Holy cow!

This will be another no-picture post, because the internet continues to be unpredictable in its availability. Ah, well.

Today, we arrived in Varanasi! This was, however, less simple than that sentence makes it seem. We had another harrowing drive out of Darjeeling to the train station 3 hours away (it was worse on the way down, for some reason), and settled in for what we thought would be the next 2 hours. Which became 3. Which became 4. The train eventually did arrive, and then we realized that the labeling of the cars was weird and we weren't really sure which one we were in. Eventually, we figured that part out, got in, and discovered people in our berths. Sigh. Because we looked foreign and, presumably, helpless, the conductor (or someone else official, I'm not sure) took pity on us and had an argument on our behalf with the family in our berths. About 10 minutes later, half of them vacated, while the others remained (in their actual seats, to be sure) and glared at us for a while.

This was the first (of 2 total, thankfully) trains where we didn't have AC1 tickets, because AC1 cars don't exist on these trains. It turns out that AC2 is an inordinately large step down. The layout is such that there are "rooms" on one side of the wagon, with 2 berths facing each other, as you'd expect. On the other side are two more berths, going the long way along the corridor. All of this has curtains for a modicum of privacy, but there's nothing to secure the curtains with, which means people passing by can inadvertently open them because there's not much space, and vendors selling food, water, newspapers, tea, and randomness of all sorts can just step in. I kinda wanted a paper, but really didn't want to encourage this nonsense.

So anyways, we sat at the station for another 30 minutes or so (not sure why, but it was very annoying), bought dinner (the bread left much to be desired, but the curry and potatoes were pretty tasty), and finally the train started moving. At this point, a different person tried to convince us to buy dinner again, and while we tried to alternately just say "no" and explain to him that we'd already eaten, the Indian family, taking pity on us, jumped in to explain and make him go away. After then, they thawed towards us and chatted, and helped us figure out which one our station was the following morning.

Our train ended up arriving over 4 hours late (I feel bad for our hotel driver, who waited for us -- we couldn't call him because our phone wouldn't get service on the train!), and in to Varanasi we went. It's...crazy, but weirdly charming. There were cows everywhere! This is what I'd been expecting, but so far, hadn't actually seen -- Kolkata is too crowded and industrial, and Darjeeling too small and high up. But Varanasi sure has those cows! They meander or lay or stand obstinately while small children attempt to get them out of the middle of the road. It's pretty great. We also saw goats and pigs and lots of dogs, but the cows outnumber them all. The streets are very crowded, but there's much less vehicular traffic. There are bikes and some motorcycles and some rickshaws, but mostly, just a ton of people walking every which way. This kind of crowd is somehow easier to deal with than the crazy amount of cars in Kolkata, at least for me.

Our hotel is right on the Ganges River, and the noise around it, to me, sounds like a beach party. There are birds, yelling children, boats, a murmur of hundreds of people talking. It's not exactly soothing, but after a while, it kind of leaves one's notice. The weather is lovely, too -- warm but not sweltering, with a nice breeze from the river. We napped, and then Mu decided to internet, and I decided to go for a walk along the river to see some of the ghats. Ghats are steps leading down to the river, and some are huge. The one nearest the hotel is pretty quiet, but slightly further south are more popular ghats, with huge crowds. I sat for a bit on the steps, one of maybe several hundred people (with more floating in) and listened to music and took in the atmosphere. There were tons of tourists, but also lots and lots of devout Hindis come to worship at the Ganges. They were dressed in robes of all colors, and were frequently barefoot, which seems amazingly unpleasant to me. It was nice to just sit and observe the craziness. I wasn't as accosted by touts as I'd expected, either. Sure, there were inevitable people trying to get me to take a boat ride, but with a few exceptions, they weren't really persistent. There was also a nice tea stall where I had a glass of hot chai that cost me pennies, and lots of shops, none of which I went into. I meandered a bit down some small alleys, but the sun was starting to set, and the lighting here isn't very good, so I decided to save the alleys for tomorrow.

Now, we're relaxing some more, preparing for the New Year's celebration at our hotel, which we're told will include dinner, beer (this was highlighted many times as it is something of an oddity here), and a "cultural presentation." We'll see what that actually means, but it's not like we have any other plans.

Even though I said this before, have a happy and safe New Year's, everyone! May 2012 bring you lots of happiness and joy!

Pictures from yesterday and adventures from today

Here are some pictures that would've gone in yesterday's post, as promised. Today's post is below the pictures.

Sunrise at Tiger Point Hill (the sun has finally come up!)

Mount Kangchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world. Everest is apparently somewhere in that view, as well, but I honestly have no idea where.

Really cute white wolves! Mu got a great shot of them emerging from their house.

Asiatic black bear, posing for the crowds.

