A pancake vendor near St. Nicholas Island. We tried the Lemon and Sugar. Absolutely Divine. Other options included Nutella and Banana or Spinach and Cheese.The BlueKey, our (not really a sailing) yacht for the week.
Southwestern Turkey is known by the doubly meaningful “Turquoise Coast.” The water is both blindingly blue, and the country is Turquoise (or Turkish, in it’s more Anglophone spelling).
We just got back from a weeklong break from Dhaka to Turkey. Yes, I know, we’re doing a lot of travelling recently, but we’ve got to make sure we take all the trips possible from here before we leave, no? And other than Sri Lanka, a few of the Emirati airports and some of China’s lesser known cities, we’ll have made a nearly complete tour of all the “direct flights from Dhaka” before we go. Turkey is the longest haul from here, (though Biman flies to London as well, that’s just too far for a short visit).
So, to Turkey.
We divided our week into two bits, a sailboat cruise along the coast and a urban sightseeing adventure in Istanbul.
The beach at Olympos
The first bit was incredibly HOT. The weather was promised to be in the 80s (35 C), but it was instead in the hundreds. Since the boat was in the sun, without a/c, this was a bit of a challenge. Most people sleep on the boat deck, but in a fit of modesty, and for fear that Neko would keep everyone awake, she and I tried to tough it out in the cabin the first night. And, yes, it was torture. I would have been less (sweaty) wet if I’d slept floating in the Mediterranean. The rest of the nights we kipped it on the deck, midnight wake-ups and feedings be damned. And, no one even noticed she woke up (3-4 times a night). I was refreshed and happy. Sleeping outside under the stars with a 6 month old? Priceless.
Of course, when we got home a week later, she had a bit of sleep regression. She must have liked snuggling cozy between us on a gently rocking boat. Yes, that does sound nice.
Some of the really tasty food aboard. The crew shopped in the towns along the way to ensure fresh ingredients. Olives, tomatoes and fresh bread… Roasted fish, eggplant, pasta….An open market shop in Kas.
We visited the lovely village of Kas, which has the air of the Riviera, and is the kind of place that people dream of for a retirement home. Quaint cobbled streets, bright white stucco, wooden shutters, geranium window boxes, tiled roofs, shady central squares, open fresh markets…. Such a happy day. We bought a handpainted bowl, comparison shopped on ice cream (one guy charge us 2.50 lira for a cone, another guy charged twice as much! We ate both), and watched as a steady stream of competetive swimmers made their way from the waterfront end of the race to the main town.
We also stopped in at a few ruinous sights (the ancient Roman town of Olympos, the sunken city of Kekova, the Island of St. Nicholas). We visited a hippy backpacker campground and farm only accessible by boat known as the Butterfly Valley, but butterflies were out of season, and we only saw 2. A great waterfall and some crickets and grasshoppers, though. We missed the Lycian tombs and the mysterious Chimera flames, but that’s just more reason to head back down there some time, right?
We did a lot of swimming (even Neko), and (forgetting that I’d applied sunscreen while wearing a shirt) got really sunburnt in a 15 minute snorkeling session. I missed out on further swimming because the burn was pretty bad, and didn’t really snorkel in the best spots, so that was a bit disappointing.
Swimming with Neko
The water felt really salty at first, but was alternately bathwater warm and chillingly refreshing. You could see about 30 feet down in most places and some of our fellow travellers used the opportunity to dive under the keel of a boat. Most everyone else on the boat was from down under, deeply tan and on extended journeys (of a year or more) before they returned home. I felt like a bit of a fly-by-night tourist.
Ruins at Olympos. Nearly all the rocks were chunks of ancient buildings.
Overall, I highly recommend the Turquoise Coast, though you don’t need to see it by yacht. Most of the harbors offer day long tours to the same sights we saw slowly over three days. Of course, you miss out on sleeping under the stars if you do, but you’ll be blessed with air conditioning instead. It’s a toss up.
Over the long weekend, we took yet another little vacation out of Dhaka (didn’t I mention that “hardship pay” before?) and headed out to Chiang Mai, in northern Thailand. Thailand is a popular destination from Dhaka, though most people head to the beach resorts. The flights are moderately annoying—you either fly over night (and the long flight’s only 2 hours, so you’re not really well rested), or you fly all day (leaves here around lunch, etc.)—and that’s held us back from visiting there in the past. But… Chiang Mai was totally worth it!
All the temples had dragon guardians outside
SO much to do… nice and compact old town… access to shopping if you need it… etc.
We arrived late Thursday evening and checked into the Tamarind Village Resort after a quick dinner at Burger King (yes, we are fast food deprived). The Tamarind is highly recommended by me, especially because of the shower. Wow. It was awesome. A rain shower (which I usually hate) with the drenching force of an ocean wave… The ginger-scented bath products sealed it. I showered a whole lot more than I normally do, just to enjoy the shower. It’s a good thing there’s been a lot of rain there recently, or I might have drained the country dry.
