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...jump to ChiangMai ...jump to MaeSai Best viewed in 1024x768 screen resolution size. |
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| This is the country home of Intera and Manuk. These are the parents of one of the boys who goes to the school we teach at. Tony and Cate Evans met/taught the boy, Atchaa, last year, and formed a friendship with the parents. They invited Tony and Cate to stay at this country home of theirs for this weekend. Since myself and Adam and Lauren were tagging along, we were also invited to stay. We got the royal treatment. Intera and Manuk (seen below) are two of the most generous and hospitable people i've ever met. I think I said thank you oooh 800 times give or take a few hundred. I am presently 'drawing' this photograph to be framed for them... tougher job than I thought it would be, but they are well worth it. |
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| Another angle shot of Intera and Manuk's country home. You can see Adam and Cate standing on ONE of the decks. |
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| This is a UUUUUUUUUUUGe Bansai tree. More below. |
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| This is a shot of what I call the 'Gonzo Bug'. If you could see it from the side, you'd see his nose is shaped exactly like Gonzo's from the muppet show. It's also 2 inches long in reality. UUUge. He did a fly by and frightened the be'JEEsus outta me so I chased him down and got a snap of the little bugger. |
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| (am i a photographer er whaa??) This is at a 'Wat' (Monk's Temple) in ChiangRai. Religion is LARGE in Thailand. This is inside a very famous Wat where the second 'Emerald Buddha' resides (much more below). This is on the way in the Wat. BEAUDZOID pic. Dragon scam. For some perspective, those dragon heads are around 12 feet tall... |
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| This is the 'Emerald Buddha'. Around 20-30 years ago, the "actual" Emerald Buddha was removed from this Wat in ChiangRai and brought into Bangkok to be safer. THIS statue is actually carved from 'Jade'. It is EXTREMELY sacred and normally no one is allowed to take pictures of it. Since Intera was with us, she told us it was alright to take pictures of it. It's very huge. One of the Monk's sweeping outside asked us where we were from, and when we told him, he told us that the huge chunk of Jade used to make THIS statue was excavated in VANCOUVER CANADA! And shipped to China where Chinese artists and sculpters carved it from one huge chunk. SOLID. |
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| The history of the Emerald Buddha. |
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| Here I am SUPER close to the Buddha. This is the original resting place of the original Emerald Buddha, and the present resting place of Buddha #2, the Jade Buddha. Nice. |
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| This is a picture of the whole group. On the left is Intera, our host for the weekend. |
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| This picture was taken in a museum Intera took us to after we saw the Emerald Buddha. This was the last room we saw. In the background is a 200 year old King's Throne, around 15-20 feet tall, covered in it's original gold leaf. This museum had very special permission from the Monarchy to hold these items. The owner is actually related to the royal family. |
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| This is me on round 3 of a dandy buffet Intera and Manuk held for us at their country home that night. Behind on the left is that UUge Basai tree. |
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| Here I am havin' a stogy with Manuk, Intera's husband. Anybody else think I look like Mayo? This man is the sole supplier to Thailand for hops, barley and malt for "Singha" beer. (compared to Canada that's like Molson Canadian and Labatt Blue together). He grows barley in his own plantations and imports the rest. Cheers. |
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| To start our Elephant run the next day, we first had to take a longtail boat for 1 hour up this river Apocalypse Now style. I decided to snag a few Zzzzzzzs... |
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| Here we go, into the jungle on Elephant back. Leading the way is Tony and Cate, then in front me is Adam and Lauren, and I am on Elephant #3 with our guide. Each Elephant also has an owner/trainer who sits on the head of the Elephant barking orders. Elephants learn alot of commands. |
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| Some of the trek led us under the jungle canopy. |
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| Most of the trek was open air, or climbing mountains. |
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| At the end of the Elephant trek, we got out and walked another 2 hours through the jungle the entire time it POURED down from the heavens... thus no pictures. We were not fully prepared and ended up totally drenched. Thailand is 100% of the time humid, like a sauna, so basically we were never again dry for 2 days. This picture is of a tribal Akha village woman doing her handicrafts as she walks through the village, and most importantly, the elder man with the little child on the right is one of the medicine men in this village (and his grandson). The hut on the far right is where we slept. |
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| Fun and games. This is our guide, (white shirt sitting at the table). His name is Chatree and he is also of Akha decent. He comes from another Akha village. The man who is at the jar is the son of the other medicine man (we are sitting at a table under his house between the stilts). Most importantly check out the UUge jar which he is shoveling out a clear liquid. This is "medicine", and trust me, it heals all. It's alcohol that tastes very much like a cross between scotch and liquid drano straight. We were drinking it from small shot glasses (seen on the table). The medicine man says it wards off mosquitos. I just think after 8 or 9 shots of the stuff, you just don't FEEL the squeeters biting you... The liquid is clear, and at the bottom of the jar is a thick layer of tree bark. I bought a 26er of the stuff before I left the village for a little over $2.00 Canadian, which they thought was far too much to ask for... |
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| A later snap of the boozers in action. Our guide was feelin' no pain at this point I assure you. Strewn about the table are bags of Squid Chips, Pork Rinds, and salted/dried minnows (yes, little fish - baby trout or something), that were heated up and tasted soleed. |
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| After we got sufficiently full of the poison/medicine, and all hands were ready to drop... We were informed "dinner is ready". We entered the family's hut (above), and sat on the floor around a round table which was full of food bowls. We each got a bowl of rice and dug in. We had 3 different kinds of bamboo, chillies, and pickled greens, and several bamboo salads with chicken in it. The shot glass has more pois..er..medicine in it. Tony calls it "kick-a-boo juice". |
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| The next morning during a very similar breakfast, we heard a commotion outside while we ate. It was ALL of the village women who heard we were in "town" breaking out their handicrafts. It was very hard to leave without buying something from every woman, because some looked extremely disappointed when they didn't sell something to us. There was just too many of them. |
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| This guy rules. This is the owner of the house where we ate. He prepared the meals and while we ate, he sat in the dark behind us to watch us eat. I actually saw him snag a free ranged chicken from the ground in the village where hundreds of them live free... and then he cooked it for our supper. Then the hike out of the village the next day he escorted us the whole 2 hours out. Apparently it is a great honour for him to walk us out of the village. check 'im out! sweeet... All along the trail he'd stop periodically and forage around and pick special plants up and put them in his "medicine bag" (in his right hand). He doesn't go far without his machete - DEADLEE. |
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| Super cool plantation, with rice fields in the background we saw on the way out. |
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| ...and then he walked back. |