Chiang Mai, Thailand

Chiang Mai is a medium sized city in Northern Thailand. It's a lot less touristy than Bangkok, and has proven to be a good stop. Keels and I found a really cool small hostel called "Julies" and got a "Fan-Room" (Room with a fan). The place is filled with a lot of travelers, and we were able to meet some guys from Germany & Spain, and also some girls from England who we've hung out with. Seems like everyone is doing roughly the same thing as us, but most are doing it longer (6 mo). Food in Thailand is awesome... its like eating at Basil Restaurant every day. They cook with curry, basil, seafood, and various spicy peppers...its right up my alley. However, I think they take it easy on the spicy peppers for the tourists...but I have slowly asked them to "make it Thai hot" and yesterday they brought the fire. I was barely able to finish the soup (shrimp, rice, basil, lemongrass, noodle, mix)...I was crying, using up all of the napkins to mop up my draining nose, and the Thai waiter-boy was laughing the whole time. Anyhow, Keels and I found some "motorcyles", well in US they are actually mopeds...but here 125cc is large as there are a lot smaller bikes all over the road.Traffic here is interesting... driving on the left takes some getting used to mentally, and just the chaos of the road is daunting. Motorcycles can go between cars while stopped, and when you are driving it seems like there are always 10 thai motorcyclers zooming past you on all sides. Interesting to say the least. But they are definitely the way to get around, and we are both excited to start our 4 day, 500 km motorcycle journey on Mae Hong Son loop in Northern Thailand later today. (Motorcycle Rental is around $5/day) Got to go on a day trip to a local Buddist Monk temple, and check out some waterfalls in the mountains yesterday.

Really cool winding roads, perfect for motorcycles. Last night, we went to the local arena for traditional Muay Thai Boxing and pretty much got ring side seats. Keels and I were joking to whether we would get into the ring with these guys (the weight classes started at around 130lb and ended at 160lb), and after watching a few high kicks we were both like "no way" (little did I know that that before the end of the night I would enter the ring for two rounds...video to come later). Later we spoke to one of the 130 lb kickboxers, and joked about getting into the ring... he said "no problem...I see", asked the ring announcer, and for 400 baht ($12) lined me up for the next fight. I agreed on the condition of: No Kicks, No elbows, No knees, and big gloves. I think he assumed I was going to be an in-experienced tourist, but figured out pretty quickly that I knew how to box. I have a good feeling that if there were kicks, elbows, and knees I would probably have two black eyes and a concussion right now...but I was able to go both rounds, and drop him on two separate occasions with a cross and uppercut. Pretty neat experience, crowd was into it, and not many can say that they got into a ring with a Muay Thai kickboxer for 2 rounds in Thailand. Internet for the next few days may be sketchy...but I will try to update again soon.