed. We thoroughly enjoyed the escalator (which are intended for elderly and children) rides up to each pagoda. Again the views from here were spectacular.
Off to lunch in some side restaurant where we had some deep fried fish, local veggies (forest veggies, which looked green and had swirly vines), omelette stuffed with pork. The funniest part of lunch was our driver performing magic tricks, and matchbox games. He also tried to have Felicia shoot rubber bands at the matchboxes where all her shots ended up in the rain forest. We then stopped at the Hmong market where we tried lots of different dried fruits: kiwi, cherries (red, green, yellow), plums, longan, & strawberries. We ended up getting dried kiwis and dried plums.
After the pit stop, we then visited one of the royal projects (a government sponsored project where the king and queen give the seeds, tools, and other equipment to the hilltribe so they can sustain themselves) which was a beautiful landscape consisting of many flowers, vegetables, ponds and fish. These grounds are maintained, but never sold for profit.
It was now off to our village bungalow with a 2 hour jungle trek. This was a lot easier than our other trek. On our way down, we encountered some little kids hauling bags of fruits and veggies on their backs. They learn to work early out here. After about 20 minutes of hiking down, we ran into a bunch of teenage boys that looked drunk. One particular guy looked really drunk and kept offering us their BBQ to eat. After many "no thanks", we got the hell away. They seemed like trouble to us. I just kept looking back to make sure they weren't following us. On our way, we reached some cool bamboo covering. It felt like a roof of a house to Felicia. To me, I was wondering "why is this trail covered? Is this some kind of camouflage to cover a drug smuggling operation?" After several waterfalls and bamboo bridges, we ended up in the rice fields. Both me and Felicia had the feeling our guide was lost as he kept stopping and looking / surveying the land. Sure enough, we're headed the wrong direction and start back-tracking. At least he realized sooner rather than later. "We missed the intersection" according to Phong. WHAT INTERSECTION???? Where's Bear Grylls when you need him.
We finally reached town and there's so many piggies and doggies! The Karen village here is a lot more modern and "rich" than the other villages that we've visited. There are 400 people here and they get donations from Christian missionaries, including irrigation system. Off we go to our private bamboo bungalow by the river. Eh, it's not very nice compared to the Lisu one. This one slants downwards toward the river and it feels more dirty to me. At least we have a Western toilet but, to take a shower, we have to use an indoor hose. I decided to shower after the trek and it was FREEZING cold! Plus I didn't have a towel so had to use my dirty clothes to dry off. I told Felicia, "Don't bother. Just use your Dove wipes!" By that time it was about 60 degrees and we could already feel the chill in the air.
Phong hung out with us before dinner and he told us about trekking in Thailand and seeing tiger claws on trees. He also said that he wanted to visit abroad, but all countries want to see how much money each Thai traveler has to make sure that they return to Thailand and not stay in the new country (they have to have at least 100,000 Thai baht in their accounts).
Dinner was outdoors and it was really, really cold (about 50 degrees). We ate as fast as we could but the food got cold fast. The tom yum soup was super spicy! We got a taste for Thai spiciness finally. We each had 2 bowls cuz Phong couldn't eat it since it was so spicy! Then cats kept coming up to us and we fed them our fish bones. I guess they don't have spicy taste buds cuz they ate it all up... bones & all.
After dinner, Phong and Samyuet hung out with us for about 2 hours. Oh yeah, I had on a fleece pullover, a long-sleeved T-shirt over a short-sleeve T-shirt, wool socks, and a cap to keep warm. Felicia had on a t-shirt, hoodie, zip-up jacket with a hood, and wool socks... and she had both hoods on. It was still cold! But we had a great time picnicking outside: we had corn puffs with cinnamon, shrimp chips, and wild bananas and just talked with them all night. Amazing how we had many things in common: they listened to some American music and watched movies (Jet Li, Arnold Schwarzenneger, James Bond, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings for them and "The Protector", a Thai movie, for us). We even found out that Samyuet "met" Rambo - they were taping Rambo IV out here and Sylvester Stallone opened Samyuet's van by accident, thinking it was his van. His rep then told him that he was supposed to use an Air Force one. Cool story! Also, seems like Samyuet is a big Rambo fan - he was able to tell us all the storylines of all the Rambo movies. The funniest one of the night was that we found out that, when Samyuet goes to southern Thailand, he doesn't know anyone down there and gets bored. So he buys postcards, writes a message, and then sends it to himself!! LOL His wife sometimes sees them and gets angry at him. Now we'll have to send him one from the States so he won't be receiving cards only from himself. Oh yeah, and sometimes he forgets that he sent himself a card and, when he gets one, he wonders, "who's sending me a card?" And then he realizes that it's from him.
Time for bed. And "bed" is a flat mattress with dirty sheets and pillowcases. And no mosquito net. Not a good thing! I shook out the blankets cuz Felicia was worried about bugs on them. We decided not to use the pillows cuz they looked gross. We sprayed ourselved down with mosquito repellent and covered every inch of skin up the best we could: we pulled our wool socks over our pants to keep bugs from crawling up our legs; I used clean socks as hand mitts; Felicia put on both her hoods and pulled her jacket sleeves over her hands.
Then off to bed and it was FREAKING cold! We had 2 layers of blankets - not enough. We needed a down comforter, flannel sheets, flannel pjs, and a space heater! We tried to huddle together like Bear said to do... didn't work! We still felt the chill cuz the wind came through the cracks in the hut and the space at the roof. Needless to say, it was rough night.
Monday, November 11 7:00 pm Thailand / 5:00 am US
We woke up at 6 am even though we were to leave at 8am. We wanted to get the hell back to our warm hotel! We had a nice hot breakfast at a nearby restaurant, trekked for 30 minutes to a HUGE waterfall (definitely worth it even though we were sleepy), and then a buffet lunch. Felicia was sleeping for most of the way back after Samyuet took out his American love songs CD. Phong offered to stop at several markets but we said no. Too tired.
Once we re-checked in to our hotel, we took a HOT shower and used a nice, clean Western bathroom with toilet paper and soap. Felt so good! Then Felicia took another 2-hour nap and I slept for an hour. So here we are - typing at the Internet cafe and killing time before we go to a Khantoke dinner (traditional Northen Thai food with traditional Thai dancing).
Tomorrow is Thai cooking class! We get to go to the markets to buy ingredients and then learn to cook 6 dishes. Hopefully, we don't food poison ourselves cuz we've been good so far. That would suck.
