We went around the village to play and make a complete fool of ourselves. The mobile minimart on bike was really cute, the villagers crowded around for retail therapy.

Morning on AkhaHill: Failed jumpshots/Mobile minimart/Back on pickup!

 We took the pick-up down (thankfully got the inside-seats this time) with the English duo ( Louise and ???) met our guide for the day tour north of ChiangRai. Van hated his guts becoz he was mostly lazy and gave little commentries. Hahaha girl was sincerely pissed. I was just glad that I was the client on this tour and not tourleading with a guide like that ( trust me i have seen worse). The day was just touristy to say the least. The first stop was a super commercialised Karen Hilltribe village where the villagers were dresseed in their ethnic costume and paraded around like a freakshow. I don’t know, i felt like i was perpetuating a really bad activity, but truth was they need the revenue anyway.

Longneck Karen, Golden Triangle (point where Laos, Burma, Thai meets), Monkey Cave

We went on to Maesai, the burma border where i peeked into the mysterious land of Myanmar (next trip!!!!!!). At the notorious Golden Triangle, we visited the Opium museum that documented the region’s history of Poppy cultivation and opium abuse.

Maesai, Burma border

 Visited Chiang Saen, temple in ruins mostly. The newer and grander temple we saw in Golden Triangle was really more entrepreneurial, touristy and blah. Did one of those “qiu qian” things, for fortune telling, lets just say it was totally general and non-specific so I really don’t see how that was my fortune to be.

Goldentriangle, Chiang Saen Ancient City

 Got back to Chiang Rai Nightbazaar and coincidentally met the 2 korean unnies we saw in laos. Was mega highness again and they treated us to dinner HAHAH. So i guess the thing about backpacking is that you keep seeing the same familiar faces because everyone takes similar routes.

Day 10: Chiang Rai – BKK- Singapore

Well guess travel charges us up for the harder part of life that reality is. It was pretty damn good while it last, till then..la korn!

Our way back home

Thai Food foreverzxzx!

Jiez says

We took a local bus back to Huay Xai. It was 3-4 hours of squeeze squeeze and the manual bus did threaten a couple of times to break down/slide down the slope. I tried to engage the Lao village grandma next to me, offered her some sour orange peel from singapore, she tried it and made a sincerely disgusted face. Oh well, i tried.

Reached Huayxai the border town where there was nothing touristically exciting for Van. Felt a lil apologetic but i left her in the room to study ( more like sleep) for most of the day while I spent time with Dao. Am thankful he stayed on for an extra night after his tourgroup left to meet…Welllll yup so basically Huayxai overlooks the mekong river and you can peek over at Thailand which seemed more err vibrant. (pasture on the other side is always greener)  

Luang Namtha to Huay Xai

Van says

Took some local bus to Huay Xai that was so uncomfortable, and the bus broke down once on the slope, thought that we were going to Mati! Huay xai really has nothing…I did some studying in room then fell asleep for maybe 12 hours altogether, but ate some red wine steak that was delicious but too well done lah.

Day 8: Monday 27 Jul 2009 Huay Xai – Chiang Rai – Akha Hill Village

Jiez says

That morning, we sampan-ed back to Thailand, crossed immigration and headed back to Chiang Rai.

Back to Thailand: Huay xai to Chiang Khong

Chiang Rai, Wat Phra Keow

We tuktuked to Akha Riverhouse to wait for our pickup 23km up Akha Hillhouse. Met a couple of other fellow-travellers and we stood at the back of the pickup, through uneven terrain, uphill, downhill, with the branches of trees inviting us to collide headon into them. Quite an experience i must say. Don sat himself right at the top of the front part of the pickup – basically its was totally BO LAW JUST STAY ALIVE. Hahaha, it was nice tho, we had a fun time with the 2 dutch law-undergrads, trying to converse in thai-eng to Don and Nice Akha Guide (whatshisnameagn?), holding on to our lives…

Standing at the back of a pickup to Akha Hill

Reached Akha Hill House, which was a Akha-village-runned guesthouse. The GH settles nicely among the greenery and within the local village. The rooms were simple, insect-infested no doubt, but the view was spectacular (for me, haha van is not your green person) Gave us a homestayfeel. At night, there was a campfire in the common area where every sat around for Changbeer and random socializing.

