Life in Chiang Mai Thailand

Kim and I have been in Chiang Mai, here in the north of Thailand since the 15th of November. Most of this time we have been keeping busy by doing some work, walking everywhere, eating delicious food, dancing and seeing the sights.

Kim has been working on his laptop and I have been keeping up with shrimp clients by phone and booking some travel for folks via the Internet. I have done a few hotel reservations, some research for a group going to Hawaii and may be putting together a group for a Panama Canal Cruise at the end of February or the middle of March. Anyone interested? So far I think we have 3 cabins already spoken for. Write me for the details if you want to come with!

What have we been keeping busy with you ask?
On the first two Sundays here at the Queen Vic, we've gone downstairs to the pub for the all you can eat “Carvery” buffet of roast meats, Yorkshire pudding,gravy potatoes etc. and it is almost $10each! So for the sake of our cheapness and our big bellies we've skipped it since.
Every Sunday evening we find ourselves hanging out at “The Garden” listening to the blues/folk music there...we even got up and danced to one 50's song last Sunday despite the fact that we were the only people dancing! We have made some great friends there and have had lots of fun with Linda and Mike from England since our first Sunday at the Garden.
We've gone to High Tea and dancing at the Shangri La hotel for the last few Saturday afternoons. It was fun despite the fact that there wasn't much food and the band stunk- we are talking “cringe” bad. At least we got to dance.
We had two Salsa lessons on Wednesday nights since we have been up here in Chiang Mai and have now switched to Monday night Argentinian Tango class. Only had one lesson so far but really liked it! Linnie and Ty, you would be proud of us!
On the 3rd of December I went with Linda and her friend Valerie to the Chiang Mai Thai Cookery School and learned to cook several more Thai dishes. The lesson was: cooked Pad Sey Yew (Wide noodles fried with sweet soy sauce), Steamed fish in Banana leaves, Yellow curry chicken, Chicken with Cashews and Spicy Prawn salad North-Eastern Style (in a chili jam sauce!) Everything was delicious and I brought my leftovers back for Kim. Unfortunately the dessert was a disappointment, it was cooked green bananas in Coconut Milk...not my thing!
On the 4th we went to the, get this...Ratchaphruek rumjaiphukrakporluang, (see Bobbie your name isn't really that long!) The Royal Flora Rachaphruek 2006 exhibit just outside of town. We are talking impressive gardens, with an orchid show going on and all sorts of events leading up to the King's birthday. The evening we chose to go, there was live Jazz and they were to play some of the King's compositions. I don't know if we heard any of his music but the band and singer were really pretty good. Linda caught us dancing on the way up towards the stage (see pics!) I don't know how she managed it but somehow she got us in the shot without anyone else, as if we had the place to ourselves, which was far from the case.
Monday we spent the morning working and then had a lunch date at Sunee's for her Panko battered fish & chips day, with Linda and Mike. After lunch we all went to the Holiday Inn to reserve our New Years Eve Buffet dinner and then to the massive Airport Plaza mall. They have this lame machine at the gym there which I was dying to check out until I saw it- I think it is called the Turbo-sonic back home but this seemed like a knockoff. Remember those goofy machines ages ago that had a vibrating belt you stood in and it was supposed to jiggle the fat away...same thing just a vibrating platform you stand on...no belt. Got back to the hotel with just enough time to grab our shoes and catch a taxi as we had a Tango Dance class that night.
The next day I worked for our dinner. I did an NMR/NKT session on Noriko, one of our Tango classmates. She has had neck stuff for a long time and I am hoping it helped her out. She certainly fed us well on an amazing organic peanut butter curry, which I will be struggling to replicate as soon as we get home!
On Wednesday the 10th we took a Green Sung Teow out to one of the big Universities and checked out the flower show there, orchids, bonsai, gourds, agriculture exhibits and a parade including parrots and a snake that I got to touch.(again see pics)
So we've gone from having very little on our plates to a busy schedule in no time at all! And you can see we are in no danger of getting bored with Thailand. The weather has been in the low 80's consistently and I hear there is snow at home so I am sending you all warm tropical mental hugs from here!