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!