Akha hill House - Guesthouse in the Greens!

Way to the waterfall

The fall is really one of those natural waterfalls that you need to trek deep into the forest for. But it was certainly well worth the wading in mud and climbing of rocks because it is just soooooooooo beautiful:

Waterfall in the Wild

As you would imagine, by the time we were done marvelling over the waterfall, it was getting dark. We got hopelessly lost at one point, couldnt fine the trail we came in by and out of desperation, waded into a pond and climbed up some crazy steep terrain to get back. KUDOS TO VAN FOR HELPING US COME BACK ALIVE HAHAHAHA. Well, after that, we calmed ourselves down with beer and akha dinner, settled our tour with an English duo for the next day, and went to bed. Tried to stargaze but it was too cloudy. Its a pity because I KNOW judging from how dark it was, it would look potentially like what i saw in Nan. (yes yes like polkadotted starfilled sky !!!)

Jiez says

We set off on a day trek with Jungle Eco-guide in the NamHa Protected Area. The protected area is an ASEAN heritage park that comprises 22240 hectares of land and 2000m peaks of its northern highlands, basically hills and hills of virgin forests. We were i guess less than well-equipped for this PRETTY DARN TEDIOUS 5hr TREK.

Jungle Eco-guide Namha Day Trek

In the morning, we met our Thai-dum guide Huk, songthaew-ed to the morning market to load up on food and headed straight to a Khmu village to meet the local guide  Pooooot ( yup, that’s his name) who was familiar with the trail. We start of the trek was STEEP to say the least, i just wished I had some gravitydefying shoes.

Wildlife, flora fauna

So while battling with bugbites and plantcuts, we blasted some music for motivation to move on in life. (Van was clinically addicted to Coldplay’s Viva La Vida and Neyo’s Mad during the whole darn trip) After a series of falling hopelessly over about 4991 times, soaking in perspiration and desperately gasping for air, we finally reached the summit for lunch!

Banana leaf lunch in the jungle

Lunch was all of funkyness while we ate using hands off a banana leaf. Lots of proteins in the form of ants and bugs came marching into our lunch. The site was overseeing the summit a lil so i guess it was a pretty good view. Couldnt stop breaking into hysterical laughters at the state we were in and recalling all of our falling episodes ( van had a really good one when half of her sank into the loose ground of palmleaves HAHAHAHAHA)

Bamboo forest, Summit

After lunch, we made our way down, with Poooot heading the way with his parang to clear the way for us ( there was no ready trail). We walked through the forests, had leeches sucking our blood, hiked up/down blah blah. No doubt, it was tough but we were rewarded with beautiful views, fresh air, great sense of satisfaction and an experience to remember for life!

Visited some ethnic villages, saw how they made Whiskey from Sticky Rice. In the evening we met a pair of KOREAN UNNIES where i went insanely high and tried to deploy whatever hangul i could manage. We went for dinner tog but on the way, witnessed a traumatizing motorbike accident zomg.

Van says

Trekking trip just two of us plus tour guide Huk and Local guide Poot was uber intense, got stung,cut,bitten,fell down, I got laughed at. Had some real nice food on the mountain’s highest point with some big leaf spread on the ground and we ate with bare hands, sticky rice,fish, chix, eggs, lots of veggies. It was delicious though, so glad stomach was ok.

Jiez says

Travelled on a local bus to the border town of Chiang Khong. In true local fashion, the bus was non A/C-ed, filled with locals with sacks and sacks of ____ and the back door never closes. Still, it was a comfy and really scenic 2hr ride! Pee factor was too intense becoz there was no stop at all.

Local bus from Chiang Rai to Chiang Khong

Chiang Khong to Huay Xai

It was another lovely scenic 4 hour ride to Luang Namtha, a quiet town with a huge National Protected Area. So when you go to in a rural province of Laos (no less),  you’d have to readjust your expectations, backtrack abit, slow down a bit just to be in sync with the environment. The general culture is just “chill chill”, no one talks about urgency, it’s just major zen. Despite being just a river away from Thailand, Laos is clearly very different, much more unspoilt and new to tourism. The main agenda for backpackers venturing into Luang Namtha is usually trekking into the Protected Area, since this tiny lil town really has nothing more to offer.

