Thailand - Round 2: The Cultural North
Aim: Elephants and Hill Tribes. Skills: Riding motorbikes and elephants.
20.07.2008 - 11.08.2008
30 °C
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Malaysia
& Thailand
on Anna.Heidi's travel map.
Our second visit to Thailand was to the north. Arriving in Chiang Mai, tired, hot, sweaty, and in desperate need of a remedy for the most horrendous bus journey of our travels to date. We decided not to let ourselves get sucked into the ‘touristy tours/package deals’ and explore the region minus the traveller entourage.
Unfortunately our return to the ‘Land of Smiles’ was marred by the everlasting effects of a Laotian sandwich and Heidi was bed ridden for a few days recovering. Once she regained her strength we wandered around the cities maze of soi (streets) and the huge number of temples on a sort of self made historical tour. Soon enough we we’re templed out and in need of some more countryside so hopped on the local bus for 4 hours to the much recommended town of Pai. Managing to get ourselves a great room in the prime location of 'Mr Jans Medicinal Garden' with beautifully fragrant herbs and many resident frogs. Deciding to hire a motorbike for a few days we explored the surrounding countryside in style, comfort and ease. This comes highly recommended. Heidi took the reigns and I held on for dear life, obviously joking...Heidi is excellent on a motorbike. We made some friends who decided to join our two wheeled adventure so we all set off in search of the areas well recommended waterfalls, natural springs and spa’s. After a few days of Heidi in charge I decided I needed my own set of wheels so I hired my own bike and the two of us set off on our own adventure along the 110 km of high and winding mountain roads to Mae Hong Son. The ride took over four hours and saw us through sun, rain and some of the most spectacular views over the regions countryside. Mae Hong Song is set around the town’s lake and boasts many Burmese style temples, which although similar to other Buddhist temples inside, are very different architecturally from the outside, and very beautiful. We rode up to the sunset spot on the mountain to overlook the city and its surrounding mountains as the sun set, truly spectacular, and it reminded us of Udaipur in India. We had started to feel a little lazy after ignoring the use of our legs in favor of our new wheels but it’s just so much fun!
The following day we set about to find the local refugee tribes who had been set up in camps or villages in Thailand to escape tribal conflict in their homeland and now neighboring Burma. This village was set up as a refugee camp around 20 years ago. The village of the ‘Long Ear’ and ‘Long Neck’ Karan tribes was 14 km out of Mae Hong Son and despite everyone telling us we couldn’t go it alone, especially ‘on those automatic bikes’ we proved them all wrong, and we’re very glad of it as we didn’t want to visit the tribes as part of a tourist group, but as two passers by. An fee of 500 baht was paid to cover the costs of the set up of the camp and protection for the tribe members, and we bought some jewelry and cards to support their crafts. Many of the women we’re selling crafts to visitors and we realised what a tourist attraction the tribes really we’re and the fact we’d come alone, really didn’t matter. We spoke to many of the women who we’re very friendly but you could tell this is not what they really wanted, to be an attraction. We both felt quite bad about being there after seeing how the tribes we’re trapped in tourism to make a living. We did find out a bit about the long neck Karan culture though, from the age of 3 or 4 the young girls start wearing the gold rings around their necks, adding more as they get older, a full set weighs 3 kilos, the bruising it caused on their necks and collar bones was immense. The rings are wound round the necks from shoulder to chin and are not easily removable (and can't be removed for bed etc). Some of the older women had noticeably longer, stretched necks and before we’d visited we’d been told they could not remove the rings as their necks could no longer support their heads because of it...although this myth was dispelled by the tribes women. The younger women no longer have to wear the rings and other tribal clothes but many still do out of choice. The village had a small school with seven classrooms where the children ranged from 4 to 16 and we’re being taught to speak english. We left the village with mixed feelings of joy and guilt.
After our tribal adventure we rode the 110 km back to Pai for a few more days of relaxation before our return to the SE Asian hub...Bangkok.
We decided our third trip to Bangkok should be done properly. No unwanted taxi’s or tuk tuk’s, it was all going to be on foot, bus or train.
We visited the famous 'Wat Po' which houses the giant reclining Golden Buddha, a marvelous site of gold and opal, and outside are many tiled monuments filling the temples courtyards. We also tried to get into the Royal Palace and to see the minature Emerald Buddha, but turned up in inappropriately revealing clothing...shorts and t-shirts, so we had to cue for sarongs and long sleeved shirts! And when we got to the gates we realised we’d forgotten the memory card for our camera! So we ventured onto Chinatown. The next day we met Anna's Dad’s friend for dinner, he took us to the famous Cabbages and Condoms for some traditional Thai cuisine, then onto some bars for some Bangkok style entertainment!
With under two weeks left in SE Asia we’re having to move on pretty quickly now, so off to the train for an overnight journey to the Malaysian border, (through the sometimes unrestful separatist southern region). Joy fills us as it always does before a long and probably eventful journey!!!
And indeed the train journey did deliver it's own charms. Sadly we had to get the air-con option as they we're the only one's left - maybe some luxury is allowed?! Bangkok to Hat Yai was uneventful and maybe even categorised as mundane by comparison, but uniquely there was sleep involved - thats a new one! We had to change trains to head east on the local connection for 4 hours. This train was heavily guarded by machine gun wielding army officers marching up and down the carriages, in-case the separatists attacked our train, even though we're cruising along with every window and door open - easy targets? They did chill out somewhat and we we're able to score a few cheeky snaps of them sleeping too!
See you in Malaysia! xx
Posted by Anna.Heidi 07.12.2008 16:28 Archived in Thailand Tagged round_the_world Comments (0)

