Two more days in Chiang Mai down, 2 more to go. During the last two days I feel like I've really seen the place, doing lots of weird and wonderful things:
Exploring Chiang Mai on foot, through into the walled city and exploring the various temples there. A full orchestra was playing in one of the temple complexes, and when the daily thunderstorm came (torrential like you wouldn't believe), they became really very good shelter from the elements.
I also managed to gulp down my first really good latte in a couple of weeks (I can almost smell Caffè Nero getting nearer - roll on Saturday morning!). Free wifi at coffee shops seems almost ubiquitous here, although I noticed at one of the Starbucks I saw you still hve to pay there. Plus ça change and all that. When ordering a tea or coffee anywhere, they'll always ask you if you want it hot or cold, cold drinks, naturally enough, are really popular here.
On leaving the centre of Chiang Mai, we took a tuk-tuk back to the house where we're staying, which is a cross between a taxi and an Alton Towers ride, one foot off the ground and handlebars like a bike rather than a steering wheel. As they're so close to the ground, it really does feel like you're going at a tremendous speed. I was genuinely worried at first, but it soon became fun, except for the fact that we were exactly level with exhaust fume height.
We also visited a brilliant restaurant, within the D2 hotel, which was right in the middle of the night market - the crème brûlées were as good as I've had: even the grim-sounding 5-spice flavoured one was delicious. Galloping to the night market afterwards, it was much calmer than the equivalent would be in other countries, for example, the el- Fnaa Square in Morocco. People also took no for an answer much more readily and a smile always went down well.
There were though, more counterfeit goods here than I've ever previously seen in my entire life, including, bizarrely enough, right next to the 'tourist police' building. Watches, bags, purses, sunglasses were the most obvious, but Wii games, software like Photoshop CS4 (has it even been released yet?), fake flip flops(!) and wooden frogs that make a frog sound by rubbing the wood (whoever though of this had a better brain than me!). The list could go on forever, but I was pleasanly surprised by the respect that the sellers had and the fact it didn't decent into a horibble tourist scrum with people being conned left right and centre.
Today was Doi Souket, a temple high high up into the sky, almost at cloud level. A good 30-minute vertical drive followed by a funicular to get to the very top was rewarded by a view of the whole of Chiang Mai. The ferrol dogs that wander around knew exactly how the funicular worked, dashing in before the door closed, waiting patiently, then dashing out again at the top: almost exactly like the pigeons that use the tube (check YouTube).
Starting to get tourist fatigue now, but still enjoying it immensely.
Other points to note:
There are thousands of mobile shops around, either on motorbikes or from the back of vans. The way everyone drives here, I'm sure some people could legitimately say that they'd been run over by a coffee shop.
There's a huge amount of construction going on here. Female builders working on building sites are as common an occurance as men and it's viewed as completely normal (as it should be).
Whereas American Express seems to be hated by everyone in the UK, who'll only take it as a last resort (apparently they charge double the commission and take ages to settle up), here it seems to be the preferred method of payment. The other day I was even offered a 10% discount for paying with it.
Lots more mosquito bites, even my face isn't immune. I knew there was one of then in my bedroom last night, and sure enough, I woke up with about five new bites. Searching the room, I eventually found it and managed to squash it. On opening my hand, one very squashed and dead mosquito had leaked my own blood all over my hand. Blughh!
And with that lovely image, I'll finish!