Cuddly langurs. These guys are apparently considered sacred in India.

Mu (and a random lady) in front of the peace Pagoda.

The Ghoom Monastery, with a huge Buddha wrapped in cloth.

Tea garden! Look at all those tea plants!



And now, on to today. It was rather a weird day for me. Mu has gotten my cold, and being more sensible that I was in similar circumstances, decided to spend most of the day in bed. He has emerged now to join me back at the tea house from yesterday (the one with internet!), but until now, I've been meandering on my own. Hence, there are few pictures from today (it rarely occurs to me to take pictures, I've noticed), and the ones that I've taken aren't up yet, because it's usually Mu who uploads them.

In some ways, it was maybe a convenient day for Mu to be sick, in that he didn't have to suffer through my traipsing through tea shops and other souvenir stalls. I meandered happily around, smelling teas and looking at beautiful teapots and shawls and other things. There's a Tea and Tourism festival currently going on, which turns out to mean a whole host of random things. There were tea tastings, which was to be expected but also a "fun archery range" (I paid 20 rupees, approximately 40 cents, for the privilege of shooting 3 arrows badly and one reasonably well, to the laughter and applause of the people hanging around), an exhibit of photos and paintings of Darjeeling, another somewhat inexplicable exhibit of military-ish things related to the Gurkhas, one of the local ethnic groups, and lots of performances, including lots of heavy metal (very strange to be listening to people screaming while I'm sitting here drinking tea) and very bizarre dance/fire-breathing performances. The area around the tea tasting also blasted Scorpions music, for reasons known only to them. I like the Scorpions, mind you, but it was rather random.

I had heard that a local heritage hotel, the Windamere, had a daily high tea, so I went in search of that (and got lost and found the festival, so that was a happy accident). They turned out to be up a very steep flight of stairs, which I trudged up when I finally found it, discovered that the tea was served between 4 and 6 (it was around 1 at this point), and trudged back down. On the way back, I acquired a very pretty warm shawl, as well as a few more souvenirs. I also encountered a monkey, just hanging out on a path. I hadn't realized that they live this high up! This one was chilling, so I took some photos, but was careful not to get too close -- a lot of them have rabies, which would be distinctly unfun.

After checking in on Mu, I went out again, first for a small lunch (momos, soup, and masala chai for 30 rupees!), and then for that high tea I had originally searched for. I brought, appropriately, an Agatha Christie to read. :) The tea was served in a very quaint sitting area, with cushions and lace everywhere, and it was very good. I had an entire pot of tea, two sandwiches (cucumber and cheese, as you might expect), a piece of coffee cake, two cookies, and a scone. For those of you from the Bay Area, think Lovejoy's but with no choice of tea or sandwiches at a third of the price. Who needs choice when you've got super yummy, high quality Darjeeling tea? I also chatted with some people there -- a British man and his Indian wife, whom he had met years prior at that very hotel, where she had then been working. The man told me that I should give Kolkata another chance and that "after a few days, it grows on you." I smiled politely and nodded. I have no intention of doing this, of course, but I didn't need to tell him that. :) After they left, I read a bit more, and then meandered back down the hill to meet up with Mu and have yet more tea.

So now, we're internetting here, with a cricket game on the TV and more rock music being played outside to a large and enthusiastic crowd. Tomorrow, we will have a few more hours here in the morning, and then we'll get on an overnight train to Varanasi!

I'm not sure when we'll next have internet, so if I can't communicate 'till then, I hope everyone has a happy and wonderful New Year's!

"I never thought I'd say this, but I miss the cleanliness levels of US gas station bathrooms."

Just in case you're only here for the pictures, due to the time-limited nature of our wi-fi, this post won't have any. We hope to have some tomorrow, but given India, heaven only knows what will actually happen. Anyhow. Moving on.

I don't think either of us have ever been more glad to leave a place than we were to leave Kolkata. This was not a good introduction to India, though we're kinda feeling like the fact that we survived it (and even had 3 meals without any unpleasant side effects!) means that we can survive anything. The train station (which was far more grand than the airport, by the way -- the international airport in Kolkata consists of several short, non-descript buildings with pretty much no services except taxi, bus, and atms) was horribly difficult to find, but had one thing going for it -- an "upper class" waiting area. As we had decided to be snobby Americans and get AC1 tickets, we were able to utilize it. It had chairs, bathrooms that were (only marginally) less gross than the ones in the rest of the station, and, in an unwelcome development, at least one cockroach that we noticed. We jumped. The Indian family near us laughed at us.