Besides the shower, our room was lovely. It was the room featured on their in-room channel, so we felt pretty special, but it was really just a base rate room that we booked on hotels.com. Their base rate rooms were just perfect for the two of us, but when there are three, we’ll probably need something a little bigger. Their breakfasts were very filling and had enough diversity to keep me happy every day. There were Thai options, an egg-station, meats, fruits, breads, juices, etc. Tasty.
Wind Chimes to keep the birds away? or to make a constant prayer? (sources differ) Our hotel had them, so did all the temples.
On Friday, we (more-or-less) followed the Lonely Planet’s recommended temple walking tour. It was a little warm, and we got lost in the beginning as old town Chiang Mai doesn’t seem to have many street signs, but we saw the major temples and sights. At Wat Phra Singh, we even saw a huge crowd of novice monks (all between 12 and 16 years old, and a common thing to do as a post-elementary schooling option, even for those who will never be professed monks) who were visiting the royal temple on a 4 day retreat. They were all very cute and excited to be there.
After sitting down in a garden at the back of the temple, a 20-something monk who turned out to be one of the retreat chaperones asked if he could sit with us. Apparently it’s quite common for the young monks to want to practice their English skills and some temples have set up special chatting areas to encourage English speakers to both learn about Buddhism and the monk’s lifestyle while the monk learns new words and accents. This wasn’t one of those areas, but serendipity struck. We talked a bit about his home temple, and where Bangladesh was. He was most impressed that we, of very pale skin, were living in this kind of hot, tropical climate. I am not quite sure he understood that we were not ethnically Bangladeshi, but I was amused, particularly when he opined that he’d prefer lighter skin too. That’s not the kind of thing you hear every day from a monk!
After we left Wat Phra Singh, it began to rain. We’d been heading for the Cultural Center and Museum, and decided to have some lunch before we went in. We stopped at a roadside noodle joint, just as the deluge began in earnest. We were the only foreigners there, but it was pretty packed with locals and the turnover was quick. We had beef noodle soup, about half of a normal American sized portion, but still sufficient for lunch. For two bowls of soup, and two bottles of Fanta, we paid 84Bhat… about $2.50.
This guy guarded a little consecration temple at Wat Phra Singh
We left there with the rain still coming down in sheets and headed for the museum, and its promise of air conditioning. The museum was nice enough, particularly if you like dioramas with little tiny people working little tiny farms and machines. However, the textual explanations were a little tedious, and hard to read. It seemed like they focused almost entirely on listing the genealogy of the king related to the events depicted, and didn’t get enough into the actual excitement of the event. The building was lovely, and the dioramas and artifacts were really excellent, they just need someone to go in there and tidy up the ponderous explanations. The gift shop at the end of the museum was also really nice, though we didn’t get anything. They had good stuff we didn’t see anywhere else, including items related to their special collections and hill tribe art.
By the time we’d finished the museum, I was pretty worn out and swelling up like a southern sausage, so we headed back to the room for a little nap, dip in the pool and then a massage at Khulka, a small but welcoming spa that didn’t feel mercenary or skeezy, as some of the massage places seemed to. Their prices were slightly higher than the average, but it was made up for with private curtained treatment areas, soft lighting and cheerful service. I had a delightful foot and leg massage, and if I’d had more time would probably have gotten a pedicure too.
A fat Buddha. The story goes that he used to be a handsome man who desperately wanted enlightenment, but couldn't spend enough time meditating because all the young women were chasing him to ask him about the path to nirvana. So, he prayed that he'd be ugly and they'd leave him. It worked, and he became fat and bald, and none of the young women chased him any more. So he smiles, because he's happy.
We walked from there to the night markets to see what the fuss was all about. And the fuss was about crazy tourist shopping. It was the first market shopping I’d done since Guatemala’s Chichicastenango, and much more appealing to me than the pretend “artisan” shopping that is popular in Egypt and India. If I want to buy tourist crap, I’m going to buy it from a mad market, and feel like I got a good deal, rather than a tourist store that your guide brings you to under the premise that they will “teach” you something and then won’t let you leave until you buy something.
We took a tuktuk back from the night market, in the hopes of saving what was left of our tired feet for the next day’s adventures. Unfortunately, the act of getting in and out of that vehicle stretched something in my belly a little too much, and left me a little tearful. Thankfully, I had a chance to enjoy the in-room tea pot and hot shower to cure some of those ills.
On Saturday, we woke up early to get breakfast before our day tour to the hill tribes and other outlying sights. A high recommendation for the team at Wayfarers Travel. They were the only company we could find to offer a one day trek (One Day Trek – Hilltribe Trail(ref. CMT1D)) that did not involve visiting fake villages and sights. Our day hike visited three different hill tribe villages: Lamu, Karen and Palong. There were not many people in the villages, as they were mostly out working the harvest, but in the drier season, you apparently get to meet a lot of people. The Palong wore the most interesting woven outfits, and I would have liked to see them doing the actual weaving and embroidery work, but that takes place at a different season. Our particular visit was near the end of the rainy season, but it’s been a remarkable rainy season, and there was flooding in many parts of Thailand in the last few weeks. Our trek, which crossed several streams, was slightly more vigorous than it normally would be, because of the rains. We had to take off our shoes to cross rocky streams several times, and I wished I had my hiking sandals on instead of my hiking shoes. Our guide, in typical awesomeness, hiked the entire thing in flip flops.
