The Saturday described in the post “Changthong Heritage Park: Chiang Mai’s Green Museum” didn’t end with me simply walking out of the park.
Although I walked quite a bit in the park, I didn’t even cover 10 kilometers. Most of the day was still left. The sun was shining brightly, so I decided to walk a little more.
On random paths, just the way I like it.
I set off for the city
In this city, I find that if you are born on one side of the road, you will never see the other.
My first room was next to a two-lane road. Beyond the four lanes, I saw all sorts of interesting places, but they were out of reach. I didn’t drink enough to possibly make it between the vehicles. There was an overpass every 5 kilometers.
Here, outside the housing estate, there is a two-lane main road. I haven’t been on the other side of that yet. It would be quite difficult to run across six lanes while looking. If I add to that the fact that I have almost hit a zebra crossing twice in the past few days, it is understandable that I don’t really feel like crossing to the other side.
It’s good for me here, eh. There is certainly nothing interesting there anyway…
On the way to the city, however, I drove along back roads for a while. The first section was so peaceful, you could feel the distance from the main road. The trees here, in their natural place, were beautiful. It seemed natural that these huge trees were part of the street. I would be curious to know how old they could be. And of course, I saw unknown flowers again. It has become almost a habit for me to pick up and look at the fallen beauties.
This entire city – as I experienced it – is spread over a completely flat area, while Doi Suthep mountain stands guard over it from the west. This flat area, with the mountain rising out of nowhere, reminds me of famous scenes from The Lord of the Rings. Sometimes I can already wait for the elves to appear.
The mountain showed its magnificence in a particularly beautiful form, as I approached it towards sunset.
On the road, I also saw a church, just like that, between the houses. Although this sight is not surprising at all, considering that there are about 300 churches in the city. And about 3,000 in the province. But that will be the subject of the next post, I don’t want to rush ahead. The point is that a church that has sprung up out of nowhere no longer causes any particular surprise. In the absence of surprise, all that remains is the enjoyment of its beauty, ornateness, and presence. But that’s enough for me.
It was even more of a surprise that I discovered an old utility object. I haven’t seen anything like this before. In one place, there were two rice mills exposed next to the road. The inscription on it (traditonal rice ngasi) was so charming that I still smile today. They wrote three words on it: one bad English, one good English, and one non-English word, so that a traveler who has never seen such a thing before would have to guess what this object was.
I also came across a Fiat 1100 that wasn’t in the best condition. Despite the fact that it wasn’t in a marketable condition, I really liked it for some reason. It was such an unusual sight, in this city, and indeed in this country, that I couldn’t pass by it without taking a closer look.
You can eat, but it’s harder to drink
By the time I got to the city, I was both hungry and thirsty. By thirsty now I mean I wanted to have a beer and read in between.
I had three books with me. I finished the one on my phone during the long walk, and I didn’t have another one on me. I read the one on my tablet in the botanical garden, but the tablet ran out of juice. Luckily, the only book I brought from Hungary was also in my bag.
So I wanted a place where I could sit down, have a beer, and read in between.
To be honest, it was a strange experience that no matter how many places I went based on random patterns, I almost didn’t come across anything but food stalls and small shops. The classic pub, tavern, or restaurant didn’t come across anywhere.
Finally, I looked for one using Google Maps. Strangely, even though I was on a main road in a big city, the nearest unit to me was 1 km away. So I headed there.
The Taev
However, I didn’t have to go that far. Driving along the chosen path, I suddenly saw a suitable place.
There were chairs under the street lamps, pleasant music was playing, there were people and I saw beer bottles.
After traveling 19 kilometers, I arrived at the Taev bar.
I was immediately greeted and asked to take a seat. The young bar girl immediately took my order and – due to some communication misunderstanding – put not one, but two large bottles of beer in front of me. If this is how it turned out – I thought – then I will drink not one, but two.
I drank peacefully, reading my book. Then suddenly a young guy, Win, who owned the place, came up to me.
From then on we talked. It’s Friday as I write these lines and it so happened that yesterday I took another long walk into the city and in the end I decided to go to this place again. Yesterday I read, had a beer and – after he came – talked to Win for a few hours.
Yesterday is only important because it is part of the story that we both had great conversations. Win also said several times that he hears interesting thoughts and stories from me, and I also expressed my gratitude several times for how much he taught me by taking the time to talk to us.
I learned a lot about the thinking, mentality, and faith of the Thai people. About how the country works, the limited freedom they live in and the fact that surprised me.
We talked about faith, how they practice it or, on the contrary, how they increasingly do not practice it. Win is a lawyer and works with international clients, so he has an outlook on other parts of the world. It was interesting to learn about this country from the thoughts of this world-traveled man.
I learned why I almost got hit on the zebra crossing when he told me about traffic and its dangers and conditions. A Thai person is very considerate, if I need it, they will give me water or even food at any time. But they don’t follow traffic rules. By force. So even though I have priority on the zebra crossing, I always have to be aware that they usually don’t give it to me. I had to agree with him, because I experienced this myself.
My interest in languages was particularly interesting because although they have verbs in their language, they never change. There are no tenses, no personal endings, no verb conjugation. For example, English is difficult for them because of this structural difference. Thai is difficult for me because of the tonality, which he showed me examples of, but – I am ashamed – I had to admit to him that I couldn’t hear the difference between the words he was pronouncing.
There was a guitar corner in the bar. Music stand, microphone. On a sudden idea, I asked if there was a guitar at hand.
There was.
After a little preparation, I played a few songs. They really wanted me to sing, so I sang. After a few songs, I said that I would prefer to sing with others now, so due to the lack of applicants, Win and I sang together. It was really fun to pick up a guitar again after many months of absence.
Time flew by. It was midnight on Saturday and yesterday, when the bar closed. Both times the company had to help me, because Grab didn’t understand my exact home address on Google Maps, so it was difficult to call a taxi. I won’t say that it was comforting, but based on the address I showed from my current apartment, it took even them a few minutes to type in the exact destination.
It was a great day, days, with great memories, great conversations and lots of new knowledge.
Oh, yes. And the beer was incredibly delicious.Buy me a coffee?
If you enjoyed this story, you can buy me a coffee. You don’t have to – but it means a lot and I always turn it into a new adventure.
Buy a coffee for Steve
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Short introduction