The train was actually pleasant and comfortable, with Western toilets that even had toilet paper! I know I spend a lot of time mentioning bathrooms, but that's because that's been one of the constant reminders that we're not in familiar places, and so, it has stood out. But anyhow, we slept reasonably well and arrived in New Jaipalguri, the transfer point to Darjeeling. We were picked up by a driver from our hotel (while we waited for him to deal with something or other, at least 8 cabbies came over, attempting to lure us to their cars. I stopped counting after that.) who took us to another train station so we could experience the famous Toy Train. The drive was...harrowing, to say the least, so the train was nicer in that respect -- I didn't feel like we might go off the curve, given that we were on tracks. However, it put-putted along at about 8-10 km an hour, which meant that the second half of our trip took 3 hours. This was made more exciting by the fact that we were in a car full of very celebratory 30-something Indian men, who spent the whole time drinking, smoking, and yelling joyfully, as if they were 18 and had just discovered alcohol for the first time. They also had small muffin cake things that they insisted on sharing with us. They also attempted to get Mu to drink or smoke with them (not me, though), but he declined. :) By the time we arrived in Darjeeling and got to our hotel, we were drop dead tired, cold, and hungry. Thankfully, our hotel had room service, a heater, and hot tea.

Our hotel here, in stark contrast to the last one, is very nice. The room is clean and comfy, there is actual hot water (though a limited amount of it), there's room service and tea, as mentioned above, a yummy breakfast, and hot water bottles for heating one's bed (and snuggling with). We were also able to arrange tours for today through it, so all in all, we feel very taken care of here. The downside is that it's quite cold -- the room is away from the street, which is good for noise, but bad for getting sunlight. Also, the electricity situation in Darjeeling is...fascinating. There are seemingly random power outages, which Mu thinks are due to the place being under capacity for the amount of power it uses. So, our lights went on and off multiple times last night, and the heat with them. The blankets were quite warm, though.

Darjeeling itself is pretty nice, as long as one doesn't mind car horns. It's smallish (110, 000 people is Lonely Planet's estimate), and very crowded because the area it's in is rather small. There are narrow, winding roads everywhere, and it's super hilly, with some rather steep streets and stairs. There's lots of tea growing all around, and a million tea houses (one of which we're in right now, in fact). There's also a mix of cuisines -- Indian, of course, but Chinese and Tibetan are also common. I've discovered Tibetan dumplings, called momos, and have been convincing Mu to share some with me at every meal (not that he needed much convincing, they really are delicious!). Today, we saw the sunrise at Tiger Point Hill (pretty, but super crowded and, obviously, early), went to 2 monasteries (very different feel from Thai Buddhism, less gold and more fabric, but still very neat to see), drummed with a nun at one of the monasteries, and visited a tea garden (briefly, since it was the end of the day and we were getting hungry). In keeping with our "wats and animals" theme, we also went to the zoo, which focuses on endangered local species. It was small but mostly well done -- many of the animals had quite extensive habitats, and there were only a few that seemed really cramped. We also saw red pandas, who are adorable! They look like stuffed animals running around, all cute and fuzzy, with awesome markings on their faces (I lied, there's one picture in this post). The zoo also had the Himalayan Mountaneering Institute museum, which had a lot of neat stuff, including a bunch of things owned by Tenzing Norgay, the sherpa who first summitted Everest with Hilary.

Now we're taking it easy, and tomorrow will be a day of meandering, souvenir shopping, and relaxing. I've already had approximately 4.5 pots of tea, and Mu even had some, and I plan for this to continue tomorrow. :)

"Not only are we not in Kansas anymore, we're not in Thailand, either."

Well, we did say we wanted an adventure...and so, Kolkata is providing one.

Obviously, we're now in India. The last day and a half in Bangkok was hot and reasonably uneventful -- more wandering around, a fruitless search for a replacement kindle (I sat on mine, or some such idiocy, on our second day in Thailand. Phooey.), and a slightly sick and therefore grumpy Elaine. I'm fine now, it wasn't anything serious, but it's no fun being sick in a strange place, especially when it's sweltering and one feels the need to continue doing tourist things instead of recuperating. Ah, well.

I wanted to write a post about my overall impressions of Thailand, but this is not that post -- I'm pretty much totally overwhelmed by impressions of India, instead. I don't have many pictures (we only took a few today and haven't uploaded those yet), but I do have a few from our hotel last night.

So, Kolkata is pretty much everything you've heard about India. There are hordes of people everywhere at all hours, shuffling along or just standing. The cars seem unable to drive without using a horn, which does approximately nothing, because people just walk at random among moving vehicles. Some roads, including some big ones, don't have lane markers. Cars organize themselves vaguely into lanes, with motorcycles weaving in and out. There are rickshaws, some auto, some cycle, and some with just a guy walking, pulling this huge contraption behind him. There is poverty and beggars, of course, but it's actually not as bad as we expected. We're likely not seeing the worst of it, but what's here is not as in-your-face as it's portrayed generally. Still, there are professional beggars -- today, when we were sitting on a park bench, two young girls, maybe 11 or 12, came up and demanded money. When we said no, they kept at it, asking for candy and then eventually switching to Hindi to perhaps berate us? I don't know. In any case, we declined until they walked away, but it was a very strange encounter.

