day one: surprises, stunning scenery

First proper day in Chiang Mai, we headed off early in the morning and started our journey to Chiang Rai. On the way we stopped at a hot spring, took a toilet break, walked around the area and basked in the magnificent view and warm sunshine.

We then continued our way to Chiang Rai, while many people took the chance to get some shut-eye, our friendly tour guide, Mr Happy shared stories about the history of Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai.

Listening to the stories about the rich history behind these old cities made me admire them. These cities were founded by King Mangrai, Why, you might ask. Well, in comparison, Singapore’s history is not as long and rich as theirs, and somehow I felt a certain beauty in being able to experience a place that is so old and historically rich.

While enjoying the view, we slowly approached the campus of Mae Fah Luang University (MFU). Situated at the foot of the mountain, the campus was picturesque.

Stepping foot there, felt so different from stepping foot in NTU. The buildings are spread out, everything was very ‘wide’ and open. It felt very ‘freeing’, somehow. Unlike in Singapore, where there is a shortage of land, many things are clumped together, very compact. At the same time, buildings are really tall, to maximise the space used. Altogether, this creates the feeling of smallness and constraint. This made my experience at MFU refreshing.

Stepping into the school building, the interior paled in comparison to the campus grounds. While they were clean and spacious, the interior was minimally decorated and seemed old.

At MFU, we interviewed Professor Chirada NaSuwan from MFU School of Social Innovation. While she was not really a suitable fit for our needs since her expertise was in Public Policy and we wanted to find out more about youths and social media, we tried our best to restructure our questions in the way that she could answer them and benefit our projects.

On hindsight, we could have arranged earlier and found a professor who was more related to our research question. However, it was good that we could think on our feet and make the best out of the situation at hand.

Along the way, she pointed out certain things that got us thinking. For example, the multifaceted side to the issue we were researching on which gave us some depth and complexity to the issue. This highlighted certain areas and other factors in which we did not consider in our research.

Some of these things could have been due to a lack of sufficient preparatory work on our part, yet some of this knowledge could only be uncovered while we were present in Chiang Mai to see the situation for ourselves. Similar to what I mentioned in my pre-trip projections, what we find on the internet may not be a true reflection of what we want to find out.

By the time we left MFU, the sun was setting and we were treated to this view:

After we settled into the hotel, we went to explore the Chiang Rai Night Bazaar, which was conveniently located just across the main road outside our hotel. While there, the atmosphere was quite different from that in Chiang Mai. Chiang Mai was much more busy and bustling with life, while Chiang Rai was more slow-paced, relaxed and chill (literally too).

I realised that I really enjoyed walking along the streets of Chiang Mai/ Chiang Rai at night. Strolling in the night market, soaking up the local atmosphere. My enjoyment may come from the novelty of night markets, since Singapore does not have regular weekly night markets (or pasar malams) anywhere. In comparison, night markets are a regular occurrence in other asian countries. Thus whenever I travel, night markets are a ‘must-go’ for me.

While exploring the streets, we walked into the filming of a Korean TV Documentary, featuring a teen boy-band idol, Jackson and BamBam from GOT7 (I only knew this from asking some local Thai (fans) girls who were following them) and two other Americans/Europeans who could speak fluent Korean. It was so cool to watch them film and the whole area suddenly felt very energized by the presence of the filming.

It was a pretty interesting day :).