Chiang Mai Markets

 During our trip to Chiang Mai, we were excited to share with Jan the wonders of the Night Bazaar.  When Jeff and I were here six years ago, we were amazed by the artists there.  Primarily painting and sketching, they exhibit a variety of artistic styles and are able to accept commission work on the spot.  Many people come with photos of themselves or their families or special loved ones and have them transformed into a custom piece of art to take home.  When not working on commissions, you can watch them painting, mostly elephants, but in just about every style you can imagine.  Pointillist, cubist, abstract.  Charcoal, ink or pastels; palette knife, paint brush or woodcut.  You find it all here.  Jan stops to visit with each artist and takes lots of photos.  Oh the shopping opportunities are endless!

On Saturday night, there is a weekend night market that we check out.  We get there about 6:00pm, just as things are starting to get rolling.  As we work our way in, we see musicians set up in the middle of the street and vendors crowding the road on both sides.  We walk and walk and finally reach what appears to be the end of the line.  Thinking we can find a cab as we exit that end, we poke around until we find a way out, then wander little alleys in the dark for 20 minutes before realizing that our only sure way to get back to a main road is to reverse our route and fight our way back through the market to our starting point.  

By now it’s about 9:00pm and approximately a million more people have come to shop.  We are like salmon swimming upstream as we fight our way out, but Jan is motivated and blazes the trail for us.  It’s actually quite impressive how well she finds a hole and darts into it.  She has learned to work her elbows as well, and is making good time.  Poor Gary is bringing up the rear, and is having trouble fitting through some of the gaps we are finding.  Eventually we are out of the crowd, panting and sweating on the street, trying to flag down a ride back to our hotel.  Jeff finds a tap-tap, negotiates a price, and soon we are flyng through the streets of Chiang Mai.  For once, traffic is light and our driver is making tracks.  We get back to our hotel in record time and agree that we are shopped out.  

Jeff and Gary head to a nearby bar for a cold beer, and when Jeff comes back an hour later, Gary continues on to check out a little more of the nightlife.  See the other blog posting about Harley Rides and Girly-Man shows for more on the rest of his evening. 

Making Friends

One nice thing about this trip is that I’ve had an opportunity to get to know Gary better.  And I’m learning that he is quite the social butterfly.  This guy can make friends anywhere at anytime within minutes of showing up.  

Phi (left) looks on as Ursula and Sharon
get pics with Gary on China Beach.

 While traveling with our Intrepid group in Vietnam, he very naturally hit it off with two of the older gentlemen in our group.  Those three guys could sit down drinking beer and swapping lies at the drop of a hat.  OK.  Pretty natural there.  But he made friends with everybody on the trip and was looked up to as a resource for learning first-hand about the Vietnam War from a point of view they would not have otherwise had.  I recall the day we left Hoi An and how Gary held the group’s attention as he answered their questions about being in DaNang and Hue and his war experience in general.  At China Beach, many photos were taken as group members vied to get a pic with Gary.  It was amusing and heartwarming and poignant to see.  It changed the way Jeff and I see Vietnam as well and has added such depth to our experience.

In Bangkok, Gary met a fellow vet at our hotel and made a friend.  In Chiang Mai, he’s had a number of encounters of the kind he seems to have everywhere.  The stories are just too richly told by Gary for me to attempt them in this two-dimensional space.  But when we get back, as him about his fishing experience on the Ping River with chewing gum as bait or the friendship he struck up with a Buddhist Monk who, upon remarking on their mutual resemblance to The Buddha, insisted Gary sit down for a smoke with him.

George (Australia), Shawn (USA) & Gary on our last night
in Vietnam after our toast of Hanoi Vodka

You could also ask him about his evening spent on the back of a Harley.  I can’t recall if that was before or after the Girly-Man show at the gay bar.  Oh yeah, this guy is full of stories.  Start making your list now.  Have some cold beer on hand and give yourself a few hours, and I guarantee you an afternoon of entertainment. 

The Best Thai Cookery School

Jan and I have been wanting to do a cooking class in Thailand and the guys have agreed to come along.  At the recommendation of a fellow traveler, we have signed up with The Best Thai Cookery School for an evening class.

 We are picked up at our hotel and driven to the school, about 13k out of the city.  We are expecting an air conditioned van and instead are squeezed into a (red-car) tap tap with the other six members of our class.  Not an auspicious start.  Gary and Jan are able to secure seats inside the cab of the truck, so at least they are out of the heat.  

We make a quick stop at a small market where we learn about selecting the ingredients we will need for the various dishes we will be cooking.  We will all make Pad Thai, Papaya Salad and Sweet Sticky rice with mango, but then we get to each select  what soup we want to cook (three choices), which stir-fry (four options) and which curry (also four options).  Everyone gets their own cooking station, so we can each cook something different if we so choose.