There are also few street signs, and those that exist switch freely between old (colonial) and new street names, which is highly confusing. We had a difficult time finding our hotel last night, and eventually, an Indian kid told us he'd walk us there, in exchange, of course, for money. It was late and we were tired, so we agreed. Ugh. Weird encounter.

Our hotel...well, we're glad we only stayed there last night. It was adequate, but very strange. There was a weird range of "amenities" -- they very proudly told us that the room had hot water (though when we got to the room, it turned out that this was less helpful than we would've liked, as it didn't connect to the shower spout), there was a local phone and a small tv, but there was no screen on the window, and gross blankets. There was a window to the hallway, which had lights on all night. There was also a less-than-comforting sign on our door, which you can see below. On the other hand, they had a locked storage room where we kept our bags, and the bathroom was, at least, private. Oh, the things that seem like benefits here...

We also had a hellish time finding a sim card for the phone. One needs a passport and visa, and also proof of local address (which we didn't have in printed form). Mu found a place that was willing to take his word for it, but then they had to take photos of him, and led him down a back alley to sign lots of paperwork. The whole process took about 30 minutes! But, we have a sim card, so huzzah!

Tonight, we leave for Darjeeling, which I think (hope?) will be calmer. Certainly, it's hard to imagine anything being crazier. For all that Thailand is officially considered a "developing country," like India, they are really not very much alike.

Hungry hungry tigers?

I've had a minor obsession with tigers since I was a kid, which I think is relatively common. They're such gorgeous animals and have that great combination of seeming wildly exotic and dangerous while often acting like an overgrown house cat. So, when Mu and I were browsing the web a few months ago, looking for a day trip out of Bangkok, I got really excited about a tour of the Tiger Temple, a place where monks and volunteers take care of tigers, and where the public can visit and interact with the animals.

We made the unfortunate decision to book a tour there, which was the one downer in an otherwise awesome day. The reason we did this is that when one searches for "tiger temple thailand," the first result on google is actually the tour company, with the implication that one can't really get there on one's own. In retrospect, we could've jut hired a car and driver for less, but there we are.

We started the day in a huge, ugly (but admittedly comfortable) van and headed first for the floating market, about an hour outside Bangkok. It's a rather touristy, but still fun market where you get on a boat and a guy takes you around all these canals, with vendors set up on barges on either side. Some sections were super crowded, leading to essentially bumper boats. There were lots of souvenirs, clothes, random art, spices...pretty much anything you'd expect in a market, but on water. There were also food vendors, floating around in boats of their own. We hadn't done any souvenir shopping up to this point, so we got a few things, ate some sticky rice with mango, and headed back to our driver.

We then had a two hour drive to pick up our guide before going to the Tiger Temple (the guide was on the way, it was just far from Bangkok), and that was when things got annoying for a bit. The guide called us (through our driver) to ask if we wanted to feed tiger cubs. Well, of course we did, I told him...that's what the tour description promised. He then told us it would be 1500 Baht each (about $50), on top of what we already paid. No, I told him, the website said it was included. He hemmed and hawed, called a manager, called us back to say the manager said no, called another manager at my insistence, and that manager called back to talk to me. And oh, my. I don't think I've had a worse customer service experience before. He was rude and pushy, accused me of being "malicious" and "American" (I almost said, "well, I can tell you're European, your customer service is crap" but refrained), kept yelling at me, and was just horrible. I just kept telling him to stop raising his voice and let me talk, and finally, after a long while of this, he agreed to give us a "discount" of 500 Baht each. We agreed, because we really did want to feed the cubs. Later, when we got to the temple, we found out that that's actually the price, and he was just gonna pocket that extra 500 Baht each for doing exactly nothing, since the guide and driver costs were included in the original price. Ugh. Conclusion: if you're in Thailand, never ever go with these guys. "Thailand Tours Center" or "Tiger Temple Thailand" (Tourism Authority of Thailand license number 13/01632) is horrible, and we plan to report them to the TAT.

But anyways, on to the good stuff. We picked up our guide (who, frankly, was useless. Friendly, but useless), stopped at the War Cemetery for POWs of the Allied Countries (which was pretty and depressing and not really that exciting), had lunch, and then got to the best part, the tigers! The temple is huge and has other animals on the grounds (deer, hogs, other random things), but of course, they were less exciting that the giant cats. We had some time to go 'till our cub feeding, so we hung out and even got to walk one of the big tigers! We also petted a 5-month old cub (that was one of the photos in the last post) and then finally got to go to the very little 4-week old tiger kittens!

