i have some pictures from chai poom's restaurant, the place where i got the awesome pad thai.
that's chai poom in the yellow shirt. and his wife is cooking there (i never learned her name). he speaks english pretty well, i guess he gets a lot of practice with the students from the muay thai institute.
this is the seating area inside, which i believe used to be his garage.
and this is the famous dish itself. with an omlette and some rice on the side.
this is sven, from switzerland, enjoying some kind of chicken dish. i'm not the only one with a name the thai people find difficult. sven is either referred to as "steven" or "seven".
these kids were playing soccer and taking up the entire street right outside the restaurant.
but now i'm in chiang mai! i stayed on night in a really nice place, and then heard from my teacher that there was a nice guesthouse that was much cheaper, but it didnt have hot water. i thought, "no big deal, it's hot enough here anyway."
so he showed me the place really quick one day, but i didnt get to check inside the room. so i went back to my room from the night before, packed up all my stuff and walked to the new place. i had to cross a highway, and walk down these sun-baked dirt roads and alleys for about 3/4 of a mile, with my backpack and my heavy duffel bag. in the middle of the afternoon, it gets REAL hot, when the sun is beating down like that.
so i get to the new place, a sweaty mess, and someone led me to the room. she didnt speak any english, so i couldn't ask too many questions. i gave her the month's payment, and started to get set up.
the cold shower would have been fine, if it was a shower at all. it had a shower head, but it didn't work. when i pointed it out to the lady, hoping i made a mistake and she would show me how it works, just said "no."
like, "nope it doesn't work. did you expect it to?"
so the "shower" was actually just a faucet coming out from the wall, about waist height. crouching and being pressed up against a wall under a cold faucet is not exactly what i want after training. but i thought i could deal with it, seeing as the place is much cheaper.
then i laid down on the bed. i mean the twin beds pushed together, with a huge gap between. and it felt pretty much like a board with a sheet on it.
strike 2.
i sat and thought about this. maybe the more expensive place might be worth it.
i set out to get some water, and couldn't find any kind of drinking water dispenser in the place. i found the lady and showed her my water bottle like, "anywhere to fill this up?"
again, just a "no."
okay. i'm starting to think that the money i'm gonna spend on bottled water alone is going to make up the difference in how much less expensive this place is.
not to mention that it doesn't have a fridge, or internet for that matter.
so i packed up my bags again and politely asked for a refund. she was very nice and didn't even ask why. i think she probably gets that more often than not.
so i trekked all the way back to the guesthouse i stayed at before, and by this time, this place looked like a palace. it's about twice as expensive, (though still only about $150 per month) but it's got everything.
A/C, a fridge, hot shower, fitness room, tv, and free wireless internet. it's way closer to the school i'm going to, and there's a nice little restaurant behind it that serves vegetarian food.
so it's worth it.
the room is REALLY nice. my A/C unit has a remote. yeah.
i'll take some pictures of the new school and post them too.
it's a really nice place. much smaller than the other place, but its surrounded by nothing but greenery, instead of highways.
it's a very different teaching style too. extremely technical, and not much conditioning. which is nice. but i think i'm gonna have to do some running and exercising on my own time.
anyway, thats all for now. i'll put up some pictures of the school later.
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