 But we need to decide now, because this is where we are picking up provisions.  I choose to make Coconut Milk Soup, Fried Mixed Vegetables and Red Curry.  Jeff will make Hot and Sour Soup (also known as Tom Yam Soup), Green Curry and Chicken with Cashew nuts.  Gary and Jan are cooking Hot and Sour soup, Fried Morning Glory, Chicken with Cashew Nuts, and Panaeg Curry.  And then we have about 10 minutes to poke around the market, shopping and taking photos before continuing on to the school. 

The school itself is located in the countryside with rice paddies all around.  On the grounds are gardens filled with herbs and veggies used on site.  Our classroom is open air and we are able to watch the sun set as we are getting settled in.

 Richie is our teacher and is funny and knowledgeable.  The first thing we do is to get started making the sticky rice.  The rice needs to soak in water for four hours before we can even begin to cook it, and that part of the prep has been done for us already.  So Richie shows us how it is then drained, placed in a cheesecloth lined steamer and set to steam for 15 minutes.  While it is cooking, he demonstrates how to mix up the sweet sauce – coconut milk or cream, sugar and a little salt.  This is boiled together until the sugar has completely dissolved into the cream and everything has become smooth and glossy.  This is stirred into the rice once it is taken out of the steamer and then allowed to rest for two hours.    

He then shows us how to create the various curry powders from scratch and we all get to take a turn pounding the ingredients with a mortar and pestle.  I’m a little alarmed at the number of chilis going into the paste, but am assured I can customize my dish by using as little or as much of the paste as I want.  

 And then we are each dispatched to our own cooking station.  The school already has each station outfitted with a little and a big wok, the various stirring implements we will need, a chopping block and sharp knife and a bowl in which to place our first complete dish.  There are assistants who come around delivering little plates or bowls with the ingredients we will need for each dish as we are ready to cook it.  They also whisk away the dirty dishes, and I’m loving that.

 Richie comes around plopping blobs of curry paste into our woks, each according to the dish they have selected to cook. It looks like an awful lot of paste in my wok, and the lady standing next to me whispers that she has scooped out half of hers and tossed it in her wastebasket, so I do the same and my finished dish is just the right kind of spicy for me. 

 Just for fun, when it comes time to cook our stir-fries, Richie gives us all a demonstration on how to create a dramatic fire-ball in our wok, then asks who wants to give it a try.  Gary is reluctant, but in the end, even he ends up with an inferno in his pan.

I can’t recall the exact order of cooking and eating, but I do recall having Sweet Sticky Rice with Mango before eating our mains.  Dessert first.  I’m liking this school more and more.  We each have our own cookbook to take home with us and I know of at least one dish I will be making in the future!

By the time we leave, we are full to bursting, have had a grand time and learned a few tricks.  Fortunately, the school’s vans are waiting for our return ride back to our hotel, so we’re spirited away in comfort.  We have lots of Asian markets in Minneapolis, so I’m pretty confident I’ll be able to find anything I need when I decide to tackle Thai cooking.  But after a month of Asian food, I think I’ll need some hot dish and Mexican Food before I’m ready to revisit this part of the world.

 

Hello Thailand

We have arrived in Bangkok.  Our flight on Qatar Airways was good – spacious seating with game/tv consoles on the back of every seat, extra open seats in which to sprawl out, and even a little snack (our flight was only 1.5 hours).  Once at the airport, we were able to take the new train into the center of the city.  From there we would need to catch a cab to our hotel, but taxis are ubiquitous here.  There is a taxi stand just outside the train station, but the rates quoted were extortionate.  Basically the same price as if we had caught a cab from the airport.  So we marched out to the street and caught a cab on our own.  We negotiated a reasonable rate, then the four of us and our luggage crammed into a little sedan with a huge propane tank occupying most of the trunk (taxis run on propane here).  We were able to fit Gary and Jan’s suitcases in the back and everything else came in the car with us.  Talk about sardines in a can. 

We had the name and address of our hotel – in English.  Note to self… always have the name, address and a map IN THE LANGUAGE of the country you are visiting.  After driving around in circles, with our driver getting out multiple times to inquire as to our whereabouts and an attempt to drop us at a seedy dive, we finally got to our hotel.  We were a little perplexed at the confusion, since the first thing we did upon entering his taxi was to type the name of the hotel into his phone, which then translated it into Thai as well as providing a little map.  Once safely delivered to our hotel, we paid him, gave him a very good tip, and sent him on his way.  We must have looked like a clown car, though, when we started rolling out of the taxi, and rolling out is pretty accurate.

We are at the New Siam Riverside hotel, and as its name would imply, we are immediately next to the river. The outdoor dining area is just steps away from the water and makes for a very pleasant place to have a beer (last night) or breakfast (this morning). There is also a pool – a very nice amenity in sticky 95 degree weather. 

We have agreed that today is to be one of relaxed activity.  Jeff, Gary and Jan have gone to see the Imperial Palace and I am “home” catching up on my blogging, scouting the area for provisions and generally holding down the fort.  We may do a canal boat cruise later this afternoon or in the evening when the weather cools a bit or we may just choose to hang by the pool or river trying to stay cool.   