Our group was led inside by a volunteer (the temple is staffed by them along with the monks, they come from all over the world or month-long periods to work with the tigers) and we were allowed to walk around the enclosure and pet, hold, and play with the cubs for a while before feeding them. The cubs were cutest things ever! They're brothers and don't yet have names (the volunteer said the names were already selected, but it wasn't yet decided which tiger would get which name), so they were referred to as "blue," "green," or "red," by the collar of their collars. They were tiny and awkward, with paws too big for their bodies, so they were fairly unsteady on their feet. They mostly wobbled around or crawled, or plopped in corner, kitten-like, or rolled around on the ground. We all spent a lot of time ooh-ing and aww-ing at them, as you might imagine. So adorable! Eventually, it was time for the actual feeding, so Mu and I got a bottle of milk and a cub to feed. The cub we got had been really sleepy right before, but he woke right up when there was milk! He was kind of ridiculous, and in his excitement to eat, ended up not actually ingesting a lot of the milk but spilling it all over the place. How like a baby! We both ended up covered with drops of milk, but that's ok, we're doing laundry today.

Of course, after eating, the baby pretty much conked out and we were able to get a few more really cute pictures with him before moving on. All this makes me remember how much I wanted a pet tiger. :)

After the babies, the adults were somehow less exciting, but still pretty cool. We walked to the tiger canyon, where there were about 10 big tigers hanging out. There were lots of guides and they walked you around and took pictures of you with various tigers. For some reason, you had to pay if you wanted a group photo, but individual ones were free, so that's what we did.

As we started heading back to the van, I told Mu that feeding tigers beat out feeding hippos. He asked if it beat them out per Baht spent, so of course, we had to calculate this. It cost 10 Baht for hippos and 1000 Baht for tigers, and tigers are not really two orders of magnitude better. BUT, we spent 3 minutes with hippos and 30 minutes with tigers, so that's a whole order of magnitude right there. Are tigers 10 times better than hippos? I think it's pretty close. So, we decided that, on a per-Baht level, they were about even. Yes, we are dorks. :)

We drove on to our next animal adventure, an elephant ride. I wasn't sure how exciting it would be, since I've been on an elephant at an amusement park, but it turned out to be great! It was a fairly long ride, and I got to ride on the elephant's head for part of it! That was a little scary and wobbly, but so much fun! Our elephant was named Kelta.

After the ride, we went to visit the bridge on the River Kwai, which wasn't that exciting, and then had a 3 hour drive back to Bangkok. Ooof. We did find a very tasty veggie place right near our guest house, though! Today, we meander about Bangkok some more, and tomorrow, we fly to Kolkatta!

Also, because I've been forgetting to say so, happy holidays!

Tiger teaser

It's been a rather long day, and I'm too tired to blog now, but here's a preview of what the post will be about. Hint: baby tigers! Eeeeeee! Excuse me. :) I hope these photos are as happy-making for everyone else as they are for me!

Why is it called the cool season, anyway?

If you are ever thinking of traveling to Thailand, you should know that the term "cool season" is highly misleading. Sure, it's probably cooler than at other times (according to Lonely Planet, May is deadly), but it's 9pm right now in Bangkok, and it's 84F with 54% humidity. This is not my definition of cool.

So, anyways, we're back in Bangkok, this time for 3.5 days. Our last morning in Chiang Mai was nice, we wandered about, saw another wat (our "local" wat, which was on the corner of the little street we were on), went to a market in Chinatown, and eventually got on another overnight train to Bangkok. This one had kind of weird arrangements -- it was an old Japanese sleeper, and each room was a single, so we had adjoining rooms with a door between them. The room itself was pretty nice, wide bed, lots of lights, and even a fold-out sink and a tiny (non-working) TV and VCR thing. There was even a non-squat toilet in the car! Oh, the things I get excited about...but anyways, we had another long train ride (made longer than scheduled for some reason, by the fact that it took about 2 hours to go the last 50 miles. It's a mystery.), slept (though less well because the engineer in control of the train seemed to delight in sudden stops and starts), and finally arrived in Bangkok, at which point we hiked about 3.5 miles, with our giant packs, to our guesthouse. I'm not sure whose bright idea that was, but here we are. On the way, we had an authentic tourist experience via a man who told us he was a teacher and then proceeded to attempt to convince us to hire a tuk-tuk to go to a temple and a tailor, but we escaped unscathed. :)

We were determined to see the Grand Palace today, so after some time spent collapsed at the guest house, we set out again (thankfully, minus huge backpacks) to find food and see more wats and the palace. Food was a bit of an adventure, as the guy served us noodles with pork after cheerfully agreeing that they were vegetarian, but we got it straightened out eventually. We have also been learning that if you don't like spicy food, Thailand is not the best place for you. Our mouths were burning after that meal! We were, however, satiated, and moved on to our first sight, the Temple of the Emerald Buddha and the Grand Palace.