Alongside the trail, some of the Karen weavings.
We stopped for lunch and let our tour guides surprise us with lunch. They played it pretty safe, fried rice, noodles, chicken stir fry and lemongrass soup, and were shocked to see that we ate it all. Apparently the foreign tourists usually don’t eat much at the lunch stop. We loved it, and finished it all. After lunch, while discussing the history of Buddhism, one of our guides finally figured out that we were pregnant, when I asked if I could sit down in the shade to hear the information, rather than stand in the hot sun. They were both pretty surprised; I was surprised they didn’t notice. But, perhaps all American women are round balloons in their eyes. I feel pretty round right now.
After the hill trek, we stopped at the Chiang Dao caves, where a 1/3 km trail wends between stalactites and Buddha statues deep underground. It was a pretty cool cave, and there are options there to do actual spelunking, but, of course, you don’t do that kind of craziness while 7 months pregnant!
We rounded out the day with a tour to the Doi Suthep, a golden temple on the mountain overlooking Chiang Mai, and a quick walk out to a really lovely waterfall just off the road to Doi Suthep in the national park. If I’d had more time there, it looked like a great waterfall to play in, and it’s popular with locals as a picnic spot. Outside the park itself were a bunch of stalls catering to day visitors, selling everything from frog or duck satay to toasted silk worms. (The bamboo worms didn’t look bad, but the silk worms looked like something from a horror film).
Other than temples, we didn’t do the typical Chiang Mai visit, which appears to include an elephant ride through the forest, rafting on a bamboo float, the night and day zoos, the tiger and gibbon parks, the butterfly park, etc. There’s even a coin and a stamp museum for the collectors. We were really just thrilled to breathe some clean air, revel in a little mud (or a lot of mud at some points on the rainy trail!), and be away from the dense population of Dhaka. Chiang Mai’s whole population could live in the tiny neighborhood near the embassy here in Dhaka, and yet the locals bemoaned the traffic and pollution. Little do they know what it could be.
All in all, I’d go back, and think it’s a great place to visit. I’d recommend Chiang Mai to family and friends, with and without children. There’s everything: history, adventure, culture, animals, food….
I was deliberately “exciting” this weekend, and attended all sorts of things that were going to be fodder for this narrative. But, sadly, they were mostly a bust. I did get a little bit of cultural immersion, but it wasn’t the stuff great travel narratives are made of.
Friday night we attended the district’s annual Pitha Utshab party, a celebration of sweet foods that are only traditionally available in the “winter” time. I thought I’d bring you back a review. While there were lots on display in cute saran-wrapped baskets, they weren’t for eating. There was only one kind of Pitha, a gummy rice cake that looked a bit like a pancake, but twice as thick, and half as tasty. It was kinda depressing. They served it with lots of other foods, but the line was CRAZY long, and people were cutting, shoving and generally chaotic in their efforts to get some. What made that especially odd was that they were all dressed in exquisite formal wear, and the event was held under a grand wedding tent in a flower garden, complete with fairy lights and linen table dressings. It was one of the loveliest things I’d been to in Dhaka, and yet there was still a food stampede.
On Saturday, I attended a CLO event that would take us to a part of town famous for it’s factory-seconds. Bangladesh is a major producer of clothes for international export, and the overruns and seconds get sold on the local market. Some of them get donated and sold in charity sales. (I’ve been to a few, full of H&M, Tesco, and Jones New York items.) The rest get sent to places like Bongo Bazaar, a large rambling market full of clothes. It seemed like the potential for shopping paradise, and I deliberately brought a relatively small amount of cash, to rein myself in. (When you buy in taka, the local currency, it feels like you’re shopping with Monopoly money.) The travel guides to Bangladesh highly recommend Bongo, as do blogs and local newspaper clippings. Perhaps we went on a bad day, but it seemed like a total scam. Most of the clothes were for small men, understandable, given the people who would typically shop there. Women around here wear saris or shalwar kameez, so there isn’t a demand for western women’s clothing. There were also several sections of children’s clothes, but not the glitzy stuff I was looking for. Many of the items were tagged falsely, with a Gap label, a M&S pricetag, but a DollarTree quality. There were a few stalls selling authentic stuff, but at High Street prices (to use a Britishism). The charity sales are flat price, all items are the same, whether they are 1st rate suiting, or cheap t-shirts that have holes and marker all over them. At Bongo, bargaining was required, and the resulting prices ended up about twice the charity sale price. Since the charities deliberately mark-up their rates to raise money, I can only imagine that the bargaining we were attempting at Bongo was pathetic, and completely related to our foreignness.
Oh well, I bought nothing. Several others got stuff they were looking for, but I was really only on the market for two things, and they had neither. Well, they had one thing, but were started the negotiations at 650t (a little under $10), and said final offer at 600t. Since the going rate at the charity sales is 150t, I refused.
I’m putting together a post on “crazy things foreigners do” (i.e. we Americans in Dhaka), so if you’ve ever done something that has elicited stares, “wows” or other general surprise from locals, send me a hint and I’ll include it on my list.
Neko and Panda's 