After a heavy night drinking in Chiang Mai I opened my eyes slowly whilst the
sunlight beamed through the window in my bathroom, the cold tiled
floor gave me some comfort from the heat in my room, what had meant
to be a relaxed evening obviously decided to take a different
direction.
The left side of my face
was laying in a perfect circle of cold puke where I obviously didn’t
quite make the extra 2 metres to the toilet though it seemed I’d
managed to take off the upper part of my clothes as I saw my t-shirt
laying in the door way, staggering around to find my phone to stop
the head pounding alarm I looked at the time at it was about ten to
7, I could tell it was going to be a hard days trekking ahead.
I bodged a cleaning job of
my bathroom floor and quickly showered before heading to the meeting,
I couldn’t remember a thing about the night before and the only
person who would have any recollection couldn’t speak a word of
English.
I walked out my room, to
see a Spanish guy named 'Joel' also walking out of his accompanied by a Thai girl, he
grinned and said “Good fucking night man! You fucking drunk!” he
laughed and started walking the girl towards the exit. It seems the
only thing Joel could tell me, was what I already knew.
The meeting hadn’t
started yet, but everyone was there ready and waiting, the 4 English
backpackers smiled at me as I walked in and said “You had a good
night then!”, apparently everyone had seen me at some point.
The meeting commenced
while I sat and sweated out what felt like a bottle of whiskey and we
left for the beginning of the trek. We drove about an hour outside
the city to a small quarry where a river was meeting its end from the
mountains, the two guides we had were named ‘Mr Po’ and ‘King
King’, two young Thai guys who were raised in the mountains, they
were both of Karen descent but decided to move down to Chiang Mai to
earn money and save for their families.
We started trekking at
around 9am, the sun was blistering hot and together with the humidity
I felt like I was going to pass out, my hangover kept hitting me in
epic waves of dizziness and I’d already drank half of my water
supply for the day!
We trekked for a good four
hours when it came to lunch, here we stopped in a small opening in
the jungle where a river ran through. It was like a small piece of
paradise amongst a thick tangle of trees and plants. Erosion had
created a sort of natural Jacuzzi in the middle of the flow in the
river, it was a perfect circle where the water ran from half a metre
above like an infinity pool into the circular space. We all sat in
here for an hour and ate our cold rice whilst getting to know each
other. By this time my hangover had near enough gone and one of the
others explained they had seen me and Joel going into a nightclub the
night before in Chiang Mai at about 1am, slowly my night was getting
pieced back together.
We trekked all afternoon
through the jungle, occasionally we’d come to a clearing and stop
for a while, as far as my eyes could see were endless rice fields of
vibrant green, like on the train it was an overpowering glow, the
water which lays beneath the plants reflects the sunlight which
creates a shimmer across the fields, a plainly awesome view which you
could sit and look at for hours on end and not get bored of.
The days trekking came to
an end, we reached our destination for the first evening which
consisted of two large wooden cabins and a separate small wooden
cupboard which was the toilet. Around the plot ran chickens, pigs.
dogs and cats which all seemed in harmony with each other, the
setting was owned by Mr Po’s aunt and uncle, they were rice farmers
and had lived on the mountain their whole life, with them lived their
son who must’ve been around twelve years old and one of their
fathers who sat in the same chair for the entirety of my stay and
just watched and smiled, also for the evening we were joined by a
friend of Mr Po’s, I never got to know his name, he couldn’t
speak a word of English but obviously very much enjoyed listening to
our conversations and would always laugh when we did, he like the old
man stayed in one position all night, laid across a long pillow as if
he were modelling in a catalogue.
The place was serene,
with only the noise of the animals playing we all sat and ate dinner
around a fire and spoke about the days trekking. By this time the 4
English backpackers and myself had naturally got to know each other
pretty well, one of the couples ‘Rob and Gemma’ who I’m still
close to today didn’t live to far from me in the UK and I can
genuinely say are some of the loveliest people I’ve ever come
across, the other two who accompanied them were Kayleigh and Chris. .
After a few hours drinking
around the fire we all sat inside the main cabin where the family
slept, smoking cigarettes and drinking whiskey I offered Mr Po a
smoke, he turned down the offer saying
“I no smoke thank you, I
smoke only special”.
Now the word ‘special’
is an intriguing word, especially when you’re up in the mountains
in Thailand. My first thought was of course Marijuana, and a joint
would’ve gone down a treat at this point, so I enquired;
“You only smoke
marijuana then Mr Po?”
“No no, no smoke
marijuana, only special”
He was pretty stuck in his
ways about not saying what he smokes, but with it not being weed i
had a pretty good idea and was interested of course.
“Maybe we smoke later,
when people go sleep” he said bringing a finger to his lips.
Mr Po was always softly
spoken, I found his voice very calming, he looked somewhat younger
than he was, with almost a bowl cut hair style he could’ve been
mistaken for a teenager when he was actually nearer the age of
thirty.