It's hard to convey how grand both of those places were. We have a ton of pictures (though only one of the Emerald Buddha itself, since photos weren't allowed inside the room, and we had to take some through the door), a few of which I've posted here, but they don't quite do the place justice. Everything was gold-painted or plated, covered with glittery things, with ornate statues and lots of other decorations. The grounds themselves were probably about 54 acres, densely packed with buildings and statues. The throne room was amazing, with more ornate glittery things everywhere. The temple that contained the Emerald Buddha was really incredible, as well. The walls were covered with murals of the Buddha's life, and the Emerald Buddha was at the front, surrounded by gold Buddhas and other decorations. Apparently, it has seasonal costumes and was at the time wearing its winter costume. This may be sacrilegious to say, but it kinda resembled Yoda. :) The grounds also contained a palace and several museums, all pretty awesome.



After this, we took the ferry across the river to see Wat Arun, the temple of Dawn. It's notable in that it has a very tall stupa (a mound-like structure containing relics, by definition, though this one was much taller than a mound!), and we climbed up, and then down again, the steepest stairs I've ever encountered! The 3 pictures below show the stupa itself, and the views up and down the stairs. Craziness!



It was getting late, so we took the ferry back and decided to go to one more Wat, Wat Po. This one is famous for having a huge reclining Buddha, and I wanted to see it. What I didn't realize was quite how huge it is! It took up an entire large building and was 160 feet long! It also had very large feet. :)


By this point, we'd been out and about for 5 hours or so, so we meandered back, stopping to eat yet more spicy food (for me) and a lemongrass omelet (for Mu). We also went into what looked like a dessert place, pointed at random pictures, and ended up with fried toast with condensed milk (me) and strawberry jam (Mu). Tasty, if random. We finally got back to our room at around 8pm and have been chilling ever since.

Tomorrow, we get to have more animal encounters! We're going on a tour of the Tiger Temple, where there are actual tigers! We're also going on an elephant ride, to add to the animal factor. Somewhere in there is a trip to the floating market and the bridge over the river Kwai (which I admit I haven't seen), so it'll be a packed day.

Ziplining in the jungle

Yesterday, one of the things I'd really been looking forward to about this trip finally happened: we did the Flight of the Gibbon, a zipline adventure in the jungle. I'd seen this on the Amazing Race (yes, yes, I watch reality TV sometimes) a few years ago and have wanted to do it ever since, so when we decided to go to Thailand, I of course convinced Mu that this would be a cool thing to do. He agreed, we booked, and finally, we went!

After picking up everyone, our van drove for about an hour on an increasingly windy and narrow road into the jungle. There were small villages along the way, but mostly, it was just forest, with a surprisingly well-paved road running through the middle. Upon our arrival, we were helped into safety harnesses and helmets by our very enthusiastic guide, Bert (and our less enthusiastic guide, Tom), driven a few minutes to the start of the route, and then there were the ziplines!

The process was pretty straight forward. At every station, one guide would go ahead to the next one to catch us, and one would stay with us to send us off. As we stood, we were always clipped in to a safety line attached to a tree, and the line only got unclipped by the guide in order to attach us to the zipline itself. Once he was satisfied, off you would go, flying to the next one! They were quite concerned that you not unclip yourself, as you can see from the warning on the right.

The first few ziplines were pretty short, and I was starting to get a little anxious that the whole thing would be less exciting than I had imagined, but then (after a hike that was all uphill for 10 minutes, and decidedly not "gentle" as described on the website), we got to the longest zipline, so long that we couldn't see the end of it, and the guides couldn't yell across anymore, using walkie talkies instead! We think it must've been about a kilometer long. Flying on it, surrounded by greenery, with a canyon and creek below, was exhilarating! After that, our whole group was pretty fired up.

There were two more rather long ziplines, though shorter than that first amazing one, and also two ziplines side by side for couples, and also one where you hung from your back and could fly, superman-style, into a net. We got a bunch of photos and a few videos. The ones I've posted here are from the same zipline ride -- one that I took of Mu coming in (sorry that it's sideways!), and one that Mu took as he was flying down!




At the end of it all, we got lowered by ropes to the ground, and you could choose to go "normally" (attached at the front), "superman-style" (attached at the back), or "upside down" (attached at the front, but lying on your back with your feet up, so you could see above and not below). I chose the latter, of course, while Mu decided to go right side up, leading to a funny picture of us. And then we were done. There was a delicious dinner with traditional musical accompaniment, and then we returned to Chiang Mai, exhausted and pleased.

