THAILAND: First Stop-CHIANG MAI

I'M BACK!!!! And I have a new and profound respect for travel bloggers. How do they keep up with all the names of places they've gone, restaurants they've eaten at, alleys they've wandered down, events they showed up to, and all the things they've seen and people they've met?! I'll try my best anyway.
Thailand surprised me in many ways.
First of all, I was really confused with the currency. It's basically the same as in Taiwan, and that threw me off a lot. Despite prior research I still had it in my head that everything would be dirt cheap in Thailand. Well, 1NTD (Taiwan) =1.01 Baht (Thailand). 30NTD = $1 USD (AMERICAAAA). So I guess, living in Taiwan is dirt cheap too.
Second, tourists in Thailand are not a commodity anymore. They are everywhere, and for the most part have a bad reputation. Thais do not go out of their way to help visitors, unless they can make money off of them. These are just conclusions drawn from my own observations, and experience. And they don't care where you're from either, unless you're me.
My third shock was discovering my alternate ethnicity. Almost every single person I came in contact with in Thailand thought I was Thai as well. They always spoke to me in Thai and when I looked confused, they also got confused. "You look like Thai!! SAME SAME! You not Thai?! WHERE YOU FROM?!" At first I was a bit offended, but after seeing a few pretty Thai girls (...or maybe boys?) I came to terms with it. I do look kinda Thai, because they are slender, petite, have delicate facial structures and are tan. So now we know-I look Thai.
K let's do this. Plane landed in Bangkok, and from there we headed straight up to Chiang Mai. It's the biggest city up North, and famous for lots of things. Such as:

COOKING CLASS: People fly here from all over the world to learn how to make Thai food. Posters for classes were offered at almost all the restaurants and travel agencies we saw, so we did a half day for 700 Baht, cooked up 4 dishes (each was absolutely the best thing I've ever made) and ate it all. I highly recommend Smart Cook School. All the ingredients were super fresh and healthy, kitchen are outside and breezy, aprons were cute, etc. 

 THE NIGHT BAZZAR: There is one huge night market in Chiang Mai. It's packed with fake Ray Bans, Thai art, lamps, colorful bags, jewelry, everything. We ate at this huge seafood pavilion and realized it was Chinese New Year Day when a huge dragon came dancing over everyone! I love dragon dances!! We didn't buy much because the next day we were scheduled for a mountain trek!

LADYBOY SHOW: Can't say you've been to Thailand unless you've dropped in on one of these! I was impressed. Don't know the name of these place, it's in the night market next to where we had dinner!

 MUAY THAI FIGHT: Got convinced by the end of the night to check one of these out. It was pretty authentic, the ring was outside and there were Thai people in the audience. This combat martial art originated from Thailand is very well known and entertaining to watch, if you're into the MMA thing. It's easy to find one, people are along the streets everywhere you go handing out flyers for local fights that happen every night if you're in the city.

MONK CHAT: Boyfriend found this temple where we could go to and talk to a monk about anything. Although I am pretty grounded in my beliefs, I have a lot of respect and am always interested in learning more about other religions. I was surprised at how young our monk was (my age) and he was rather handsome too. Turns out every Thai man has to be a monk for some time of his life, whether he wants to dedicate years or just a week, before marriage. It was just casual conversation, and I enjoyed hearing Buddhism explained by a monk. If you're ever in the area, check it out! 

Okay, so the purpose of us going up to Chiang Mai was to do an overnight trek up into the village tribes. Admittedly this wasn't my idea but I wasn't opposed. I like adventure, and finding adventures is cake in Thailand. Streets are packed with adventure agencies, so we easily booked a 2 day 1 night trip that included tons of stuff, and we did it all. 

 Butterfly and orchid farm! Random, but it was first place they shuttled us to. 

 One hell of a hike, about 4 hours. The sights were enjoyable, and it was HOT! 

 We stayed over night in this huge bamboo house on stilts. It was just like camping in the ol' days, but just not in a log cabin or a tent. Okay la. 

 Next morning, we went on a small hike and then to the Elephant Riding place. I rode an elephant, but was shocked when our driver started whacking the poor beast on the head w a metal rod. It was terrible, and I will never do it again. Here is me sadly petting a baby in chains. I was embarrassed for not researching and being only vaguely aware of how badly these animals are being treated in this industry. Here is a good article and short clip on what goes on behind elephant riding camps.

 Bought stuff from a long-neck 'village'. Really just gift shops with Burmese women selling their handiwork! 

 Zip-lining with our crew! 

Waterfall-enjoying

 Bamboo rafting! Here are the boys from our travel group, a mix of Canadians and English dudes.

Lastly, white water rafting. Oh, how I wish I had gotten a waterproof camera for this! Rowing on a raft with rapids and rocks is a lot harder than dragon boat rowing, but fun. 

