Chiang Mai: Part 2

This is the continuation of my adventures in Chiang Mai, but I'm afraid that I couldn't come up with a more clever title.  And sorry about the long wait.  It has been pretty hectic recently and my internet has been on the fritz as well.  Anyway, I hope the entry makes up for it.  Enjoy!

When we last talked about Chiang Mai I told you about Buddha Day and our massages.  The others stayed up late at night drinking at the hostel (since alcohol can't legally be sold on Buddha Day), but I decided to get some sleep--I was worn out from arriving late on Thursday night and going to the crappy dive bar.  So early to bed, but the sleep was soooo nice!  Nobody was even stirring when I woke up, so I decided it was time for some wat sightseeing.  My first stop was Wat Umong, a forest temple outside of Chiang Mai.  I had said this was a priority for me and nobody else expressed any interest, so I felt safe heading out there without notifying the others.  I have to say, I really enjoyed the visit.  It was my first visit to a forest wat, so it really had a different feel from the temples I had seen before, either on the top of a mountain or in the center of Bangkok.  It wasn't as breathtaking as some of the others, either in natural beauty or in its architecture, but it felt more real, more lived-in.  It did have a pretty spectacular chedi, still wrapped from the Buddha Day ceremonies, and an interesting network of tunnels and prayer alcoves beneath the chedi.  I enjoyed wandering around the grounds and just observing life there.  There seemed to be a large group of new monks at the wat.  One of the funnier things was seeing a sign with the basic cartoon images of a male and female and a green check below the male and a big red x through the woman.  NO WOMEN ALLOWED PAST THIS POINT it seemed to yell.  Monk stomping grounds!  Anyway, the temple grounds were intriguing.  Many things to see, and I'm sure I missed many of them.

Fish feeding pond--for relaxation.  Pigeons enjoyed it too :P

Naga!

The chedi

Heading into the tunnels

Alcove in the tunnel

Praying in the tunnel

Another alcove

So after my time at Wat Umong, I headed back to the hostel to see if anyone was awake.  Turns out that the group did in fact get up and had gone to brunch.  I ran into a couple people who were still at the hostel (one had been exploring town, the other still sleeping), and we made phone contact with the remainder of the group.  It turns out that in light of no "official" drinking the previous day for Buddha Day, they had already made their way to a bar after brunch...it was only just 11 a.m.  Although none of us were in any mood for it, we reluctantly agreed to meet them at soi 13 (soi meaning alley off a main street).  Now, I assumed that the person talking to the group had established that is was soi 13 off our street--apparently this was not the case.  After walking around Chiang Mai for 45 minutes and not finding soi 13, we decided to call again.  Turns out it was soi 13 off a main street on the opposite side of the old city.  Not cool.  I would have gone back or called a songtaew, but they wanted to walk, so walk we did.  In the end it took almost 1.5 hours to get to this stupid bar.  By the time we arrived the group was preparing to leave for the riverfront.  I thought this was an intriguing prospect, at least until I realized they were just going to look for more bars by the river.  (As it turns out they spent the entire day in bars)  So I had a quick lunch before bidding them farewell to continue the afternoon on my own.  Total waste of a few hours!

I then went to Wat Phra Singh, one if the most famous wats in Chiang Mai.  It was quite beautiful  and made for some stunning sights.  More striking that Wat Umong, but also more people.  One thing that was quite surprising there were the wax monks.  In a couple of the buildings there were very realistically carved wax monks set in various meditation poses.  I was quite confused by this since the first group of these I saw were out in the open sitting near several live monks.  I completely believed they were real!!!!  I thought they were just deep and meditation and that is why I didn't see them breathing.  Later on at another temple I saw a couple of the individual "monks" sitting in what appeared to be glass boxes?  I started to be confused and more than a little bit creeped out.  Needless to say I scurried out of those areas very quickly.  The mystery of the monks wasn't revealed until Sunday when I was leaving a temple.  I noticed a sign for the "Monk Chat" hours where you can sit down and ask questions of a monk--in my book it said they were only during the week, but luckily I was there during the appropriate timeframe.  So I decided to suck it up and ask.  So I went and asked about the monks in glass boxes.  At first the monk seemed very confused and just sort of shook his head, then suddenly the light went on.  "Oh, the sculptures of the old abbots!"  He starts giggling. "You thought they were real?"  More giggling.  In my defense, they are very realistic!