Today, we have the morning in Chiang Mai to meander one last time, and then we get on an overnight train to Bangkok!

Hungry hungry hippos!

If I had to assign a theme to the last day and a half, it would be a toss up between food and animals (and, on several notable occasions, food for animals). This started at the Sunday Walking Market two nights ago. The market was completely nuts, by the way. Imagine a typical street fair in the US, increase the length and amount of people by an order of magnitude, decrease the prices and increase the kitsch factor by a bit, add random performances in the middle of street (literally, we had to avoid stepping on people sitting there, playing things like a violin), and you have an approximation. The picture on the left is a decent representation, but it's hard to do the insanity justice in a photo. We were surrounded by other shoppers, as well as by vendors selling an immense variety of endless things. There were purses, scarves, lamps, dolls, jewelry, skirts, postcards, book covers, paintings, and lots lots more! The only thing we didn't see was, of course, what we were looking for -- a cheap watch for me to replace my previous cheap watch which broke in transit. Ah, well.

Faced with this amount of choice, we didn't end up buying anything except food. In addition to all the stuff being sold, there was also lots of street food, most costing 10-20 Baht a dish (33-66 cents, more or less). I ended up making a dinner of spicy chicken (like the kind sold at Quickly in the US, but better and spicier), wide flat delicious egg noodles, and a random assortment of veggie things (shared with Mu) which included something that looked like a chive dumpling, something that I think was a taro cake, and something...green and tasty. And there were egg custard tarts! Not as good as those in Hong Kong, but still happy.

The next day, still jet-lagged, we woke up at around 6am, in time to hear roosters outside our window and the morning playing of the national anthem. After a search for food (spicy glass noodles for breakfast for 20 baht each, yay!), we decided to go to Doi Suthep, a national park with a mountain and temple, Wat Suthep, at the peak. We set off in one of the weird cabs on a very windy road up the mountain, passing some bikers on the way (and being glad we weren't them!), and finally arrived at a super crowded little area with the Wat at the top. When they said this thing was high up, they weren't kidding! There were 306 steep steps to climb! You can see Mu at the bottom of them, before we finally decided to brave them. The Wat was well worth the climb, though. The story goes, a king who had some holy relics from the Buddha loaded them onto a white elephant and told the elephant to go walking until it found an appropriate spot to house the relics. The elephant meandered up the mountain, trumpeted 3 times, turned in 3 circles (somewhat like a puppy, I imagine), and sat down. This was a good enough sign, and the Wat was built on the spot.
Inside, it is really quite grand. There are gold Buddhas everywhere, a pagoda that houses the relics, and frescoes on the wall of the Buddha's life. We took tons of pictures, here are a few for a sense of what it was like. Tons of people, too -- tourists, of course, but also pilgrims from all over, coming to pray. We spent a good amount of time up there, walking around and then just sitting, absorbing the atmosphere and the gorgeous view down the mountain to the city. Also, there was a weird little guardian dragon named Mom. :) I don't know, either.

Eventually, we made our way back down and asked our taxi driver to take us to the Chiang Mai zoo. We had read reasonably good things about it, and we both like zoos, so it seemed like a good choice. Plus, there were gonna be pandas! Well, the zoo did not disappoint. It was huge and mountainous (we hiked about 5 miles total, we think), with lots of animals in actually very spacious and nice enclosures. And then the best thing happened! I got to feed hippos! And a giraffe! Like, by hand! Hippos are actually surprisingly endearing, and a little like puppies, begging for food with open mouths. Giraffes, of course, are hugely adorable as well. This was the best 20 baht I think I've spent this whole trip thus far! After that, everything else paled in comparison. :) Mu got to feed a hippo, too, though he was considerably less giggly about it than I was.
We did see pandas, who were really cute (and one of them was stretched out and eating, looking like a fat, happy, human), and koalas, and lots of other neat creatures. I also got a new stuffed moose! By the time we returned to our guest house, we were exhausted.

In the evening, we decided to continue the animal theme and went to the Chiang Mai Night Safari. To be honest, it was underwhelming after the zoo. There were two tram rides to see different animals, some of which (deer, zebras, giraffes) came up to the tram where they could be fed. This was cool, but somehow not as exciting as those hippos. :) There were also lots of gorgeous wildcats, so that was great, so I'm glad we went, but not as exciting as we were hoping.

Today, we're gonna find some food and then go on the Flight of the Gibbon, a zipline ride through the jungle! I'm so excited! After seeing this on the Amazing Race, I've been wanting to do it for years, and now here we are! I'll let you know how it went!

We're here!

Before I say anything else, let me tell you: you're lucky that my assumption that a drop down menu might be a language preference was correct -- when I logged into blogger, the whole page was in Thai, and if I hadn't figured the drop-down thing out, there wouldn't be a post today. :)

So, by the way, we're in Thailand! It's been a crazy few days, so let me summarize best I can, with a few pictures. We took a ton, and many more will be up post-trip, but I'm gonna share just a couple for now. It's gonna be a long post as it is.

