Thailand is a free and peaceful country. Recently we had the opportunity to live there for a period of one month. It was purely a professional trip for attending the CELTA certificate course. The location was in the north of Thailand in a place named Chiang Mai. We stayed in a resort cum spa known as Vdara.Chiang Mai is far away from the hubbub of the capital city Bangkok. This short stay in the rural country side lies juxtaposed in our mind with the racy life of the cities like Pattaya and Bangkok. CELTA program was a highly demanding one in terms of work and lesson plan preparation. We were free only in the weekends so we tried our best to squeeze in more sightseeing trips on weekeneds.
One of our first trips was to the Wacharatan waterfall situated some 50 kms from the Chiang Mai city centre. It took almost one hour for us to reach the spot which is located in dense reserved forest area.On our way to the waterfalls we visited an an ancient Buddhist temple. The temple was some 600 years old.and it was one of the ancient and historically relevant monuments of Thailand. A Buddhist monastery was attached to the temple and we saw some Americans dressed in the Buddhist attire participating in the holy ceremonies.
The waterfall was a great sight as the whole place was part of the reserve forest.
The huge white column of water cascading down the green mountainous slope offered an excellent view. We decided to spend some more time listening to the thunderous roar of the waterfall. We took our position on the stumps of huge trees Which served as seats in a coffee bar located conveniently next to the waterfalls. We felt the calmness and ferociousness of the surroundings as we sipped coffee and talked to our guide cum driver about the drug related threats in the area. In the coffee shop we befriended two Buddhist monks who were on a journey to discover Thailand. They were quite animated in their conversation and they asked us about the Tibetan monks who were living in exile in India and they were quite happy to know that India is providing the logistical support to the monks in exile. We ended the first day of our trip by eating dinner in an indian restaurant. Thai food was quite bland in taste and we were in search of something to burn our tongues. We enjoyed the food and left the restaurant with our tummy singing 'jai ho'.
The next leg of our sight seeing adventure took us to the Walking street in Chiang Mai. The market extended to 2-3 miles and all sorts of traditional stuff was displayed and sold there.We saw puppetry show from Japan, Chinese lamp sellers, Chihuahua's on display,and lots of Thai food. The walking street looked like a Thai version of R.K Narayan's market place in Malgudi.
The walking street can be termed as the commercial life line of Chiang Mai. The fact that Thai people were dependent on tourism were quite evident from the hustle and bustle of the evening market. The poverty induced misery and hardships were etched on the faces of the locals. They smiled and laughed for the sake of pleasing their buyers and rolled back into their own gloomy world once the transaction is done.Artists performing traditional art forms occupied the middle of the street. They played on some Thai country music with great involvement and vigour. The market and street became too crowded as it became dark. We could see sorts of nationalities there - French, Spanish and even some Indians. Among all the din in the market one little girl stole our attention. She was dressed in the traditional Thai dance costume and swayed to the slow music emanating from the recorder. She reminded us of the exquisite artists made popular by Arthur Gordon in his novel - Memoirs of Geisha.
The girl had a placard in front of her which stated the reason behind her act. It read - No scholarship, Please donate money for my Education.
We took some time visit the Royal Gardens where we saw the Tulip flower festival. The garden housed the Royal palace and horticulture products from around the world. We figured out that the garden stretched for miles and miles. So we hopped into the tour bus and enjoyed the endless flower beds and the world famous topiary of Thai elephants and other things. The royal palace inside the park had elegant wall paintings chronicling the life of King Rama IX,the Great who belongs to the Chakri dynasty. The palace also contained various religious motifs.The tulips that were on display was Siam Tulips which was cultivated only in Thailand and it is different in size and shape from the tulips found in Netherlands. The Royal garden is the permanent venue for the Annual royal flora festival held in the month of december.
(This concludes the first part of Thai diaries. Still to come Life @ CELTA, Bangkok and Pattaya - Illusions and Realties, Train journey from CNX to BKK.)
