Overnight Train

Now when I said Overnight train you may have been thinking, oooooh. So exotic.  Just like the movies.  Perhaps you were thinking of something like this?

The Eastern and Oriental Express

When I saw this train, those were my exact thoughts.  However, I hate to burst your bubble, but our train was slightly less upmarket.

Purple!!!  Which is Matt's mom's favorite color.

Ex-Japanese Diesel Rail Car.  This train was not exactly something out of an Agatha Christie novel.  However, it would be if she was writing novels about Thai Train Travel for the Budget Minded!  Well, I am and we got our money's worth.  We saved 2 nights hotel by taking this  purple wonder there and back again.  We also saved the price of plane tickets.  All for around 28 buckaroos each way per person.  Anyone want to see the inside?

Our berths 1,2,3,4 and 5 were located in conveniently next to the toilets.  That way we had easy access, and also could people watch as others made their way to the bathroom.

Japanese style.  On a moving train. Uh, awkward!

Sinks that made a wierd grindy noise when you used the hot water.  The noise was audible from our berths.

 The toilets were way scarier in person.

My tip for you if you travel by train in Thailand, get a berth in the middle of the train car, or even better, a  first class cabin with private washroom.  However, it was not a bad experience, and we can now say that we have taken a sleeper train!  Also, the ride through the jungle when there was daylight was way cool.  So beautiful to see all the trees, vines and bamboo.

If you are interested in train travel in any country the following website is extremely helpful:

www.seat61.com

It gives you the lowdown on train travel in most countries, including Europe and I think I will always check that site when I plan any future train travel!

After we arrived in Chaing Mai we had the most awesome experience.  Tell you next time!!

The Quest for Silk

The 1st of November  (see, still 2 months behind) we had a lazy morning, Matt and I were so lazy that we didn't show up for the free breakfast which is highly unusual for us.  This completely uncharacteristic behavior had Matt's parents concerned for awhile.  All turned out well though and we were off for a bit of shopping before we picked up our visas.  On the way to shopping we took some pictures:

Matt had an electrifying experience! Just kidding.

Normally I don't like sculpted shrubbery, but this was too cute!

We were actually on a quest to find the Jim Thompson Silk Factory Outlet.  However, due to a confusing guidebook, and even more confused reader of said guidebook, (ahem, me.) we didn't find it til after the visas.  In the meantime we did some gaping at the duty free gem place.  Zowie.  We did some shopping at MBK, which is an overwhelming mall simply stuffed with stuff you want and even more you never knew you wanted!

Later, after examining the guidebook again we DID find the Outlet.

Only took all day.  Victory!!!

As you can see though, there are lots of bolts of silk.  Which is very beautiful but I'm not doing any home decorating right now so there was no point me buying anything there.  Didn't matter, we found it and then we went to a little silk shop we had spotted on the way.  I wanted to buy this silk for a dress but since my dress skills aren't so great I passed it up.  It was so beautiful though. Sigh.

Then we hiked back to the Banyan Tree hotel for a view of the sunset over the city, and to see the lights come on.

On the way we saw a homemade checkers game.

We were denied entry into the Moon Bar this time, but we went to a different place a few floors down and had a nice view there too.

What a view!

Yummy Drinks and Snacks!

Matt and his family.

 After we had finished our night time viewing session we went back towards the station for a streetside supper.  Matt had scoped out a brick oven pizza place earlier so we went back and had the yummiest pizza we have had since we have been in Asia.

The next day we checked out of our hotel and went to Dusit Park.  You might remember that Matt and I had already been there but we enjoyed it so much and wanted Matt's parents to see it too.

This time we had people to take pics of us together there!

The big stone building with all the glittery gold stuff we didn't go into again, but while Matt's family enjoyed the artistic finery we took some pictures of the stonework outside.  So amazing!

We thought our friends that appreciate stonework would like this picture of the curving detail on this spiral staircase.

 Then we took a taxi back to the hotel.  Turns our our taxi driver has a complicated family situation which he explained the whole way back.  Very interesting.  We collected our bags and made our way to the train station where we caught an overnight train to Chaing Mai!  A first for all of us.  More later!

Jim Thompson's House Museum

The week of the 29th began with me being sick.  No surprise there.  I spent the day in my room.  I needed a vacation.  Perfect timing too, because Tuesday we were headed to Bangkok for our next visa trip.  Not only that, but we met Matt's parents and his uncle there!  How fancy are we, reuniting in Thailand instead of some commonplace spot like Wyoming or Utah.  That's just how we roll. ;)  Tuesday evening we arrived in Thailand and met up with our family at our hotel.  We heard all about their adventures of the day.  They did a lot in one day!! I was shocked, on our first day in Thailand we were not nearly as ambitious as they were!  Wednesday morning came too early, but we had to be ready to get in line for our visas.  Naturally as we went to the station it began pouring down rain.  And I, the ever prepared one chose this one day to not bring  my umbrella or raincoat.  Both were located safely in my suitcase upstairs at the hotel.  However, not even a monsoon could dampen our zeal.  Well, maybe it did a little bit.  However, at least the embassy let us inside to wait!  After minimal mishaps we went on to Siam Paragon's food court for a lunch of some Thai food and non-Thai dessert.

