Thailand....the land of smiles/ Tai - naeratuste maa

well,
it all started differently. I had a flight from Auckland to Sydney. Then it was raining and storming there, so our flight was delayed. Next to me was sitting alcohol-drinking old couple...well not heavily...but I admired the lady, who could sleep her head just standing up...amazing...I was having hard time there...my longest flight ever.. almost 9 hours...I will never get myself window seat when I have to fly so long...everytime I felt guilty when I wanted to leave my seat to walk around...but I watched Bucket List, Enchanted (disappointment), Ps. I love you, half of Awake and half on Nanny diaries...

and then got off the plane. Needed to get visa on arrival...1000 Bahts, so about 30 dollars. There was an extremely grumpy man sitting, next to him was a welcoming sign..Thailand, the land of smiles...I was looking hard for those smiles...I think the first one that I got was from waffel-selling girl, after I made small talk with her...I found out, that she loved the waffels too... :D.

Then I went out to the lounge and there she was...smiling with Estonian flag...Kulli of course. I was happy to see her!

we spent the night at the airport...earplugs, mask for eyes...sleeping bag and my cool mattress. Now I was happy I bought that for those 200 bucks.

Then went by local bus to town...Bangkok.
Dirty, Noisy, Polluted, Crowded, Annoying. That's it.
Went to one temple...climbed the tower. Had a view like this.


But we met one nice girl from London. Had fun with her.

went to the floating market.


schoolgirls are getting ready...for a bit of pocket money??? anyway, that was entertaining. And if you look carefully, not ONLY SchoolGIRLS. Yeah, you can see lots of boys, wanting to be girls, some of them do makeup, some of them are dressed like women, some of them have false boobs...some of them are prostitutes...


We also went to see a movie...decided to see thai movie...it was called Memory..first thought it was gonna be a bollywood-kindathing...but actually this was suprisingly good, kind a scary at some parts...but surely had a good point, good acting.. well done, thai people. To get to cinema we took tuk-tuk, and he agreed to take us there for 50 baht, only if we popped in to one tailor shop. Apparently they have a deal with shops...drivers get free petrol money, if they bring potential clients. We said, entering the tailors place, we came to have a look...and guy said...well, this is nota museum..thanks a lot... Land of smiles. :D

After cupl days took a train up north Chiang Mai. Much better.
It's still Thailand, where locals want to sell you even the dirt on the road... most of it absolutely useless. And for me, not even so cheap that I wud be tempted to buy it.
like this...

Food is okay. You learn quickly to tell, not spicy please... I have discovered, that if you want more authentic food and do not know anyone personally, go to the really dirty places, where thai people eat.

Last night we went out to have a nice dinner and saw this add...cool, I actually cud have packed those tenderloins and striploins.. :D

Tomorrow we are gonna go to 2-day trek in the forest, probably gonna ride elephants a bit, swim in the waterfall, do some rafting and visit local tribes...
then gonna go to visit those long-neck women, ...well their necks are stretched over the years, when they add metal-rings around their necks..

And becuz they needed our money, we got also half day handcraft making for free... so gonna be doing stuff over next days.