So, on Thursday afternoon, we arrived in LA and hung out at Cindy and Eric's for a while before our flight. We were already getting wildly excited, it was hard to wait the necessary time before being able to go!

I passed the time by playing on Cin's iPad. We both look slightly crazed, don't we? Mu and I (on the right) were also looking a little giddy.







Eventually, we did the dinner thing and the going to the airport thing and even attempted, unsuccessfully, to get bumped up to business class, and then finally got on our crazily long flight. I did spend a lot of time pre-flight being anxious, but actually once we got going, it wasn't so bad. They fed us pretty well, too. Cin told us to take pictures of the food, which we didn't really do most of the time (too obnoxious, frankly), but it was the best airline food I've had in a long time, with Air New Zealand being the only real competition. They even gave us cup noodle as a snack in the middle of the flight!

We had a short layover in Hong Kong, but since our outbound flight was delayed (due to, apparently, the "congestion at the airport around Christmas," according to the captain), we were able to wander about for a bit and have breakfast. I was so excited by this! There were dumplings! And custard tarts! And noodles for breakfast! And milk tea! It took some effort to find food for Mu that was both vegetarian and included protein, but eventually he ended up with a weird combo of noodles, scrambled eggs, and a bun. We also got fed again on our flight. As I said to Mu after that, the one thing we don't appear to be in danger of on this trip is going hungry. Everyone seems eager to feed us as much as possible. :) I have to admit, this makes me pretty happy -- one of my favorite things about travel is getting to eat yummy things!

Eventually, after the delayed flight, a long line at passport control, and a fairly quick sky rail line into town, we arrived in downtown Bangkok (where we would stay for 4 hours before getting on a train to Chiang Mai). First impressions: traffic is nuts and on the wrong side of the road, there's a ton of pollution, street vendors are everywhere (I was a little sad not to be hungry!), and Thai people are super friendly. When we stepped off the train, 3 people approached us within the span of about 6 minutes, offering directions on getting down from the rail station (needed because the signage was unclear) and guidance on how to get to the main train station downtown (not needed because we had a map and a plan, but we didn't have the heart to tell the very excited man this, so we allowed him to explain it to us). We were, by this point, exhausted and (at least on my part) feeling a little delirious. We wandered around, I caffeinated in a vain attempt to feel less dead, and eventually, we made it to the train station (with the help of a few more friendly people with badges labeled "Tourist Information Authority"). We'd walked about 2.5 miles by then, with our huge backpacks (you can see me with mine on the left), so at that point, we pretty much collapsed until we had to actually board the train, and then we boarded, found our room, and collapsed again, very relieved not to have to put on our backpacks any time soon!

I'm glad to say that the romantic picture I had in my head of train travel (stemming, amusingly, from when my family went to Moscow and back when I was 8, and then again to Moscow to leave the country a few months later) has actually been, so far, borne out. Our room was reasonable spacious and even had a little sink, the food was pretty amazing and not too pricey (dinner and breakfast for both of us for 500 Thai Baht, or about $17), and the berths were fairly wide and surprisingly comfortable. We tried to stay up as late as possible, but crashed out around 9pm and both slept like logs, lulled by the motion of the train. It was really quite lovely, though I can't say the same about the squat toilets. At least there was toilet paper and soap? Heh. Looking out the window in the morning was pretty amazing. We were basically riding through jungle, with occasional stations (and, inevitably, shrines) popping up in the woods. Very incongruous, that.

We finally got into Chiang Mai around 8:30am, were delivered to our guest house by weird taxi (a truck with benches in the bed, this is apparently typical here), and went wandering about the old city, looking at Wats. A Wat is a Buddhist temple and monastery, and there are a ton in town. Lots of monks everywhere, and giant gold Buddhas (I said to Mu at one point, "Look, there's a huge Buddha!" to which he responded, "I think we'll be saying that a lot on this trip."). We sat and listened to monks chanting in one, and wandered about a bunch, and took tons of pictures, one of which you can see on the left. Eventually, we got tired (and overheated, it's mid-80s and humid here!) and found our way to a delicious veggie restaurant (Thanks for the rec, Nikki!), where we feasted before heading back to our guest house to rest.

And that brings you up to speed! Tonight, we'll go to the Sunday walking market to meander and possibly shop a bit and see performances, and tomorrow, we're not sure yet. We may go to the Flower Festival, which sounds pretty but is a little far, or a forest with another Wat, which is also a little far, but all the pictures of it look very grand. It's really nice not to have to make up our minds ahead of time! A very nice start to our vacation. :)