After we got driving back into town, we grabbed dinner at the Sunday Market and then jumped on the bus to start our journey down south for the islands!!

The Versatile Blogger Award

My fabulous South African friend and fellow blogger Liesl from Pretty.Random.Things  has nominated me for this award! Thanks girl! Now it is my duty to: 

-Nominate other bloggers I love 

-Let them know I've nominated them 

-Share 7 random facts about myself 

-Thank the blogger who nominated me 

-Add this award to my post

At least, I hope that's how it works. Let's go! 

I nominate my talented, truthful and heartfelt blogger friends: 

Jamie's blog

Didi's blog 

Victoria's blog 

Nicki's blog 

(The Tumblr ones still work but won't highlight lol)

Okay now 7 random facts about me: 

1. I'm laying on my stomach on my yoga mat in the kitchen floor typing this. I prefer it over the couches and bed cause it makes me feel athletic. 

2. I really like using coasters. 

3. I've been cooking over my studio's one-stove top kitchen the past week. 

4. Oh, and I won a toaster oven from my company's year-end dinner. 

5. I've started taking One A Day Women's Vitamins. 

6. I teach kindergarten at an international school in Taipei and my kids are all loosing their teeth. 

7. I love amber ales and they are so rare here. 

8. I hate going to gyms. 

9. I take bus 311 to work and back almost every day cause the MRT is too crowded. 

10. I am going to Thailand in two days and Boyfriend will meet the parents there! 

Thanks again Liesl!  Sorry I took so long to repost :) 

A Day in Keelung

Inspired by Anthony Bourdain's episode of Layover Taipei (EXCELLENT PORTRAYAL OF THE FOOD CULTURE), Boyfriend and I decided over breakfast yesterday morning to make a day trip out to Keelung to explore. Keelung is a port city of located in Northern Taiwan, only a 50 minute train ride from Taipei Main Station but a completely different feel. As soon as we got off the train and walked a few minutes over to the waterfront, it felt exactly like Seattle. The air was fresh and salty-I could see cargo ships everywhere as we sat on by the docks to map out what we wanted to do. As almost always, the weather was beautiful.

Since we were only there for the day, we stayed around East Keelung. Downtown is small, a few main streets with lots of exciting dark alleys and the famous MiaoKou Night Market. We walked through the markets and were surprised that lots of stands were already open, and they all had English signs showing what kinds of cuisine were being served. We wandered through some back streets and up a mountain looking for the ZhongZheng Park, which was supposed to have a birds eye view of the city. It was just a random destination, and we enjoyed the journey there. Oh, what fun it is to just go somewhere new to see what you can see! (Actually, as I attached that link I realized we never made it there! I never saw that statue!!!! Oh well, we were SOMEwhere!)

After we were satisfied with our pictures, we embarked back down to the city center and took Bus 101 to Helping (Hoping) Island, less than half an hour up further north to see these cool rock formations I've been wanting to check out for years! Unfortunately, as soon as we stepped off the bus the temperature seemed to have dropped dramatically and I was freezing! If you come to Keelung, bring a jacket!! I could feel the misty/stickiness of the ocean. It's a small little park with a pathway around these rocky shores, and people can walk down to take pictures of these crazy twisted rock formations. 

Back downtown, we combed through MiaoKou Night Market, overwhelmed with the variety of food everywhere. I have been to a lot of night markets, but this one was just insane. Everything I've ever had at a night market was there, and more. Actually at one point I felt nauseous from all commotion and overload of mixed smells. I wish we had taken a picture of the crap load of food Boyfriend and I brought on the train with us to have on the way home. On that day, we had salad rolls, gua bao, fish tempura, oyster omelette, stone cooked corn, wild boar meat, fried crab, starchy stuff I don't even know, egg tart, ginger hot chocolate, etc.

Anyway, like Boyfriend said, it was an excellent way to prepare our appetites for our upcoming holiday-THAILAND!

Don't make decisions when you're angry.

Don't make promises when you're happy.

...and don't text when you're drunk. 

A Tuesday

Today we checked out the Taipei Fine Arts Museum that I have been curious about since moving here. I used to love going to museums back in Portland, but in Taipei the opportunity rarely arises. Maybe cause my friends all love sport, food and parties more than art?!

Anyway, it was all super contemporary, a little more than I could handle. It was Andy Warhol who once famously quoted: "Art is anything you can get away with" and boy, he knew what he was talking about.

Maybe I'm just not artistic enough to appreciate a bunch of plastic buckets taped together with a garbage bag. Or tables with a printer on them. I spent about an hour in that museum in a state torn between amusement, boredom, and confusion. The most interesting 'exhibit' was actually a form of animal abuse trying to get by as 'art'. There was a little cute black bird in a cage in an all-white room with speakers just blasting the sentence 'My name is Little Black' in over 400 different languages. I think the bird at some point was meant to repeat or learn how to regurgitate the phrase but it just hung out. I hope someday Little Black will escape and fly free!