If you have any spare top hats, now you have a use for them!!

Then we hopped over to the Jim Thompson House Museum.  It is worth a visit if you come to Thailand!  Jim Thompson helped revive the silk industry and his house is several traditional Thai houses grouped together in this beautiful garden in the middle of the bustling city.

On the way to the museum.

 We saw a demonstration of how they traditionally would make the silk threads.

Silk Worms

Cocoons.

 They boil the cocoons and somehow they get several superfine strands to come out of the water and then they are joined together as they start to roll over the wooden wheel and then they are pulled into the thread.  It's awesome.  Someday I would love to do this myself.

The silk is dyed into beautiful vibrant colors.

 

 The house was lovely too.  So open and airy.  We enjoyed our tour!

The living room.

Part of the main house.

 Garden photo ops!

Matt's parents.

Matt's uncle.

Guess who?

Peekaboo! Speaking of peekaboo I can say it in Myanmar and Japanese now!

Love this picture!

After our tour we checked out the gift shop.  No gift shopping for us in there!  First of all it was all gorgeous and I wanted to buy one of each thing, second of all there was no way I could afford any of it.  Such a shame.  Think of all the gifts I could have given;)  For dinner we went back to Siam's food court.  Then we walked around the mall a little bit.  One last picture for all of you who made it through this extra long post.

Sale = happiness.  I always knew it.  Now I have proof!  :)  Thanks for sharing our adventures.  If you have time, let us know how YOU are doing!  We miss you all!

Cake and Crickets

The week of the 22 (yes, that is still October) I was doing laundry all week.  We both had meeting parts on Wednesday and that same day we welcomed a new couple to Myanmar.  Most of the other foreigners left for the district convention in Bangkok that Thursday, so on Saturday we took the new couple out and about to show them the ropes.  We walked them down to the Hledan Market.  As always there is lots to see there.

 

Carl and Nat are from New York City so they know about humidity and heat in the summer.  Even still though, we were all thankful for the air-conditioning in Junction Square.  We had a nice lunch at a Thai Restaurant (pronounced Tie, not Thigh, just in case you were wondering) and afterwards wandered around a little bit.  There was a  special event going on, some sort of baby food promotion, but there was singing and dancing for the kids.  

 The best moment was when one little guy sneaked onstage to join the giant giraffe.

In the evening we had planned a little dessert party for those of us that had not gone to Thailand for the convention.  I baked my first ever chocolate cake from scratch with chocolate frosting. It was amazing.  If I do say so myself.  I wanted to make it with cream cheese frosting but was unable to buy cream cheese at the store in anything smaller than a gigantic brick that was 20 dollars.  We went to House 1 for the party because it has the biggest table for games!  All the desserts were just yummy.  Things got a little crazy though when the newbies brought out a contribution:

Carl eating a deep fried cricket as featured in a previous post.

Mai from Japan shared some traditional dried squid.

Chocolate cake, crickets, squid and Pringles.  Extreme variety at it's finest!  I did not eat the crickets.  However, we did try the dried squid.  It was different.  You dip it in Japanese mayonnaise and it tastes like fishy jerky.  Beef jerky has nothing on this stuff though.  This stuff is super jerky!  You might be able to snack on one squid for a week.  After the crazy culinary experiments we played a couple games.  Dice 100 was a favorite, we were all worn out after 2 games.

Sunday we went to meeting.  There has been some remodeling work done in the building and we arrived to discover a new entryway.  We took pictures for our tiling buddies.

Just the basic tools

Who needs buckets when you have woks?

 After meeting we took Carl and Natalie to the market to show them around.  We walked up to Ruby Mart underneath the gold leaf bridge and jumbotron.  There is always a football (er, soccer) game going and people just stop or sit on the street to watch it.

We had dinner at the restaurant near the market and then had to walk quite a distance to get a reasonable taxi home.  For some reason that evening everyone wanted to charge us WAAAAAAY more than usual.  We ended up paying more than normal, but it was still less than some taxi's had offered.  Usually we don't have that much trouble.  Finally made it home and got ready for the next week.  Which was a big week.  You will see why next time!

