I've been in a few places since the last blog, so I'm gonna try to cram them all into blog. A lot of the last few days was spent chilling on a hammock, so there aren't as many pictures. Not to say that I haven't had an eventful time since the last blog. I went to Pai, a little hippy town in the Northwest of Thailand, planning on staying there 2 days, but I ended up staying 4, and easily could've stayed 4 more but I forced myself to leave. It was just such a relaxing place to be, and time just moved slower there.
This is Indira cottages, the place I spent my first night in Pai. It's just a bunch of bungalows right on the river, and was really nice. I couchsurfed again for the first night in Pai, and I stayed with Sarah, a ladyboy who runs the cottages. Staying with a ladyboy was a really interesting experience, and I learned a lot about ladyboys, what their life is like, and how tough it is for them, even in such an open culture. Sarah was born a man, but from a very young age knew that she was a female inside. But she lived a lot of her life without doing anything about it. She is now in her early 40s, but only got the sex change operation in the last few years.
There are many ladyboys in Thailand, for a few reasons that I can see. Thai culture is strongly influenced by the Buddhist religion, which is mostly focused on reducing suffering, attaining nirvana, and showing lovingkindness to all creatures. This makes Thai culture very openminded, and also very friendly. So there is not as much hatred and prejudice as in most western cultures, which lack this Buddhist perspective. Secondly, and Sarah told me this, Thai people are slightly androgynous, and Thai boys look a lot more like Thai girls than most ethnicities, and so it is easier for them to make the switch. Third, the sexual tourism industry is a major factor in the Thai economy, and the amount of money for a ladyboy to make is enough to at least be a factor in many of their decisions, and the prevalence of ladyboys presents the option to many who in western cultures would never consider making the switch, even if they should.
Given all of this though, Sarah still has a tough time fitting in to Thai society. She works as a co-owner of a guesthouse, which has nothing to do with her being a ladyboy, but still sees some prejudice from Thai people and even more from foreigners. Sarah doesn't have much trouble, however, finding drunk and curious foreigners to hook up with, but this isn't what she wants. Sarah just wants to feel like a woman, and would rather hold a guys hand or cuddle than have sex with a drunk guy. Sarah cherishes every moment like this, and it is tough because her appearance causes them to be scarce.
I could talk all day about all that I learned from Sarah, but I'm tired and you all are probably bored. Suffice to see that I am very glad I met her, and it was very illuminating to see life from such a different perspective.
This is Shisha, the dog that lives at the cottages, and follows you around whenever you go into town.
This is Sarah's cottage. Just you and nature.
I spent the first night staying on Sarah's couch, then the next 3 nights at an awesom hostel called Spicypai. This is the view of the common room from one of the hammocks, the place I spent the majority of my time in Pai.
This is the field beside the hostel, which was about a 10 min walk out of town. There were usually a few cows grazing.
My spot.
So when you want to get anywhere around Pai, or you don't want to walk 15 minutes just to grab some food, you motorbike. They rented them out from my hostel, and pretty much everybody in the hostel had one rented. Now as many of you may know, I don't even know how to ride a bicycle, so I was pretty skeptical about renting a motorbike. I was pretty sure if I got on that thing I would crash and die. But everyone was doing it, many for the first time, so I decided to give it a try.
Me riding my motorbike. I drove it around the hostel for about half an hour, swerving all over the place and nearly crashing about every 10 seconds. But it started to get a little easier, and after a while a ig crew from the hostel was going to the Pai hot springs, and they convinced me it would be fine to drive there, about 10 min away on the motorbike. The roads were long and straight, and there was very little traffic besides other motorbikes and the occasional elephant (we passed 2 on the way there). So I went for it and I made it there in one piece, and only swerved off the road twice. But going on the long straight roads actually was pretty easy, and was fun too, as long as I was sure I wasn't going to crash in the next few seconds.
My motorcycle gang, the Spicy Pandas.
The next day, we went to this awesome waterfall, with a big natural slide built into the rocks that you could go down. This was about a 30 minute motorbike ride, and a lot harder than the one before, but I actually felt reasonably comfortable on this trip. The only time I still feel pretty bad is sharp turns and when people or cars are around. There was a crazy little Thai kid at the waterfall, maybe 8 years old, who would provide the foreigners entertainment. He would surf down the rock slide on his feet, or moon the crowd then go down bare ass, and get a good laugh. And he would find the se leech-like tadpoles and go around throwing them on the guys, who would be acting all cool with the girls they were with but then would freak out when they found a tadpole on their shoulder. And one time the kid swam up to me in the water and jumped on my back, so I grabbed him and launched him into the air a few feet and into the pool. At first he tried to say no, but then after I did it he kept coming back for me to do it again.
Not too many pictures with this one, I kinda got lazy with the camera for a few days. But Pai was awesome, I stayed for double what I planned to, just cause it was such a chill place. I met a ton of cool people, and went out and had a blast in town every night.
But alas, all good things come to an end. But at least in my case they are replaced with other good things, as I went to Mae Sai for a couple days then am going on to Laos. I don't have time now to talk about Mae Sai, which was also really fun, but I will try to do another blog in the next couple days about it. Until then,
Sewadee krap
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