Anyways, then we wandered around that area and ate at a park. Then went for a jog along the riverside and had dinner at our favorite Japanese restaurant blah blah blah blah. Oh, the stove got fixed, that was exciting too. Now I have no excuses to not learn how to cook. My life is full of thrills!!!!!

Sun Moon Lake

There is a place in Taiwan where lovers go. It has claimed to be the most romantic, most scenic spot in Taiwan, and it's called Sun Moon Lake. Guess where my boyfriend wanted to go for his birthday! So off we went over the first weekend of 2013. You can go by either HSR or bus, and we chose the bus to avoid transferring down in Taichung. Sun Moon Lake is a lake in the middle of Taiwan, surrounded by mountains and next to Nantou, home of One Piece Theme Park and an aboriginal village!
We were excited to ditch a dreary, rainy week of Taipei weather for some warm sunshine and a brilliant blue sky when we arrived! We quickly figured out that our resort was on the other side of the lake, and our first view of the lake was from a 50NT ferry ride over it.

We checked in, and grabbed our bikes to start exploring only to discover that there wasn't much to do around the area, just a little open town square and aboriginal-styled stands and shops selling guabao and sunglasses. We decided to park the bikes and take cable cars from the lakeside over to the theme park for the day. I have been to the One Piece Theme Park/Aboriginal Village before, and it was just as I remembered it-lovely, sunny, and uncrowded. There are only really like five good rides, but since there aren't any lines you can go on them as many times as you like. Boyfriend and I jumped on to every ride, fearless, and laughed ourselves silly from the queasiness til we got soaked on the 'Caribbean Splash'. The cable cars stopped running at 4:30pm so we headed back to the lake to catch the sunset.

THE NEXT DAY was adventure day-we were determined to bike around the lake. We had heard about a famous scenic bike trail, and so we set off early in the morning to conquer it. There is only one path around the lake, so you can't get lost. If you know me at all, you know that biking is NOT my favorite outdoor activity. However, if all conditions are optimal (perfect weather, flat trail, good company and pretty views) I will go. For the first two hours or so of our bike ride, this was not the case. The view was pretty but it was all uphill on a twisty concrete road, and the end was no where in sight. However with the persistance and annoying encouragement from my fitness-crazed boyfriend we finally hit flat ground, and the legendary spectacular bike trail after all. We could NOT stop taking pictures-it was too gorgeous and so worth it.

BEFORE

AFTER

We reached the opposite side of the lake where we took the ferry from, after about four hours. This part of the lake was a bit more lively-swarming with tourists actually-and we had lunch on the sun-shiny boardwalk. Thankfully, bikes were allowed onto the ferry for extra charge and we didn't have to bike the rest of the way around the lake to get back to our stuff. We packed up, and strolled around enjoying the view a bit before heading back to Taipei.

First Hike of the Year!

My friend Paul invited us to go on a hike last Saturday, and what a hike it was!!  We met up on Saturday morning in Muzha, and took a cab to an intersection in the middle of nowhere. The English name and directions are unknown, apart from what you can tell from this map.

The hike started off with concrete steps for the first 20 mins, so I ate a pizza bagel and lagged behind til the boys were out of sight. I wore the same shirt I slept in cause 1) I was lazy/half-asleep and 2) I thought it would be short hike. The terrain eventually evolved and soon we were pulling ourselves up with ropes and dangling on metal chain ladders! It was actually pretty dangerous in some areas, and we heard that lots of people have died trekking this mountain before they put in all the ropes and ladders. The hike turned out to be very popular-we ran into tons of people and even a tour group!! The path was very narrow and there were a lot of roots, rocks and dirt…yes, like a hiking trail. I hadn’t been on a hike for a really long time, and this one felt like it went on forever, in a good way. 

We made it to the ‘end’ which was just a really high point of the mountain, although signs had eluded to a lake-nowhere to be seen nor heard of. It was beautiful. The whole hike took about 5 hours total, starting and ending at the Muzha MRT. Sometimes I love feeling like I live nowhere near a city and going on hikes really helps.  Fresh air is good, y’all!! 

Oh, the next day was my first rowing practice of the year as well! Kazu (one of the captains from last year) has been setting them up every weekend and Sunday was the first time I could make it this month! I LOVE BEING ON A BOAT IN THE RIVER ON A SUNNY DAY. Although we won't be starting real practices until March, it was good to see familiar faces and meet new potential teammates. ****IF YOU LIVE IN TAIPEI AND IS INTERESTED IN JOINING THE BEST DRAGONBOAT TEAM IN TAIWAN, PLEASE COME LET ME KNOW**** 

****PS. See my shirt? It's a GAELIC FOOTBALL jersey and we are also starting to recruit for next season. So, IF YOU LIVE IN TAIPEI AND WANT TO PLAY-LET ME KNOW!****