We're Not At Ricky's Anymore

We are waiting to take a taxi to the Chiang Mai Airport, enroute to Luang Prabang, Laos.  Chiang Mai has been lovely.  Our guesthouse has been great, a real pleasure.  Breakfast has been...challenging.  Great coffee, thank goodness, but the meusli with fruit and yogurt makes me miss Ricky's in Bangkok.  Muzzy marshalls on with eggs and an amazing variety of bread things on the side.  He gave up on the french toast.  We have walked and walked, had foot massages at the Wat, a full on two hour massage at the Old Medicine School for Muzzy, and lots and lots of great food!  I think I will miss the variety of food here; kao soy, a northern Shan curry noodle dish that is a specialty here, the best somtam (green papaya salad), cashew chicken stir fry, gai yang (chicken on skewers) from the alley off the Warorot Market, and of course, sticky rice. 

Last night we went into the old part of the inner city to a restaurant (Huean Phan) famous for its northern cuisine.  It was set in an old style teak house full of antiques with antique silk fabrics on the tables. Hors d'oevures were served in a red lacquer bowl on stilts with a towering ornate crown sort of cover that the waiter removed with a flourish to reveal pickled pork balls, long green beans, spicy pork sausage, crispy fried tofu and crispy fried pork thingies with a red chili tomato dipping sauce in the middle. We had jackfruit salad, crispy pork with lemongrass, green chili sauce with vegetables...and sticky rice. Yup. great food!

We first came to Thailand and Chiang Mai in 1990.  Both have changed.  Chiang Mai is a big city with a small city feel still, but it has definitely grown and spread.  You no longer see women in the traditional phasin (wrap skirts) except for older women or on special occasions.  People are still very polite, still wai as a marker of social position, but it is much more western over here.  There are cross lights at some of the breathtaking intersections you need to cross to get around, although they serve as suggestions to vehicles rather than hard and fast orders.  You still take your life in your hands as you dodge cars and songthaew and tuk tuks, motorbikes and even samlors (single person bicycle rickshaws).  There is still morning price and bargaining in the Night Market, but the Night Market seems tarnished with little appeal.  We preferred walking around, sitting and watching people.  The daytime excitment of the Warorot Market, ringed with Chinese gold shops where Thais shop for household goods, flowers, food and a myriad daily items was much more fun than any of the tourist oriented places.  We did visit our friend Buckley at Kesorn Arts and had fun buying ancient beads and talking about the old days.  I also got to see a magnificent exhibit of antique Chinese robes, shawls, bedspreads and hangings at Lost Heaven.  Sadly, all of them were for sale and none of them even remotely in my price range.  All I could do was sigh.

So now we journey on to an even slower paced country...and we are glad.