Main temple

Fake monk #1

Blurry pic of wax monk

Wax monks--the one at the end is real

So yeah, the whole wax monk thing was a bit odd.  I didn't think much about it until the next day (when I saw the ones in the individual glass cases), but in retrospect it makes much more sense.  After my visit to Wat Phra Singh I headed back to the hostel to prepare for my evening activity--a cooking class!  The rest of the group had decided on attending a Muay Thai fight, but the class sounded more to my liking.  So Duco (a Dutch guy staying in our hostel) and I set out for the cooking class with high hopes and an empty stomach.  It turned out to be quite the adventure-- we began with a hands on tour of a local market, including a detailed explanation of the various fruits and vegetables.  That was super useful for me, since I have been having trouble recognizing a lot of the items in the market.  It was also really a nice class because we were the only 2 in it!  Instead of cancelling, it was just really personalized--when I asked the chef to show me morning glory (since my students had talked about it as a food in ecology class), he tracked it down, bought some, and added it to the menu for the evening.  After our visit to the market, we gathered our ingredients and headed out to the countryside, or, more accurately, our chef/teacher's house outside Chiang Mai.  We picked some veggies and herbs from the garden and prepared to cook!

Our chef-teacher

At the market

Cutting lemongrass

Collecting...something?

The cooking portion was a lot of fun too.  The ingredients had been portioned out for us (if recipe called for 1 clove of garlic, 1 was set out for us), so we didn't have to do too much legwork.  I was surprised by how easy some of the dishes were though.  And we actually cooked a lot!  I know it will be more difficult when I do it all on my own, but it was nice to try it out here first.  Plus we got the recipe book so I can practice my skills (and show off later).  The menu: Hot and Sour Soup with Prawns, Panang Curry with Prawns, Chicken with Cashews, Pad Thai with Chicken, Morning Glory with Garlic, Banana Spring Rolls.  Delicious!  The scariest thing was the Pad Thai--showed me just how much of a weenie I am.  I ended up with some pretty big flames on the wok (as intended), but I just scrunched my eyes closed and looked ridiculous until it was over.  I was so scared!  Anyway, it all tasted quite good and I had a wonderful time, but I will be letting the street vendors take care of my Pad Thai for me.

Totally professional

My soup in the making

OH MY GOD I'M GONNA DIE!!!!!!!!!!

Ok maybe not

Success!

Mmmmmmm

We rounded off the evening with a visit to the Saturday night walking street--a much bigger, busier, and fancier version of the walking street in Nan.  It was lovely, but we didn't stay long.  It had been a fun filled day, but at the end of it all we were tired.  It was time to crawl back to the hostel and get some sleep.  I ended up in bed around 10:30--not bad!  From what I heard most of the Muay Thai crowd got back around 3, but some didn't make it until about 6.  One guy actually passed out drunk in the hallway.  Sound like a college frat party to anyone?

The next morning I once again got up to do things on my own schedule, especially since everyone had been out so late the night before.  I went to a few more wats (Wat Chedi Luang, Wat Phan Tao, Wat Prasat), all of which were lovely in their own ways.  It was at Wat Chedi Luang that I was able to speak with a monk about the glass box monks, a.k.a. wax sculptures.  It may have been embarrassing, but it did help me understand!  I also spent the morning returning for a massage--if possible this one was better than the first.  It was a wonderful way to end the visit to Chiang Mai.

Inside Wat Chedi Luang

The glass monk box!!!!

Unfortunately, it did have to end.  The rest of the group had gone out to brunch and were late returning, but once they got back we started to go our separate ways, branching off to go to the bus station.  Ours was the first bus, since we had one of the longest trips.  So a few of us leaving around the same time set of for the station, and thus ended our trip to Chiang Mai.  It was quite a whirlwind, but I will be excited to return when I have time to explore some more and, hopefully, some more like-minded travelling companions!