Luang Namtha Town

Basically, Namtha feels very ’50s. We tried to make arrangements for our trek the next day, cycled round town to the Chinese market and met a couple of PRCs along the way (this town is close to the Chinese border too). We chanced upon a Lao-Chinese elementary school, some PRCs and locals were playing basketball, badminton etc in. Decided to join them. Had a basketball game with the PRCs guys whose egos were thoroughly demolished by Van as a result of her ultra pro-ness. HAHAHA it was fun, and amusing cuz i could really see the guy’s selfesteem depreciate over the course of their 1 on 1 HAHAHAHA. Well ok, PRC dude (called himself Xiaozhu HAHAHA) gave some sort of inspirational talk about his life in Laos and how we was to lead a high brow life in x years with a flashy porche and blahz. I guess it was funky to have a immigrant’s perspective of Laos.

Van says

• Whole day of travelling. From CHiangrai to CHianKhong (2hours plus ride), then cross the river to Huayxai, some intense bargaining there, got a very good deal for minibus to LuangNamtha (3hours plus ride). The guy who sold us tickets was called Dui and I think he likes Chia too, kept talking to her, or maybe CHia has very good PR skills, I was busy sleeping anyways… Stopped over for some Vietnamese Pho, was so afraid of the cleanliness.
  
  

  Huayxai to Luang Namtha

• Ate a grand total of 3 Imodin pills, 6 charcoal tablets, 1 shen sian shui, 3 poh chai pills. Then like kanna constipation for next few days, oh my…
• Reached luangnamtha and went into Zeula guest house, spacious room but full of mosquitoes, I got stung till I gave up.. hot water was powerful but water supply was pathetic..
• Went around looking for our tour trip, almost settled for Green Discovery then found out then opposite them was some Jungle Ecotourism with cheaper deal, haha being singaporeans we went over, it was a matter of PRICE.
• Jies needed to get a pair of Chinese shoes and we rented bicycles to go to Chinese market, people all from CHIna there, got a pair of sneakers for US$3 or less. Then went to some lao-china school and played some badminton and basketball, fun.

Jiez says: From Chiang Mai’s Arcade Station, we took a 3hr bus ride to Chiang Rai. The Greenbus was way posh, there was a hostess giving out drinks and refreshment. Now and then, they would decide to blast thai wayang music…

Bus trip from Chiang Mai to Chiang Rai

Chiang Rai is a quieter cousin of Chiang Mai. The city is so small, you can see the whole of the tourist stretch from front to end and get anywhere at all on foot. It was a slow, chillout day for us. Had local food, walked around, came to terms with Van’s ever failing stomach etc. Visited the night bazaar, had traditional live thai performance with food.

Chiang Rai City

Van says

• Took some VIP bus to Chiangrai, had water,biscuits,wet tissue, and oh toilet in the bus somemore. When reached, we looked around for guesthouse, Pam’s guesthouse was so dodgy. Settled for Orchid guesthouse, cable TV (Channelnewsasia man), free Wifi (which I think didn’t work), free coffee/tea, safebox. Not bad man..
• Went out for lunch, had some noodle at apparently the best noodleshop in town. I had some serious food poisoning!!!!! Ate the pig’s blood( that jelly thingy which I love and is now banned in Singapore). Had diarrhea about 5 times that day, totally weak and while walking, had to run all e way back to guesthouse,stupid jies kept laughing.
• Rested for a long while then got up to go to night bazaar, I love the night bazaar, lots of nice things and big and great foods ( we had some fish soup which was delicious and SAFE)… but I had diarrhea again and had to go home early. Slept throughout, I was so disgusting, didn’t even bathe. No strength lah…

Chiang Rai Night Bazaar

• CHiangrai overall was a quiet town, but the highlight really was the night bazaar…need to go back again.

Jiez says:

We booked a daytrek with Julie’s for 1100Baht (abt SGD55). It was a pretty fun group, there were about 12 or so of us: Welsh, English, Austrians, Americans, Dutch, us and the wayang Thai guide, Don. Squeezed into a Songthaew – which is a sheltered version of a pickup. After an hour plus of pick-ups along different guesthouses we travelled about an hour to the Elephant Camp!