People began to dwindle
down at around midnight, slowly the group got smaller as the days
trekking had taken its toll, together with the whiskey I was feeling
the same. We sat and played guitar with the young boy of the family,
he had self taught himself guitar for five months, purely by ear the
he had taught himself ‘Wonderwall’ by ‘Oasis’ amongst a few
other songs, pretty incredible really, for a young boy who’s near
enough cut off from the western world, just goes to show how reliant
we are nowadays on technology and just how simple life can and should
be.
When it came to just a few
of us left Mr Po looked to Mr Catalogue model and muttered something
in Thai, this is the only time I saw the man move all night, he stood
up and went outside;
“Ok we smoke now, if you
want join, you can”.
Mr Po walked into the
corner of the room and pulled a metre long piece of bamboo whilst Mr
Catalogue re-entered and reassumed his position on the pillow.
The cabin was being lit
merely by two candles which flickered shadows around the room, Rob, a
Dutch guy named ‘Ilya’ and myself were the last ones remaining
along with Mr Po, Mr Catalogue and King Kong, by this time the old
man had fallen asleep in his chair.
“You smoke Opium
before?”
I hadn’t ever come
across Opium before but was always intrigued by it, I’ll say now
that my two main rules when it comes to drugs is that I will never
inject anything due to it being purely fucked up in my mind that
someone needs to inject to get high that quick and I will never touch
crack cocaine just because I’ve seen what crack has done to people
and their families and the crack heads I know just aren’t nice
people….this is maybe just my warped morals but I stand by them.
Opium is where heroin
derives from, it’s the substance which grows in the poppy plant,
these poppies grow in abundance up in the mountains of northern
Thailand and through Laos and is a major money maker for many of the
locals transporting and selling it throughout The Golden Triangle.
I sat and watched as Mr
Catalogue opened up a small transparent square similar to Clingfilm
which contained a small black circle about two centimetres in
diameter, he used the wooden end of a match to take a small piece and
pressed it into a small hole at the end of the bamboo pipe.
Mr Catalogue laid down on
his side into his pillow and poised his lips round the pipe while Po
lit the pipe for him, he drew the smoke in slowly until he’d
finished the hit and laid back flat holding the smoke in his lungs,
exhaling I could smell the sweet smoke fill the air.
Mr Po followed suit,
laying down again he took a fresh hit from the pipe and laid back
holding in the smoke for as long as he could.
Mr Po looked to me and
said “You wann’ try?” I obliged, how could I say no to free
Opium whilst up in the mountains of Chiang Mai, as they say ‘Right
place, Right time’ and I couldn’t think of a better setting than
this.
Po informed me that It was
important to lie down when smoking Opium, so I assumed my position
and placed my lips round the pipe, breathing in, the smoke filled my
lungs.
Opium was completely
different to what I had expected, firstly the taste was sweet, the
best thing I could compare it to is liquorice but at the same time
not at all!
I held in the hit for as
long as possible for my body to absorb it, laying flat on my back I
instantly started to feel the effects; the sensation was beautiful,
as if I had lost all weight in my body and all thoughts in my mind
were put aside, all I could really focus on were the flickering
silhouettes on the ceiling and walls around me.
After a couple more hits
from the pipe I felt light as a feather and completely at ease,
complete relaxation overtook my body to the point I felt almost in a
dream state but completely conscious at the same time to all the
goings on around me, until I fell asleep I laid there watching
shadows smiling and listening to the three locals talking.
Waking up the next morning
on a wooden floor wasn’t the best way to start a days trekking but
I still had a smile on my face, perhaps due to the fact I was still
pretty high. I opened the door of the cabin bracing myself for
glorious sunshine pouring through the jungle to find the heavens had
opened.
It was the end of
September in Thailand, therefore I was still catching the end of the
monsoon season, though in a sense it is a spectacular time to see the
country.
When the rain hits it’s
as if someone has turned on the tap full blast, one minute you could
be sitting in scorching sunshine then the next the sky turns to
greyscale and the rain will fall in an exceptional fashion. Together
with the humidity the rain is bearable, unlike England where each
droplet feels as if a needle is piercing your skin!
I personally quite enjoy
the random downpours in S.E Asia, it’s quite a thing of beauty to
see the entire country stop in an instant and all appreciate the
benefits of the wet season, of course with the good comes the bad,
such as the deadly floods the country has seen in the past.
Trekking through the
jungle in the mountains during a torrential downpour though isn’t
the easiest feat to undertake and by lunchtime we were all caked in
mud, but thinking back I wouldn’t have changed the experience one
bit.
The rain changed the whole
scenery in every sense, the noise of the rain hitting the trees was
hypnotising, it echoed from all around and together with animals and
insects it felt like a rain forest symphony.
The second night we slept
in a place similar to the first, though this time we were camped near
a river which surged down to a magnificent waterfall which was in
full flow after all the rain. The evening echoed the night before, a
communal meal together enjoying a dry evening after a days rain,
rounding off the evening with smoking a few more pipes of “special”.
The next morning three
quarters of the group had left due to only doing a two night
excursion, which only left myself, Joel and a Dutchman named Greg, we
started the day by grabbing our bars of soap and heading down to the
waterfall for a morning shower. The river was still extremely
powerful from all the rain, but we braced the cold water and stood
there whilst the river’s flow poured over us, there was something
very liberating about this experience, and the freshest I ever felt
any morning in all my travels.
