Chiang Mai - uh?

Why one should travel to Thailand and what one should see there was incomprehensible to our dear friend (and tax advisor) Toni, when I listed him the destinations of our trip - from the mouth of this experienced, open-minded and wise traveler, an unusually harsh judgement. So far, I can only give him one answer: You can eat really well here, (repeatedly, but not always). Chiang Mai has been Thailand for us so far, and that was definitely underwhelming.

Chiang Mai, so our travel guide and many internet sources claim, is a particularly nice place to spend a few days. You can take a nice stroll in the old town and relax. However, in Chiang Mai there is hellish traffic, you are literally pushed to the side by cars and mopeds, because there are usually no sidewalks. This also applies to the 'old town', where there is no longer a single old house, but only modern, larger and smaller blocks for hotels, massage studios, yoga schools, etc.

There was one temple - or let's say 1 1/2 - out of quite a few that would have been worth the journey to northern Thailand. The Wat Jet Yot from the 15th century still has many of its lovely stucco decorations: quite large figures of gracefully dancing ladies, whose dresses swing merrily, and dignified gentlemen sitting cross-legged. A similar, albeit not as old and quite renovated decoration can be found on the small, very charming library that belongs to one of the main temples of the 'old town'. All other buildings are (at least after visiting Bagan) rather modest or over-restored, even though the temple roofs here have a very attractive, curved shape.

The mystery remains why Westerners like to come to Chiang Mai so much. My theory: Here they can get a taste of exoticism at exceptionally low prices. A taste of it, because people here have been used to tourists for decades, because there are cafes in Western style (with brownies, burgers and French fries), because huge markets take place here on Saturdays and Sundays, where you can buy trinkets, and because the local eateries tend to omit the spicy chilies and other strong spices when preparing food for tourists. We like to eat authentically and constantly struggle to convince the (poorly English-speaking) chefs not to produce tourist food for us. If you ask them about the spices, they immediately assure you: no spicy. If the communication succeeds, well then, you get spicy, but really good food: salads made from green mangoes, papayas or pomelos with dried shrimps and all sorts of other exotic ingredients (always very spicy); bamboo filled with minced pork (not very spicy); soup with jackfruit and pork (by the way, a delicious fruit; devilishly spicy); steamed catfish in banana leaves (medium spicy); briefly grilled crab eggs (not spicy at all) ...