Us in the Songthaew

Van and I got allocated to a teenage angsty elephant, who would eventually threaten to throw us out during the trek. Naively holding our bunch of bananas as treats for these Chang friends, it turned out to be a mad situation of elephant trunks from all sides nudging us for food. Adding on to that, our seats had NO HANDLEBARS attached and when i ran out of bananas at a crucial steep slope, all hell broke lose. Our elephant was quite determined to have us killed and we were holding on to our freakinnn lives screaming the shiz out of our asian selves. The falangs were pretty amused but i kid you not, if we didnt hold on tight enough we would have been flung out and i dno, dead.

Elephant Trek

 After lunch, we started our trek into the Akha Village. It was a moderately easy trek, with uneven terrain, crazy-steep steps, the occasional streams and most importantly, beautiful beautiful greenery. I think it helped that it was a lil crowded, so we didnt have to die trying to keep up with the longlegged falangs.

Trekking into Akha Village

At  the end of the trek, we reached a waterfall for a cool down drink up break.

Waterfall

Bamboo Rafting

Did some whitewater rafting next. The rapids were alright since it was the raining season. But most of it was calmness on the river and mindless splashing of water. Some rafts were packed with crazy falang men who were determined to capsize, just really glad ours was fine. No pics since no waterproof cam. We did some bamboo rafting, bought a tourist pic for keepsakes. It was drizzling a bit, so it was all a big wet mess but fun enough. On the way back on the songthaew, the group started chatting (with van fast asleep 90% of the time) about each of our countries’ idiosyncracies, from legal age to drink, drive and (in the netherlands) smoke weed. Well things got abit high and we all started taking turns to sing our National Anthems. Just so you know, the angmos liked Majulah Singapura.

Elephant Trek: Note Van's traumatic expression ( We were hanging on to our lives)

• Had some fried rice for lunch.
• Did trekking about an hour to reach a waterfall, the waterfall was so beautiful, the ANG MOHS were so liberal, straightaway into bikinis and trunks and jumped in. Trekking part was so tiring. No chance to look at the surroundings as my eyes were fixed on the path that I’m walking.

Up and into Akha Village!

• After that we did whitewater rafting and bamboo rafting, it was so-so, not exciting enough. Lifevest was so smelly,eww..
• Can’t remember what happened after that, oh they were singing national anthems in the pickup.

Motorbike

After some slight issues with maps, navigation and the lack of english roadsigns, we made it to our first stop, the Tribal Museum! It’s a pretty great ethnology museum featuring Northern Thailand’s various hill tribes’ culture, lifestyle, architecture, tools, jewellery, musical instruments etc. Better yet, there was no entrance fee. The museum faces some greenery and a nice pond with a row of  lil houses on stilts on the bank, pretty.

Tribal Museum

Panoramic Chiangmai City Viewpoint

Doi Suthep, Wat Phra That

With alarmingly little fuel left, we went down to Monthathan Falls. Hardly saw anyone else there – it was a quiet, back-to-nature environment – kinda like those shooting sites for martial arts movies. We trekked up a lil but ended off  at the 2nd storey of the falls since Van was slipping endlessly and threatening to die..read abit about how it was believed to be the “home to the evil spirits”, was somewhat spooked out and left.

Visited the University Arts Museum which was just one-hall huge and kinda blah. The Arts and Cultural Centre was way better. It was a neat, interactive museum depicting the change from the ancient Lanna civilisation to modern day Chiang Mai. The videos, exhibitions and showcase were generally very well done, we stayed on all the way till the closure of the centre, had the staff waiting it out for us whoops.

