Networking in Chiang Mai

Saturday turned out to be another lovely day meeting people.
I spent the morning strolling around and wandering through the local market.

It must get very tiring trying to remember all the different types of rice

One of the many fresh fruit juice/shake bars

I stoppeded at a juice bar and ordered a fresh water melon shake and plonked myself down next to a girl sitting on her own.
She was happy to have some company as she was on holiday on her own, her name was Seyran
She was originally from Turkey but lives in Germany and was on the last day of a 2 week holiday packed with activities such as diving, trekking and zip lining. It makes me feel tired just typing it.
She was spending her last day mooching around, I told her there was a great Saturday market starting about 5pm to buy her last minute presents etc.
I was meeting Susan (crazy Canadian lady) mid afternoon so we all hung out together.
We walked and talked, perused the market that is full of amazing goods at amazingly cheap prices and ate and drank our the way around the many yummy food and drink stalls.
Later we were sitting in a local Thai food place and got chatting to a guy who had popped in for a late night snack.
He was from Herts in UK and had met a girl from NZ over here.
We (Susan and I) were quizzing him about her and it turns out she was in the middle of her TEFL course.
I said I would like to meet with her and have a chat about the course and its content (as I keep hearing it is quite intense) so, I asked him for her phone number and said I would call her the next day.

Susan and Seyran

On Sunday I was wandering around (again) and stopped in the local 7 eleven for an air con break

The fridges were almost empty displaying this sign on them

An English girl and her boyfriend were commenting on the lack of supplies and I struck up conversation with them. Turns out they have been here for 3 months and both taken the TEFL course and are now in paid teaching work.
I told them of my intentions to do the TEFL course and  that as its not until the end of the month I would like to do some volunteer teaching in a temple school if possible. They said they have a list of the schools and I am meeting them tonight to collect it so hopefully it will be of come help
.
Where I am staying is right behind the oldest temple in Chiang Mai, I can see some of it from my bedroom window. Until yesterday morning I had simply walked past it, but I took my time to enjoyed its beauty and the surrounding monuments.

This is the inside, as with all of them they have many Buddhas, in front are prayer mats. You always have to take your shoes off when going inside of the temples and cover shoulders.
I went in (mainly to cool off) and enjoyed the stillness.


I met with Susan around 4pm and we went to a lovely Thai restaurant and ate some tasty food and then walked to the Sunday market.
It's quite different to the Saturday one, less touristy, more for the locals but still full of cheap and good things to buy.
As usual it had every type of food you could wish for, grilled corn on the cob, pad tai, salads, curries, sweets, sushi, ice cream, noodles and lots of other things I didn't know.
It is all so cheap with none of the above costing more than 60p!!!!!

The corn was delicious and a steal at 40p

This is just part of the sushi stall

Having called Danielle during the day, we met with Aaron (the English guy we had accosted the night before as he was getting his take away) and her at 8pm in Starbucks, which was another good air con break.

She was lovely and really happy to chat about the TEFL  course telling me how it includes 6 x 50 min teaching in a different school and class age ranging from kindergarten to 16 year olds.

She said it was intense and at first overwhelming but one of the best things she has ever done and well worth doing.

I shall just have to get my head down and manage best I can, it's only a month of hard work!

Susan and I left them some hour and a half later and wandered back to 'our part of town' where we sat in a small Thai cafe and had a drink.

They had the news on that was showing the floods in Bangkok which look just awful.

Sitting behind us were a Father, Mother and teenage son. He spoke English and I went to sit with them asking him to explain what the latest situation was.

He said that the inner city was now threatened and it was still indeed getting worse as more water finds its way into the capital.

It turned out that the family were themselves from Bangkok and had fled to Chiang Mai to escape the floods as their house was under water, they had been here for almost 2 weeks and staying in a hotel.

Very sad for them and thousands of others who have lost their homes, businesses and jobs.

Today I am meeting with a girl  from Germany called  Miri, whom I got chatting to a couple of days

ago, she is here teaching yoga.

She is going to a lecture about Thailand and its customs this afternoon and I said I would be interested to go along too. 

Should be interesting....