A Regular Weekend in Myanmar

Saturday the 20th we walked to Hledan to meet up with some friends.  While we were waiting for them we saw the puppies of the street dog that some of our friends feed.  So cute!

 

Beyond the puppies a little boy was playing in his house:

 

Then we walked around and tried to find a tailor shop that one of the brothers had told me about.  We did find it, and found that they also wanted to charge way too much.  On the way though we saw an interesting street food snack:

Fried jumpy bugs. Yes, that is what I call them.

I gave that one a miss.  Even if I was craving some deep fried winged delight, I still wouldn't eat it.  And neither should you.  Unless you want to experience your stomach instigating some sort of full on mutiny, skip the street food here.  We walked over to the blissfully air conditioned mall and had a (non insect) snack and a chat.

Sunday after meeting Matt and I walked over to the market area because we had heard that there was a store where you could buy cheap computer programs.  Matt wanted to take this picture for Andy, we know it would a spot he would want to check out:

Each Sunday the market is crowded with men sitting on stools sipping tea while they sell and trade gems.  It's a genuine Myanmar experience to walk through the Gem Traders Sunday Market (that is the name I gave it).

 On the way to get a taxi there is always someone painting.  You can buy one for 1000 kyats.  Which is about $1.30.  It's fun to watch them work.

That's all for now!

Yes, we are still here!

Well, you may have noticed it's been awhile since I blogged.  This is due to a variety of reasons, such as painfully slow internet, sickness and laziness.  When the internet has been fast enough I was either sick or exhausted.  When I have had the motivation, the internet has chosen to thwart my creative spirit.  Then there was the awful sickness.  I won't go into the gory details but it was gory.  It's funny, here we all talk about our bodily functions freely.  Everyone gets sick at some point, and so we compare notes and confirm if what we had or currently  have is a new thing going around or due to something else.  You have to be here to understand this show and tell atmosphere (mostly tell, because showing would be way gross not to mention extremely weird), but I have to remind myself that all you folks back home are really not interested in the particulars.  Even now I am restraining my fingers from typing them to you.

Anyways, my point being, it's been awhile.  I am now about 2 months behind in the relating of our adventures and there is a better than even chance that I will never catch up.  Ever.  I will try to address the highlights from here on out but that may or may not be successful.  I tend to think not, but hey, miracles can happen! Right????  Now, back to the story.

Once upon a time (lets say in Mid-October 2012), in a land extremely far away, like on the other side of the globe from our parents houses, there were two adventurers.  We resume the relating of the adventures on 10/13 which was a Saturday.  On this Saturday we found ourselves on site and not alone!  Our congregation was invited for the day to lend us their enthusiastic support!  It was a very hot day but that did not dampen the zeal, not one bit!

Matt was smiling despite the heat!

 We have a yummy lunch of Indian rice and chicken on Saturdays (you can see the boxes on the tables behind Matt). That's actual authentic Indian food my friends.  (Did you know that Myanmar actually touches India???  I can barely believe I'm in a place with such an exotic geographical location.)  The great thing about the Saturdays in October is that I got to help out a little bit!

Me and my gal pals!

Later that evening we went out to Onyx with some of our friends for a steak.  Yumo!  

To be perfectly honest, it wasn't as good as let's say, Cowfish in Lander, or anywhere near as fabulous as an Andy's Grill Special. (Hint hint) However, it's the best 5 dollar steak I've ever ordered at a restaurant.  In fact, it's the first time I've ever paid 5 bucks for a steak dinner. 

Sunday I went shopping in the morning with Hkatom to buy some Kachin material for a dress.  Kachin is the name of a group of people in Myanmar.  Each tribe has certain patterns they wear.  Kachin is my favorite, partly because it's lovely and partly because my friends are Kachin and I'm sentimental about it.  Once you have been here for awhile, (several months to several years) you can see the difference in styles and can identify which tribe certain material belongs to.  I am pretty good about the girl's styles but the boy's patterns I don't really recognize.

The week of the 15th there was a deadline to meet (which was met) but it did require extra focus from everybody.  Everyone pitched in and got things looking amazing.  Here is the hallway on level 2 on Friday that week.

So pretty!

Offices just ready to be worked in!  Almost anyways!  Even some from the home department were invited to lend their support!   Here is one of my friends giving a cleaning demonstration:

Can't you tell how nice she is?

This sister doesn't speak much English and I don't speak much Myanmar but we do the best we can and sign language comes in handy!  It's amazing what you can understand even though you don't know the words.  She always talks to me like I know what she is saying and I pick up some words and get the gist!  It helps if she repeats it 5 or 6 times.  Slowly.

Ok, I'm going to publish this post and I will work on some more soon.  I want to post it before it deletes itself and something happens to all this brilliant writing.  That would be truly tragic.  More to come, hopefully!