Fray Adventures

Mike and I took off for Thailand on December 24th and landed in Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand just before the stroke of midnight. Before I get started on our vacation though, I thought I would share a bit of geography and pre-emptively answer the geography questions you might have.

Thailand is a long skinny country on a peninsula that juts off Souther China. It shares the peninsula with Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos, Malaysia and Singapore. That is a alot of countries on one, relatively small peninsula. It is above the equator, so shares the same seasons with Korea and the US, but significantly South, so their winters feel more like summers to us. Note

Here is a map and the red line is the connection between Seoul and Thailand. Since Thailand is such a popular tourist destination, direct flights from Seoul are pretty widely available, although a rip-off during the holidays.

Here is a close up of Thailand. We flew into Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand and then flew out of Phuket in Southern Thailand. It was about a 2 hour flight between the two cities to give you an idea of distance on this map. Note that Bangkok is the capital city and you will find it in the center of the country. We didn't have a chance to visit Bangkok, but chose Chiang Mai as we heard it was smaller and more laid back.

Now that we have the geography lesson completed and you can picture where we were, let's start with Chiang Mai.

Chiang Mai is in Northern Thailand up in the mountains. It is a beautiful town, very well set up to cater to tourists. The people are kind, there are no large hotel chains and I think it was a great experience to feel the culture. We landed in Chiang Mai at almost midnight Christmas Morning, just in time to celebrate my birthday!

Chiang Mai is actually a walled city. The wall is still intact and
surrounds the city in a square. In fact, there is actually still a moat
inside the city walls.

Our first hotel in Chiang Mai was within the Old City walls. It was a quaint little boutique hotel called the Bodhi Serene. Doesn't look like much from the outside, but very nice inside the walls. It was a great location near the markets and temples, so we could walk and avoid getting hustled by the taxi cab drivers...they love to hustle tourists.

We arrived at our hotel about 1AM Christmas Morning and were greeted with fireworks in the streets outside out hotel, which continued throughout the night. Location of the hotel was great for sight-seeing, but not good for quiet nights. We would soon discover that fireworks are very poplar in Thailand and I don't think we had one night without them lulling us to sleep :-)

Our second hotel rocked. It was closer to the river, was quieter and so pretty.

They even did our laundry and gave it back to us in these great little packets for $2!

After a great night sleep in out first Thailand hotel, were off to out Thai cooking class...my choice as my birthday present.

Thailand is full of cooking schools that cater to tourists. Other than Southeast Asia, I don't think cooking classes are a norm for vacations, but since Southeastern Asian food is just soooo delicious and a bit exotic to Westerners, taking a cooking class is pretty much a prerequisite for a Thai vacation.

And...ours lived up to the expectations. Our teach, Yui, was a Thai woman and the class was at her house. We have two other Americans (that live in India) in our class. Small world looms again...one of the Americans grew up just 20 minutes from Mike outside of Pittsburgh.

Our class started at 9AM and we cooked through until 5PM with a total of 6 dishes and a trip to the local market in there as well. It was one of my favorite days and the best Thai food we had the entire vacation!

Enjoying out first dish of six that day...Pad Thai!

Preparing my Spring Rolls!

Yui on the right telling us about the fruits at the local market

Yui's house. The cooking school was called A Lot of Thai. I would
highly recommend it.

Mike preparing to cook Green Curry Chicken...yum!

The next two days were a mixture of massages, temples, lots and lots of eating and shopping in the local markets. It was wonderful.

Anywhere you go in Thailand, you will find massage parlors. I have no idea if all of them are legitimate, but both Mike and I indulged in a few massages...great deal for 2 hours of full-body massages for $20! How can you say no.

Every third store front was a massage parlor. In
Thailand, if you have a couple of comfortable chairs and
some space on the sidewalk, you had a massage parlor!

And...we ate. Warning: The following pictures may make you feel queezy or just leave you with a sheer curiousity of how we could have possibly eaten this much food in just 7 days!

My now favorite food in the whole world...
Sticky Rice with Mango. No joke here. It
melts in your mouth. Had it at every meal!

Pad Thai, Pad Thai, Pad Thai. Need I say more...

Thanks Mike for capturing me at most beatiful moments...with my mouth full of food.

Happy Mike! Why, you ask...Pad Thai, of course.

Happy Jen! Why, you ask? Fresh Coconut Water on the beach, Fresh Fruit Smoothies, Coconut Cream ice cream served in a coconut and curry masaman, of course! What more can a girl ask for?

