November 7, 2008 – 8:00 AM.

Right now Kevin and I are eating breakfast on the outside of Thae Pae Gate. I am having eggs and toast and french fries and Kevin is having the spicy tomato soup with mushrooms, tomatoes, roots and bugs.


Yesterday we had a good time. I ate a lot of good food around bugs. Actually the food in Thailand is really good in general but sometimes weird. For example, certain western dishes that you order because at that moment you need something familiar and not totally surprising are just not quite right. We were a little tired of this mystery point-at-something-on-the-menu ordering so we went to an Italian place for some good old fashioned know-what-you’re-getting pizza but when we the pizza came it was made with bread that sort of resembled naan bread. I guess we should go New York if we want New York style pizza. I'm just saying though, and I’m down with whatever and it didn’t taste bad, it just wasn't... quite... right. However, if you want some great authentic Thai food the street carts will cook you tasty pad thai for a couple bucks. These are the places to go if you have a man stomach.

Our itinerary from yesterday is as follows. We woke up and drove our car to bum phuck to see another wat. I thought we were going to see some ancient ruins but they were actually just an ancient city called Lamphun. It looked pretty much like a normal city but I guess it had been there for awhile. Driving through the countryside was very nice. On the way back we saw a huge cloud of smoke from a fire and thought that while we were gone Chiang Mai had been attacked by bombers or something but when we got closer we found that it was not as bad as it looked, just a run of the mill warehouse fire or something.


Back in Chiang Mai we returned the car and walked around the inner moat area of the town. I bought some fruit. Mango, a rose apple and bananas. Kevin isn't fully into the street carts yet but I got him to eat at a street cart type restaurant run by a pleasant old couple. The stuff that the old man made for us in his open air cart was kind of like chicken soup, cost only about 75 cents American and tasted good.

After that we went to some more wats. We saw a good one that was really old and was half collapsed from an earthquake.

Then we did some things that I don’t remember and got ready to go to Thai kick boxing. It was cool even though in such a small city as Chiang Mai the kids are all under 18 and weigh like 100 pounds. I guess when you get good you move on to bigger fights in Bangkok.





When the boxing matches were over we went to the Night Bazaar and looked (I swear just looked) at some ladies of the night which I guess is considered to be a normal profession here. Still weird though. Like I said, just looking, come on it's an authentic Thai experience!, even though we did try to get a ping pong show but had no luck. We were however happily surprised with the dart show.

This afternoon we are flying south to Koh Samui.

P.S. Everywhere you go in Thailand you will be eating very close to some type of animal. Lots of bugs around and don’t be surprised if a dog comes and sits in the chair next to you during dinner.


Picture above is of the interesting art choices at the kick boxing arena. Not bad.