Thoughts, Prison, a Birthday and a Pickup

Dateline Chiangmai October 20, 2008

It's been a few days since my last post, so wanted to put some things down before they're forgotten. A number of things, including Mika's birthday (33) have come and gone.

Karina, Mika and I are currently sitting on the couch in the living room while watching TV and uploading some of the latest pictures.

Mika's Birthday was way better than I thought it would be. I was all prepared to go out to a vegetarian restaurant (the best) and to pick up a cake on the way. (really, now! did you think I had an oven?) Instead, after hauling the stroller over my shoulder and KRose in my arms, getting on the songtow, getting off at the wrong exit, walking down the sidewalk that really isn't a sidewalk - rather it's an extra retail space - for what seemed like at least five miles (I know it wasn't) and crossing who knows how many lanes of traffic (I say, "who knows" because the lane markings don't begin to define where the cars will travel), we made our way to the AIDs/Net office. We walked in to hear Mika say that the office was taking her out to dinner for her birthday.

That was great! ... and a much better time for Mika. Until you've travelled the way I do and availed yourself of all of the wonderful opportunities that arise, you'll never know what you might miss. As it was, we went to the Comeda, a fine riverside restaurant with only a few other diners. That left us to enjoy the ambience, the food, and the lounge music by ourselves. It ended up with about 15 of us, singing Happy Birthday to Mika for her 33rd after a wonderful meal of endless dishes that I can't even begin to describe. I'm not sure what all was in them - but they were great.

That, of course, brings me to what's on the TV. Generally, we watch CNN, Bloomberg, CNN World News, Al Jazeera, or one of two channels with fourth-run movies dubbed in Thai. The advertisements are quite a bit different here, and the economic development advertising agency (I'm presuming there's only one, since they all run on the same format and the announcer has the same tone in his voice) is working overtime telling business and tourists to come to "Kazakhstan, a huge country in the very heart of the Eurasian subcontinent" or to Poland, or Qatar, or "Slovakia, a big little country", or "Croatia, the Mediterranean as it once was", "Yemen - one country, many destinations". Sure.

That was on Tuesday. Then, on Saturday we were pummelled by women at the women's prison. The one-hour Thai massage we received (about $6 ) is a vocational education program run by the prison. Massage is a traditional craft here, and the money these soon-to-be-released prisoners earn goes directly into a fund they can use once they are released to help establish themselves. Of the two we sampled, one had a four year sentence, the other two years. We didn't ask what they were in for, but they were so coy and demure - and tiny - that we wondered what on earth they could have done to merit their "time". Other prisoners are trained in sewing and embroidery.

On the weekend, Jeep (from AIDs/net) asked us if we'd like to accompany her family to an outting at the Doi Inthanon National Park - which, among other things, is the site of Thailand's highest peak (2,565 meters). So ... (again, never let an opportunity pass!) ...

On Sunday morning we arrived at the Office about 8:15 AM and a number of us piled into Jeep's pickup with her husband, Add, driving. Doi is southwest of Chiang Mai - I'm not sure how far, but about two hours in the back of the pickup! We got to know Jeep, her husband, and daughter View, Ana and her husband, Song, and Noy. Mika and KRose, of course, rode in the cab. I was one of those in the back with the wind-blown hair, learning about Thailand from relatively non-English speakers. We had a ball!

Our first stop was a small market where any number of Hmong crafts/produce were sold. Fabrics, resin elephants, traditional Hmong garb, necklaces, passionfruit, roseapples, beans, eggplant, etc. I made it a point to take some pix of the little ladies manning the booths. Note: Little = 4 feet tall on a good day.

Then, off to Phra Mahathat Naphamethanidon (a chedi) built by the air force for the king's 60th birthday - and a somewhat less grand chedi built for the queen. We had been climbing up the mountain on the wrong (left) side of the road - sometimes on the right side - through scenery that was very much "Asheville-esque", until we got to the final few miles of swerves.

At that point, a mossy misty rain forest started presenting itself, and I found myself trying to teach the difference between haze, fog, and smoke to my pickup mates.

Finally, we were at the Phra, which just "appeared" out of the fog-shrouded mountain as two golden peaks Workers demonstrated how the pyramids were probably assembled ... teamwork, much like the workers at Phra were moving large amounts of stone to install an upper gardens at the King's chedi - to match the beautiful gardens (down nearly 100 steps, across a landing, then up about 100 steps) - dedicated to the queen.

The view from each of the chedis was awesome. It was chilly and the fog swirled around us as we took in this awesome structure that I had no idea existed.