Out Of Chiang Mai

Location: Mai Rim, Chiang Mai, Thailand
Local Time: Friday, June 30, 2006 - 4:46pm

Well, I'm out of the city of Chiang Mai for a while, though I'm still in the province of Chiang Mai. I'm at the Love Animal Sanctuary near Mai Rim, about 12km north of Chiang Mai.

Water buffalo, cows, dogs, cats, geese (including one that bows to me in greeting), ducks, two monkeys, a civit cat and a heart broken goat inhabit this place. So far I've worked on mosquito netting for the buffalo house, groomed dogs and tried to hang a gate into the buffalo pen.

Marianne broke her wrist, so I'm currently also the designated driver. Did you know they put the steering wheel on the wrong side of the vehicle, causing me to bang my knuckles on the door each time I go for the gear stick. However, the key is on the right side of the steering wheel, which means it's no longer on the inside of the steering wheel.

It's all quite confusing.

Visa Run

Location: Chiang Mai, Thailand
Local Time: Monday, June 26, 2006 - 6:00pm

Well, I'm back in Chiang Mai. My Thai tourist visa was starting to expire, so I did what is known in the Thai traveller's colloquial as a visa run. Which means I ran for the nearest border, crossed out and crossed right back in again. It took about half an hour. After I got to the border that is.

Val and I rented a motorcycle (Honda CB 400, very nice) and rode up to Chiang Rai, about 180km north of here. It is a lovely little city, which is not quite as nutty and commercialized and touristized as Chiang Mai. The road was a very nice twisty little piece, which took over 3 hours to ride. The forest covered mountains are pretty amazing through there.

Val stayed in Chiang Rai Sunday (she didn't need a visa renewal) and I rode another 70km north to Mae Sai, the northern most town in Thailand. There I walked across the border, out to Thailand and into no-man's land.

I tried to cross back into Thailand again, but the Thai immigration officer informed me that I need a Myanmar stamp in my passport. I can't just go out and then come back. I've got to go out TO somewhere. So, I went over to the Myanmar immigration, and they stamped me into Myanmar and then stamped me out again, right there, no problem. I think they get a lot of that. 250 bhat (~ $6.25CND) was the charge for entering Myanmar (and leaving again). Then I wandered back to the Thai border and entered Thailand again. I'm good for another month of hot Thai weather.

Foooooood ...

Location: Chiang Mai, Thailand
Local Time: Thursday, June 22, 2006 - 10:58am

Monastery food is bad. Real food is good. Hmmm.

He's Back ...

Location: Chiang Mai, Thailand
Local Time: Tuesday, June 20, 2006 - 4:02pm

Okay, I'm back. Now, whoever promised to reveal the meaning of life, please e-mail me that information.

Also, I enjoyed the deluge of e-mails I recieved while I was gone. It was great to feel appreciated. If your e-mail was not in the afore mentioned deluge, I just want you to know, better late than never.

Please Do Not Disturb

Location: Chiang Mai, Thailand
Local Time: Monday, June 12, 2006 - 7:20am

I'm off for about 2 weeks. Back later.

Back in Chiang Mai again

Location: Chiang Mai, Thailand
Local Time: June 8, 2006 - 10:16am

Well, after hanging around in Bangkok for a couple of days, we caught the night bus out of there. We arrived in Chiang Mai at 6am this morning (a mere 10.5 hour ride) and we're back at the Royal Guest House, where rooms are an affordable 200 TBT (~ $5) / night.

They seem to have painted since I was last here. Dark red with gold leaf imprints on the walls. Which is a lovely color and decoration scheme, but too dark. It makes the hallways shadowy.

Chiang Mai looks nice and familiar, and it is a relief to be back again. I'm planning on going out for a nice breakfast burrito this morning, with a large mango shake to wash it down. Hmmm.

Bangkok

Location: Bangkok, Thailand
Local Time: Monday, June 5, 2006 - 3:00pm

Well, I'm back in Bangkok. Plane landed okay, didn't flip over or anything like that.

I've been staying at a place in Chinatown called My Hotel. You know, I have never yet met a Chinese traveller, but there are Chinatowns all over the world. I've been busy reading some of the signs written in Chinese. It's pretty cool. Those squiggly looking things are actually words. Who knew? I always thought it was a big massive conspiracy to intimidate non-Asian people and keep them out of Richmond.

In the next day or two Val and I are going up to Chiang Mai. It's a lovely place, and they have a nice monastery where I can find some peace and quiet. Except for the dogs that bark at the gong every morning at 4am. Other than that, it's pretty perfect.

I'm Gone

Location: Bangkok, Thailand
Local Time: Saturday, June 3, 2006 - 12:11pm

Finally, a change of city. Beijing is beautiful, and I'll be going back some time, but it was getting monotonous always entering the same location in my blog.

Now, I get to put a new city up there. Bangkok.

And that will change, Because I'm not staying here long. Bangkok has a nice international airport, and it is a good place to leave. I'm thinking, maybe an island retreat.

The Great Firewall of China, Strikes Again

Location: Beijing, China
Local Time: Thursday, June 1, 2006 - 9:00am

A day and a half to go and I'll be flying to Bangkok. Phad thai is waiting for me.

In the mean time, for the second time in 2 days, gmail is unavailable. The Chinese sensorship has decided that access to google is subversive, or something, or maybe they've just screwed up again, who knows.

When I was working for Newbridge, we found out that at a very well known telecommunication company, it was a coop student who was making all of the circuit changes to the ATM network that provided services to all of their big, high paying customers. We got a bit of a laugh out of that.

Maybe it's a Chinese coop student who is in control of the firewall rules that control China's censorship of the Internet. Maybe it was an accidental screwup that is now blocking access to gmail.

I'm not laughing anymore. This is email, damn it. This is serious stuff.