Chiang Mai University Art Museum, Chiang Mai Arts and Cultural Centre

Went round town to try to refuel. Turned out to be a big joke since we had NO IDEA how to refuel a bike and it was SELFSERVICE. Fuel overflowed and we were quite convinced it was going to explode but was reassured by the amused thai cashier. And back to the guesthouse where Van just comatosed from 630pm all the way to the next morning. As a result, dinner did not happen. (Hi Van You suck)

Van says:

• We hired a motorbike( even had to fake my driver license as motorbike license,haha) and attempted to venture up to Doi Suthep to visit the Wat and Waterfall. Got lost initially and went around the inner city kept going round and round and lost abit of petrol.
• Finally found our way and got to the Tribal Musuem first, a lot of ethnic history, the tools, explanations of their cultures, traditions, and way of life.
• Left the museum and went uphill to Doi Suthep, it was a really long and steep mountain up and about halfway, stopped at a viewing point and wow,amazing view of ChiangMai. Jiesin totally EMOing there. Then all the way up to the Wat, started to drizzle and wore our ponchos to visit. Nothing spectacular about the wats, many tourists, some 306 steps up to reach the temple, tiring…
• Went downhill to some waterfall. Boy it was 1900m up all the way to reach the peak of it. Stopped at level 3 and along the way, I kept sliding and falling down( lousy slippers) . it was cool though.

Monthathan Falls - home to evil spirits

• Then left doi suthep and went to arts museum, really nothing there,not my type.
• Managed to visit CHiangmai museum, that was really nice. Something like our national museum, very detailed and full of interactive videos, but I don’t think I need so much of their history, (I need to handle LKY’s memoirs first.)

From Singapore to Chiangmai

Jiez says:

Set off once again with the ever-trusty Lonely Planets and Rough Guides, for some time away from city and to indulge in some major greenezzz. We transited via Bangkok into Chiangmai, tuktuked to Julie’s GH tucked away in the back corner of the main backpackers’ street, with simple and small $9 twinrooms. Thailand (and Thais) were generally good to us considering the “nit noi” Thai that Van manages and the exotic-enough Asian backpackers that we were. Afterall, the locals have seen their fair share of carefree bikini-cladded hardpartying falangs (thai equivalent of angmos) . I guess for the staff at Julie’s, we were a refreshing break from the typical falangs..that’s how we got pretty much extra-friendly reception, hung out abit during our stay with Pam and gang with much lols over Changbeer.

Streets of ChiangMai (Singaporean-owned Same Same GH!)

Wat Phra Singh, Chiang Mai

Had a slow first day around town. We were staying in the inner city walls, where most of the tourist action was. Headed to Wat Phra Singh, the largest temple in Chiangmai, with a Buddhist library, and a famous bronze Buddha image – Phra Singh Buddha. The temple is next to a school for novice monks so we saw small little ahboys playing basketball, soccer, rattan balls etc. Monks experimenting with their english proficiencies were seen conversing with falangs.We sat around in the main hall to read our RoughGuide about the history and just zen out in this genuinely peaceful temple. The trees in the backyard were hung with quotes, some of which were gayly inspiring, like ” Merit making calculated to impress is not real merit” and ” Do try to do good but not to be great, otherwise you will be in danger”. INDEED INDEED.

Chiang Mai Night Market

Headed to the night market for your usual touristy noise and crowd. Wasn’t too crazy about the night market, but we had pretty good Tom Kha Kai (coconut milk spicy sour chicken soup). Returned to the guesthouse and joined the gang for some BBQ where we talked to some fellow-travellers. We were like some high level PR throughout the trip and Van’s Thai really gets us around HAHA. Most of them were travelling longterm so our short 10day seemed really unimaginable in comparison. Welll one day when we have no strings attached, maybe we could do a longterm thing, but for now, guess this is it!

Van says:

