My Friend Fawn Visits Thailand

We went to the mountains about 2-3 hours away....more words and descriptions to come shortly.

About this... well, we were going up a steep mountain and my gas tank was emptying quicker than normal (since there were two of us on it, and going up a mountain) so Fawn generously offered to walk up the rest, or until I was able to find some gas at the top and come back down for her. But she was picked up along the way by this nice Thai family from Chiang Mai.


What a view!


Doi Angkahn- (Angkahn Mountain).
We finally made it up to the top. This area used to be deforested and used for opium poppy growth, but now the Princess Mother reforested it and its now an organic farming area with a great restaurant with fresh veggies just picked from the gardens!







On a new route down the mountains they still use small horses for transport.


And they have the sasquatch here too. We caught it on film.


Little Thai Switzerland.


Tha Ton, a city.



A wat on top of a mountain in Tha Ton, even the dog is at peace.


Another view from Tha Ton wat.


Grazing water buffalo.


Our favorite elephant!!!!! She's 6 months old and really likes to play and runs really fast, and farts like a music box.


Fawns wish come true- hugging an elephant.




I love her too!


And of course a trip to Thailand wouldn't be complete without seeing some baby monkies!


These monkies live just 20 min away from school along the same mountain range.


After the monkey caves climb up to the actual caves.


Look out at the top.


Doi Wow, in Mae Sai


Fawn- watch out for forest fires.


Ma Fa Luang Gardens just 40 mins from Mae Sai- this place also used to be poppy fields for opium. not any more!!!! ha ha ha Ps, i'm under a man made waterfall.


Real coloring! wow.


more manicured gardens.


oh how'd this get here. the last night this big bug flew to our porch while we were hanging out. its about 4 inches long.

Rice Paddies and Springs

Last weekend we went to a friends home town about 2 hours away from Mae Sai. His family grows rice.

Here is a rice paddy in his front yard.


We also went to a natural spring loaded with calcium, it was also a waterfall.


The rocks in the waterfall had become totally covered with calcium from the spring source. You were able to walk up the waterfall because the texture was very porous, almost like walking on very smooth barnacles.


a tree in the way


On the way back we stopped at another natural spring. This one piping hot- 90 degrees Celsius. They'd built this guard rail, and there were people selling eggs that you could boil in the water, once you dropped them down in a basket. cool....or hot.

Day Walk to Doi Wow

I went on a day field trip with the kids just to a temple a little bit away from the school. On the way back we stopped at another temple who is friends with our school, and they gave us a sweet little lunch.

the kids loved it and pretended they were at a restaurant, they especially liked the dessert of bananas in coconut milk.

Misc.

So what we got going on here is 3 small ants carrying 1 large ant up the wall and out the window. Quite miscellaneous.


The store I bought the Cheese for the Lasanga at in Chiang Mai, called Rim Ping. And yes if you look closely, it says organic in above the vegetables. And I'm supposed to look happy, but really it looks like I'm overwhelmed with emotions of all the western selections in the grocery store...but give me a break, its been almost a year that I've been here in Thailand.


A waterfall just outside of the city of Chiang Mai.


A friendly dragon fly.


Not so friendly spider no.1.


Not so friendly spider no.2. (both found on the same day). They were bigger than the palm of my hand.

Cute Things Section

cute shirt- molli I told you about this one- buttons, a bow, plaid, and polka dots. Who knew it could work all together. I bought it at the night bazaar in Chiang Rai. Only about $5.


Cute skirt from Big C. Big and small polka dots, and flowers.


A cool big bag from the Chiang Mai, thought it'd be good for carrying all my goodies on the subway, when I move back to New York.


Random- so our neighbor down the driveway was having a funeral. This is it. If you look closely you can see the elaborate casket (gold with red) on top of the dragon with red glowing eyes. And the lights around the dragon are colored vertical florescent lights. And on top of it all, they had monks chanting until late every night for a week. Kinda weird, especially that all of this was just set up in the middle of the main neighborhood road.


Lychee season, they're so ripe, the trees are drooping.


I began teaching silk screening to about 10 boys, as a vocational skill. Here's our first test screen.

The Solar Oven

There were some good days and bad days. My sister, Tana, who's totally awesome, might I mention, she introduced me to solar cooking. Here is my cooker:


A simple car windshield screen folded into a cone, then a black painted pot with an oven bag around it to help insulate.

These biscuits started as a good day- ended up being a bad day.


Here they are halfway thru the day...looking good, just a few more hours to go. But alas, the wind knocked the cooker over, and ants got inside and were all over the biscuits, especially the jelly filled ones.


A good day! Lasagna.


Looks great, right? Tasted pretty good too. I used some ricotta and moz cheese I bought in Chiang Mai. Here's my second serving. yums.


Another bad day, yet ok. I tried making some bread in the cans, and warming up the leftover lasagna. The lasagna worked.


I thought the bread worked...


But the bread didn't work. Not enough rise and too buttery.

maybe another sunny day will come along...but prolly not too soon, with it being rainy season now.