Farewell to Viet Nam

 On our last night in Viet Nam as a group our tour leader, Phi, arranged for us to go to a Water Puppet show. It's apparently a traditional theatrical style unique to Viet Nam.  The show itself was interesting, but the experience was kind of bizarre because of all the activity in the audience.  We were in the very back row, so could see everything going on down below.  There was a large group sitting in the middle that kept standing and sitting and trading places with each other, and finally got up and left en masse.  There was another group that apparently had a medical emergency with one of their members, because there was a sudden gasp, then about 8-12 people got up and rushed to the side, looking down below.  I was concerned that something might be happening in the theater, but it was contained to their group. 

So then that group was gone.  And the people sitting directly in front of us seemed to think they were at a coffee shop and talked all the way through it.  Since I’ve never seen a water puppet show before, I didn’t know if that was a normal thing or if we just happened to hit a particularly lively evening.  The music was great, though, and the puppet stories were interesting.  Afterward, Phi explained the mythology which put a lot of what we had seen in perspective.

 After the show, we went to dinner at a restaurant our guide recommended.  Like so many other meals I’ve had at tour guide recommended places, the quality was been hit and miss (the best food really is to be found with the street vendors and little restaurants packed with Vietnamese locals).  We ordered the special Hanoi spring rolls, which are shaped into triangles instead of rolls, and fried.  They were quite good.  Jeff ordered the Bun Cha, which came as a plate of grilled meat on compression skewers, cooked noodles, bean sprouts and fresh mint with a small bowl of sauce on the side and two small empty bowls for eating out of. You build your bowl as you go, mixing up the meat to veggie ratio as you desire.  That, too, was quite good.  By the time our plate of fried rice arrived, we were full and could have done without it.  It’s just as well it arrived last, because it was the disappointing dish of the night.  I’m glad we hadn’t filled up on it before getting our other food.

From dinner, we went back to our hotel for a quick drink.  Jeff had picked up a bottle of Vodka Hanoi and some mixers, so we all stood in the lobby and had a toast to Gary, for his service and in honor of his trip, and as a final farewell with a leave-taking much different from the last time he was here.  There were hugs all around, then we went out for our last beers together.

This has been a good group with whom to travel.  The age range has been good, and we’ve all made friends and promises to visit one another, in England and Australia and Minnesota and other parts of the world.  Some in our assembly are heading straight home (wherever that may be), and others still have weeks or months left to go, with many more places to see.  What we all have in common, whatever our age, is a curiosity of the world and a young heart. 

Members of the group enjoyed hearing Gary's first-hand perspective of his service in Viet Nam

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Halong Bay

Today we are headed out of Hanoi for a boat cruise on Halong Bay, a World Heritage Site that is truly spectacular.  The last time Jeff and I were here, we had cool, rainy weather.  Today is glorious – sunny and warm and perfect for being on the water. 


About the only thing marring the experience is the sheer volume of garbage floating on the water.  At one point, it looked as if we were pushing through the remains of a ship that had broken apart… not just the plastic bags, styrofoam coolers and disposable cutlery we’ve been passing, but actually pieces of furniture bobbing in our wake.  It’s a real shame and I hope the authorities can do something to reduce the dumping and improve the water quality, for the sake of not just the tourists, but especially the Vietnamese people.  This is their beautiful gem and should be preserved in its original pristine beauty.


We are served a multi-course seafood lunch aboard ship.  I am feeling better and ready to ditch the BR diet, so tuck in to all the delicious food set before me.  Ooh… it is yummy.

There is a cave to explore in the afternoon, but it involves climbing hundred of stairs up, up, up a mountainside, then down, down, down into the cave.  Jan is dubious about her ability to do it and Gary is suffering from his neuropathy, but they both push themselves and find they are able to make it all the way through. Well done Nohners!  Fortunately our boat has come around to meet us in a different location, so we don’t have to deal with all the stairs on the way out.

The more adventurous are then outfitted with kayaks and have about an hour to putter around the little bay in which we are anchored.  The rest of us enjoy a cool beverage and nice breeze aboard ship until they return.
  And then it is time to head back to port.  We have gotten a good, long afternoon on Halong Bay and our boat is one of the last to pull into port.  We will spend the night in the town of Halong and head back to Hanoi in the morning.  For us Nohners, a day on the water has been a wonderful respite.

More Images & Highlights (Jeff)

Rita is the official blogger, a much better writer than I am. I get to do the technical part - trying to manage our large photo/video files without proper processing equipment (no PC) and making sure things are backed up. We'll have more images once we can get them back into our post production facility. Meanwhile, I finally have a good enough internet connection to share a few more images from earlier in the trip.

Streets and walkways of Ho Chi Minh City decorated for Tet

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We had better internet in the rural Mekong Delta than in some hotels.
Here Jan is Skyping along the river bank with her daughter Tawnya.

Hard to pass up the amazing fruits and vegetables in the various markets.

Fishing boats on China Beach looking towards Da Nang

Rita, Jeff, Gary & Jan on China Beach

Getting around via cyclo in Hue

The Dragon bridge in Da Nang