• Got up super early to go Airport (BUDGET TERMINAL-1^ST TIME IN MY LIFE)
• First major incident happened!- I dropped one side of my waterproof gloves in the stupid taxi. OMG…felt so depressed. I want to go home!!
• Checked in and inside departure waiting area second major incident happened- POSB ATM not working—chia has no money! Unable to withdraw money, she was super depressed… wait a minute, anyway whilst changing money,i.e. into Thai baht, I think I got cheated, rate was 1=1.21.6. the lady at the counter was shocked that I agreed to change all $400. Arghh….
• The departure gate and way up to airplane was cool…Chia got stopped by the police for taking some pictures of the aircraft (Suspected terrorism?) and was forced to delete the pictures in front of him. So scary..
• Reached bkk and transfer to domestic terminal for AirAsia flight to CHiangmai. The airport lounge food was so expensive. Had to share a bowl of noodles for 160B=S$8.
• Reached CHiangmai and walked out of the airport to main road to catch a tuk tuk to go to Julie Guesthouse.
• Julie guesthouse was so popular and crowded, full of farangs. Room was super small, no A/C, no hot water, but cheap.=)
• The reception guy was hostile until I tried speaking some thai to him and he became super friendly to us. A lady named Pan spoke some amazing Chinese (better than CHia’s) and they were really nice to us. I guess coz we were one of the few Asians and they are really quite sick of Ang-Mohs lah.
• Anyway, we managed to book a tour on Wednesday which includes some baby elephant camp thingy,trekking and whitewater rafting.
• Walked around the place for food and even saw Starbucks, so cool..(no chance to try because no money…boohoo..)
• Walked to visit Wat Phra Singh temple, got lost quite a few times, and I had serious stomachache along the way. Luckily managed to reach destination eventually. The place is so holy and serene and quiet and tranquil. Felt so nice, saw a monk stature which Jies thought it was real. They had like a shelter place with idioms hung on every tree, mmm so meaningful.
• We were invited by the Julie guesthouse people for some BBQ at night, but before that we went to the night bazaar to look around, it’s more or less like those in BKK but more things I guess.
• Tried to play some toy called Ploi which can be lighted with fire and it’s like a kind of performance thingy, quite cool. Met this Hongkong guy who have been travelling solo for about 2 yrs, cool..

Shanghai: City, city, people, cars, construction, skyscrapers, billboards… CITY!!

Food- HZ specialties – Long Jing Shrimps, Beggar’s Chicken, Do Po Rou, Sweet-vinegar fish (Tang Cu Yu) Shanghai – Xiao Long Bao, Spicy stuff. Food is generally affordable even if you dined as lavishly as we sometimes did. Theres a great variety of cafes, chains ( starbucks at almost every corner of the street). A food haven !!

Buddhism influences the everyday lives of Laotians. Most boys become novice monks for months, years before they complete their education (like NS)- where they will live in the monestary away from home. Other than for personal growth, the stint is believed to help accumulate blessings for the household/parents/the elders. Every village would have one temple that serves as a “community centre” where they can zen out and stay calm etc. Strikingly, the temple would be the most extravagant property that sticks out like a sore thumb in the village of zinc/wooden stilts.. Hmm. Such is the strength of religion. But its amazing what religion can do for a society. Every morning, the common people would offer alms to the monks, the monks will give some share of their food to the poor and stray animals. They were pretty enterprising abt the alms-offering as well- the locals would prepare sticky rice and sell it to tourists at USD3 to offer alms as part of their tourist experience. I thought it was totally lol-ful and smart at the same time…but whatever works right? At least wealth is distributed in this way to the poor and the strays!!

As usual, exotic episodes happened and I actually made a trip to the only govt hospital in luang prabang. I have to say it hardly even looks like one. The doors to the ICU were wide open and i could totally see random people ( NONE OF THEM LOOKED LIKE DOCTORS) hovering over a random man on bed. There was not much of a structure, SOP,ward system.. you just open a door, find a bed and sit amongst rusting, unkempt equipment. It looked like maybe an old abandoned school in Singapore. BUT STILL the doctor we eventually met was totally mother theresa…absolute tender lovin care + some english. (We were there because one of my elderly passengers on the tour fell ill. )

Nightlife in Luang Prabang is like Back to the 60s. They still call the place a discotheque. But the concept is a dragon made out of neon lights instead of a disco ball. Everyone danced to lao/thai techno, there were funky laotian she-men, awkward angmohs flirting with the she-men, unawkward angohs going absolutely insane, and an Indian dude as a DJ. It was all TOO exotic a situation HAHAHA. Still, tiger and lao beer is much much cheaper there and the laos REALLY drink with zero regard for their liver. The “pub”, on the other hand, if you go to the local ones

instead of the angmo touristy ones, is literally wooden benches nxt to the bank of the mekong river with light thai/lao ballads in the background. Don’t get me wrong, I do like it.. it’s so yknow, close to nature and un-shady. It’s a fuzzy feeling. Like beer @ seletar reservoir. Crickets and all. It’s great !!!

So until next year, I’ll be back for Vientiane and the other pretty laotian towns!!