Well, we're back. Back to Bangkok, the city where it all started. As I write this, on Shabbat 13 Iyar, David and I have one full day left in SEA, and he takes off early Sunday morning, local time. I head back to Israel mid-afternoon Sunday. It's been a whirlwind trip, and tonight, as David and I sat eating iced cream on the steps of the snazzy Siam Paragon mall in downtown Bangkok, we remarked how earlier this week we were in Cambodia. A week ago were we finishing our first day at Angkor. And in a week, I will have been home for 4 days, (hopefully) gotten a cell phone/number and a car, and given the speech as the alumni speaker at my K-8 day school's graduation. Whew.
Our time in Chiang Mai was lovely. It was a very cute, quaint, flat city. David and I rented bicycles and rode them around town, visiting a bunch of temples, eating, and arranging our next few days. It was very hot but nice day. Wednesday night we went to a northern Thai restaurant, which was more leafy and spicier and delicious. Thursday was a real highlight. David and I took an all-day cooking class at a Thai cooking school (they're rampant in Chiang Mai, the "cultural capital" of Thailand). We got picked up early Thursday morning and driven, with 3 other people, to an organic farm about 20 km outside of the city. Our instructor was a Thai woman called Nice (pronounced like the adjective, not the city); our classmates were a really sweet French couple and a woman who was Korean born, but has lived in Alameda for most of her life. It was crazy to meet someone else from the Bay Area; one of the first Americans we've met too!
We cooked all day. We made our own curry paste, totally from scratch. We made curry and stir-fry chicken and basil, different types of soups, stir fry noodles, spring rolls, desserts (mango and sticky rice; bananas in coconut milk). It was all tasty and fun and easy (if you have the right ingredients) and they gave us recipes so we can recreate them back in the states.
Thursday night, we took a night train to Bangkok. It was kind of my "Murder on the Orient Express"/"Some Like it Hot" experience, the the sleeper berths and an all girls band running around. David kept calling it our "Darjeeling Limited" experience; I thought that was kind of in poor taste and renamed it the "Pad See Yew Limited." It was definitely an experience. We had upper berths (much cheaper) but the whole train was air-con, so that was nice. But they kept the light on the whole time and the train was incredibly slow (it's about 700 km from Chiang Mai to Bangkok, about 500 miles, and it took about 13 hours...) and kept lurching and stopping randomly. Needless to say, I slept poorly. David slept better, I think, mostly because he was so tired because he slept poorly in our Chiang Mai hotel (where I slept really well). So we got to Bangkok around 730, went to our hotel, but we couldn't check in, so we put our bags down and then traipsed around the city, killing time, for like 3.5 hours. we saw an amazing temple called the Golden Mount, which is literally a mountain in the middle of the city. Terrific view. Then we wandered around Chinatown and Little India. When we could finally get into our room, we both passed out for most of the afternoon.
Tonight we took the river taxi, and then the skytrain to the center of town, and enjoyed having Indian food in Little Arabia (yeah? it was strange) and then walked to the main mall center. And now I'm off to bed. Tomorrow we're going to check out the huge weekend market in the northern part of town, and maybe get massages in the evening. It's also my last chance to ingratiate myself with the royal family and become their tutor, and perhaps whistle a happy tune or two, or sing about getting to know each other. But we'll see.
I've reached a strange point with my reading. I'm realizing that I will [probably finish
Poisonwood Bible before I get back to Israel. Which means I went through all of my books (David is about halfway through
The Brothers Karamzov and wont finish it for a while) and need to get another one, here. All of the books at the hostel are not in English, so I need to buy a cheap one. Egads. I forgot how fast I can read when I have nothing else to distract me.
I look forward to seeing you in Israel or back in the states!