No need to move from your beach chair in Phuket.
Pad Thai comes to you!
Thai Guy: "That will be $2 please."
Mike: "Gladly"

Me, again with food in my mouth enjoying the
ribs at our New Years Eve Buffet

Yes, there was food, food and more food and it was delicious.

Then, after the food, there were temples and lots of them. I have hundreds of pictures of the temples and if you are interested in seeing more, check out our Picassa pages.
http://picasaweb.google.com/jonofray/Thailand?authkey=Gv1sRgCL-T14j1hMe0PQ&feat=directlink

Here, I will just give you my Top 5 (kind of).

Mike and I both felt like this after all of our eating...
Full & Happy! Praise the Big Buddha!

And...we enjoyed this. Sleep with no alarm clocks!
Yeah for the Sleeping Buddha.

This was a NO! NO! at temples, but you know Mike...
he is quite the crazy one! Trying to make a fun picture
at the temples.

Buddha...and lots of them.

And...your final cultural picture from Thailand...a Buddha!

I think over 90% of the population is Buddhist, so you can imagine how many temples they need.

And, finally there was shopping. Clothing for $2, jewelry for $4, Pad Thai for $1, scarves for $1, tshirts for $2. It was glorious and Mike so sweetly came along for the ride. Chiang Mai had three major markets and we did 2 of them. The Saturday Walking Street is where hindreds of vendors line up on Saturday until midnight to sell their goods and the Night Bazaar which appened every night. Both were just a few blocks from our hotels, so it was wonderful.

There was so much more to Thailand, but in order to not make this too long...I will leave you with some self-portraits of Mike & I throughout our vacation. Our Thailand Photo Montage!

And...Mike's favorite!!!

More about Phuket in Thailand Part Deux!

Hello 2011!

I have to admit that I didn't make any official New Years Resolutions this year. It just seems kind of silly and I don't know anyone who has ever kept a resolution throughout the entire year.

But, I do understand the concept. A turn of the calendar page to the new year offers a fresh start for many people...a reason to take that extra step to get out for that morning run. I just had my fresh start a little earlier in the year. Instead of using New Years, I actually made my resolutions back in August when Mike and I moved to Seoul. With this type of move and the big change for us, it brought so many opportunities for me to experience all of that stuff I was too busy for at home. I decided and resolved to take this time I had to experience life! I think I have acheived some steps towards that so far, but know there is so much more...

With all of that cheesiness aside, today I found a book that really resonated with me and my resolutions for this year and I wanted to share it with you. It is called The Book of Awesome. I have not read the entire book and cannot claim that it is earth shattering information, but gosh...it makes sense. And for me, it leaves me with this urge to go out and DO SOMETHING! I feel energized, empowered and happy.

The Book of Awesome is written by a normal guy (although from Canada) that had crap happen in his life and he needed an excuse to wake up every morning, so he started a blog called 1000 Awesome Things...it became hugely popular and years later...here it is as a Top Selling Book. The part that I like...he reminded me of all of the awesome things I experience here everyday in this new world in Seoul. Some things leave me feeling like a 3 year old again while other things bring me to tears in laughter. I have this unbelievable experience of living in a whole new country across the world and having the time to experience it all. I want to soak it all in...and hopefully share a bit with all of you out there too!

So, no better time to start than now. Totally and completely stealing the Book of Awesome Idea, I thought I would share some Awesome things about Korea with you. It won't be every post, but as they come to mind. I hope you enjoy! And if you feel like sharing some awesome things back...I would love it!

I thought I would start with one of the first Awesome things I experienced here in Seoul:

Awesome Things about Korea #1: Paris Croissant!

Yes. I said Paris Croissant in Seoul. I have no idea if this is a phenomenae across Korea or just in Seoul, but the city is flooded with French Pastry Shops with names like Paris Baguette and Paris Croissant. It is my downfall. I have been to Paris and the pastries don't get much better...that is, if you like food.

Everyday, you can see the pastry chefs making fresh pastries that morning. This is no removing frozen pre-prepared goods from wrappers and defrosting or microwaving them. (I won't say who I am talking about Starbucks!!) These are fresh baked butter croissants where every buttery layer flakes off in your hand and melts in your mouth. They have cinnamon buns that would put Cinnabon in your local mall out of business. They have muffins and cookies, apple pies and blueberry whachamacalllits. It is delightful!

It is a wonderful day to stop in...get a great cup of cofee, a butter croissant and sitting on their plush couches with fluffy pillows and read all of the world news on my iphone via their free wifi. What a great world!

Thank you Korea for introducing me to French Pastries!