(I had this blog post written and finished a few days ago, but my Chromebook crashed and I lost everything. This is punishment for being a shtity travel partner who spends time blogging. But here we are - sorry for the delay.)
Toward the end of last week, we were beginning to feel some vacation fatigue. The temples were starting to blend together, we were feeling a little fluffy and, worst of all, Marisa was getting really sick of my jokes.
Our last day fixed all of that. From the period of noon to midnight, we:
Had gyoza for lunch
Had second lunch at a sushi train
Received a funky but effective Japanese massage from a man with what seemed like a sinus infection
Had dinner at that "modern kaiseki"
Had second dinner at the Izakaya we visited the night before
This final day was a microcosm of our full 10-day trip. Good drinks. Exciting culture. Kind people. Endless eating.
Leaving Marisa was tough. We travel really well together, and it's fun getting to explore a new place with someone who can (usually) deal with me and is equally into food. I am a big advocate for traveling with a partner early and often in a relationship. At least in my experience, we've always grown quite a lot during our time away, as it forces us into compromises and uncomfortable situations that we normally wouldn't face in our daily lives back home. She is and probably will forever be a better traveler than me, but it's fun to observe how in sync we can be while exploring a new place.
Our view from Giro Giro Hitoshina.
But now I'm with Steve.
My flight from Narita to Bangkok was 6.5 hours, about as long as it takes for me to fly from New York to Portland. When I arrived, I was met by a surprisingly nonexistent customs line. I barreled my way through the airport, picked up a mobile WiFi (had one in Japan as well; highly recommended), headed outside, immediately started sweating in the humidity and proceeded to catch a cab.
Now, I didn’t do much research before this trip, but I did read about how to deal with taxi drivers in Thailand. When you arrange for your ride, you’re supposed to kindly request “meter, please,” signifying that you want to pay by the meter, not by a negotiated price. Normally the drivers are cool with this, but some will give you a hard time. If that’s the case, you can ask to leave the car and grab a different cab.
So here I am, confident travel blogging guy, walking up to my cab driver and asking for the meter. He said yes, put my bag in the trunk, and then started the car. He did not, however, start the meter. We begin driving off and I ask again, “meter, please,” and he says “NOOOO 800 Baht.” I know this ride is supposed to cost in the vicinity of 400 Baht, so I again say “no, meter.” I then ask him to let me out of the car, but he continues to drive. I ask one more time, and he yells at me in Thai before turning the meter on.
Apparently I was also supposed to pay for the highway tolls, but I couldn’t understand what he was asking. What followed was a tense, five-minute negotiation in our respective native languages where neither person understood the other. Finally when we got to the toll, it made sense. I’m not in Japan anymore!
I finally got to the hotel after midnight, where I met up with Steve, one of my good friends from college. He took the world’s 27th-longest commercial flight (16 hours) from JFK to Guangzhou (China), where he switched planes before heading to Bangkok. Steve arrived earlier that morning. Guess who was more tired? (Me.)
Steve could only lend a week to this trip, which meant we had to pack a lot in a little. (A week is definitely not long enough in Thailand. I know this because everybody likes to tell us when they find our we’re spending a week in Thailand.) Anyway, our research led us to believe that we only really needed a day in Bangkok to see the big sites. This proved to be true.
A tuk tuk. I stole this from Wikipedia.
Some late night Googling led me to a service called Tuk Tuk Hop, an on-demand, hop on, hop off tuk tuk service that brings tourists to nearly 50 different temples, markets, and more. Think of it as Tuk Tuk Uber, but with unlimited rides and a daily rate of less than $10. In just a few hours, we were able to see Wat Trimitr (Golden Buddha), the Grand Palace, Wat Arun, Wat Pho (home of the Reclining Buddha), the Flower Market, the Marble Temple, and the Democracy Monument.
Bangkok was definitely a change of pace from the past 10 days. While Japan is very orderly, Bangkok features controlled(ish) chaos. The first few minutes on the tuk tuk involved bracing myself for impact from any combination of cars, scooters or humans. But once you realize that there’s a bit of a method to the madness and your tuk tuk won’t get t-boned by a Chinese tour bus, it’s really fun to watch people just weave in and out of each other like it’s second nature.
"No, you hang up!" (Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho)
Oh, and have I mentioned that it’s hot in Thailand? It is really fucking hot in Thailand. The combination of heat, humidity and relatively no breeze is my weather nightmare. I walked around looking like I just played a few hours of basketball, but luckily for me, everybody is sweating. As long as I avoid wearing white and becoming a one-man wet t-shirt contest, I can deal with it.
That evening, we took a one-hour domestic flight from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, Thailand’s second biggest city located in the north. This is a city famous for its food, more temples and an interesting mix of locals and expats. Our hotel was just around the corner from one of the famous night markets, where we went for a late dinner before passing out.
The next day was similar to the one before, as we kicked things off with a self-guided tour of Chiang Mai’s temples. These were also gorgeous, but after seeing so many in such a short period of time, they began to blend together. I do wish each site had a bit more historical information available to its visitors. At a minimum, it would give a little more context to what we were seeing. I could also just look this up on the internet, but it’s a bad look to be inside of a shrine while staring at your phone.
At that point, it was time for our first real Thai lunch. We found a place called Huy Phen, which came recommended by the hotel. We were the only foreigners in the place, which served delicious Khao Soi (Chiang Mai’s most famous dish) and other types of curry and spicy* salads. Spicy gets an asterisk because it wasn’t that spicy, even though we were warned. My guess is that we got the gringo treatment, as this became a trend at a few more restaurants.
Steve at Huy Phen. I told him I'd overeat spicy food if he didn't smile for at least one picture.
That afternoon, we took advantage of the hotel pool, which was very welcomed in the sweltering heat. Dinner was at another restaurant, although this one was definitely more tailored toward tourists. Regardless, it became one of our favorite in Chiang Mai, so much so that we ate there twice. It was either at lunch or dinner that I made a comment about how well my stomach was holding up after blasting it with thai food for 48 hours. This trip was beginning to make a man out of me… until later that night. I won’t go into details, but I made my bed and I was forced to lie in it. The things I’ll do for Khao Soi.
Tummy troubles were a good excuse to go to bed, as the next day we had an early wake-up call to head to the Elephant Nature Park, one of the best elephant sanctuaries in the world. That trip deserves a post of its own, which I promise to do soon.