Our final days Trekking
took us to a small village atop a mountain, where a small group of
Karen women made tapestries from hand made looms, they taught me the
basics whilst finding it extremely funny to see a male taking part in
the activity, throughout they kept calling me ‘Katoi’, obviously
thinking I didn’t know what the term meant! That night the last few
of us had our own individual bungalows and watched the sunset over
the everlasting rice fields of Chiang Mai in a superb deep orange
glow, complemented with a fresh bag of bush weed purchased by the
Dutchman off of a local for all of 4 quid, it came to the point we
were so stoned we couldn’t even finish the giant bag of buds so we
gave it to a local who was overjoyed…..who wouldn’t be!
Awaking the next morning
in my bungalow I was absolutely covered in mosquito bites! I’m
usually one of the lucky ones who doesn’t get bitten too much, but
this night was different, every inch of me had been munched on by the
little bastards, though I could only blame myself firstly for leaving
my repellent in the hostel and secondly being too fucking baked to
put up my mosquito net!
Coming down the mountain
was a lot easier than the way up, a gentle hill all the way down
which brought us to the Elephant camp.
Elephant safaris are a big
business in Thailand, tourists jump on the opportunity to ride an
Elephant and I was one of them. Though I was dubious about it, I’m
not one to partake in cruelty to animals, to be honest there’s
nothing I hate more than Zoos and shit like that, but before I booked
the excursion I’d looked into it and everyone I spoke to assured me
that Chiang Mai was the place!
Arriving there I was a tad
confused, Elephants were no where to be seen! All I could see was a
large wooden platform 4 metres off the ground and a vast green area
which backed onto the opening to the jungle, I know there’s a lot
of cons in Thailand but invisible fucking Elephants would’ve taken
the biscuit! Though in no time at all a rustling came from the jungle
and slowly large grey trunks began to appear between the trees.
For myself I don’t think
any animals compares to the Elephant, the sheer beauty and majesty of
a creature that size just blows my mind. The Elephants which appeared
were nothing compared to the size of an African Elephant but stood a
good 3 metres in height and 4 metres long, they were healthy looking
and all happily followed a Thai guy that walked in front of them
without even being given any commands or stick beatings which I was
expecting!
Each of us climbed the
wooden platform and were introduced to our individual guide and
Elephant, I was allocated “Banyan the naughty Elephant” my guide
laughed;
“Why is he naughty?”
“He no listen, never
listen”
My guide named himself
‘Bill’, he looked how ‘Mogli’ from the ‘jungle book’
would do if he’d aged forty years and during that time had smoked
fifty cigarettes, drank a few litres of whiskey with a side of LSD a
day, frankly the guy was a fucking loony toon, uttering things in
inaudible broken English then bursting out in fits of hysterical
laughter every few minutes, saying that, I loved the guy he had me in
pieces the whole time purely because of his lunacy.
So here’s me climbing on
the back of a schizophrenic Elephant for a two hour ride through the
jungle with an unstable alcoholic Elephant trainer..…your standard
day.
As we set off all the
others trundled towards the jungle, whereas Banyan began to walk in
the complete opposite direction towards the giant pile of bananas by
the entrance to the camp, this was going to be a long ride.
After a ten minute banana
interval Banyan decided to listen to ‘Bill’, we sauntered into
the jungle along a dirt trail for the next two hours, never catching
up with the others the whole time.
The safari was a great
experience, Bill allowed me to sit on the back on Banyan’s neck and
steer us through the jungle, to do this it’s a simple action of
tapping your foot on either side of the elephant’s head depending
which way you wanted to go and shouting “Bai” when you want them
to stop.
During the safari Bill
constantly sang a Thai song which I ended up learning and still
repeat to this day, phonetically it’s pronounced;
“No Gcoyen, Chang Le
Bow,
Chang, Chang, Chang”
This is an old Thai song,
similar to a nursery rhyme, I come across it on regular occasions in
Thailand and always join in much to their surprise that I know it, it
loosely translates as ‘The Elephant has very big tusks, Elephant,
Elephant, Elephant’ (“Chang” being Elephant, which any beer
lover will know as the national beer of Thailand ‘Chang Beer’)
Though we ended up taking
a bit of a detour and not sticking to the path as Banyan was more
interested in anything around which was edible, we did finally make
it back to the camp.
To get back to the hostel
the last of us took a bamboo raft down the river which we helped
construct, by literarly tying together about ten pieces of thick
bamboo we made a small raft which supported the weight of 4 of us and
another piece of bamboo to steer us down the river.
When you think rafting
down a river of course the first thing that comes to mind is white
water and epic rapids, I as well was expecting a bit of excitement on
the river but it was a lot more placid than I’d expected. We sat
there and drank whiskey whilst snaking down a long brown river
through the jungle, beams of light broke through the canopy
illuminating the water beneath us showing schools of fish either side
of the raft. We all took turns steering down the river, myself ending
up getting us caught on a bed of rocks for about fifteen minutes
while other rafts occasionally passed in fits of laughter.
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