outrageous

here is a listing of some of the more outrageous observations and events of the past couple days. i won't go into extensive detail or it might take you hours to read, but you get the picture.

wednesday:
-morning trip to the royal flora. kind of like the disney world of botanical gardens, but with no one there. seriously, there were about 7 cars in the giant amusement park-sized parking lot. there were more people watering flowers than visitors. but it was free and nice to be in a quite place, even if it was a little over groomed.
-last day of teaching my private lesson japanese student, Yu the 5 year old. Present from her mom: toothpaste. yes, a tube of herbal toothpaste from the thai royal projects.
-flat tire#1 on the way home.
-bought a plane ticket to vietnam.

next day:
-trip to chiang dao caves on our motorbike with danny (he was on his own motorbike).
-long, long drive on the motorbike. scary construction zones. stupid dogs in the middle of the road.
-arrive at caves. butt hurts from motorbike.
-most amazing sign in thailand: totlet for lamer = handicapped bathroom.
-girl with incredibly crossed eyes gets us lunch.
-caves were really big and really cool. lady led us through with a gas lantern. big huge cave rooms with dripping stalactites and stalagmites. also TONS of bats! a little bit of creepy crawling in between some of the big rooms.
-met a girl from maine who went to uvm and had an italian friend.
-giant fish in pond.
-danny calls his climbing friend who tells us about a cool wat.
-we are tired, but the wat was really cool and worth walking up about 500 steps. on a hill in the jungle. really quiet. lots of bugs.
-time to ride home. danny goes first and ends up ahead of us.
-flat tire #2 in 2 days. luckily it happened in an area that actually had life and there was a mechanic across the street.
-while they fix the tire, we witness 2 school boys trying to balance 2 large boxes, 2 soccer balls, and the 2 of them on one bicycle.
-man fixes tire. changed tube. insists that we can get home with the same tire even though there is a hole ripped in the rubber. are you sure? yes, can go to chiang mai, he says.
-after pulling out of the place, tire feels wobbly. we plan to check it if it continues to be weird. luke is driving slow.
-not even 5 minutes later the thing goes flat and ends its life with a loud pop. luckily, luke was watching out for mechanics on the way and there is one near us. i keep luke from destroying the bike and/or his helmet.
-on the walk to fix flat tire #3 we see a boy riding a bicycle with a young man on the back seat of the bike. the man on the back is holding a full grown chicken in each arm. of course, of course he is.
-we have 6 mechanics to fix our tire. after a long series of miscommunications in thai, they all realize that we want a new tire at any price and we will not leave without one. man takes tube off and we find out that our last mechanic had used our old tube, cut in half, as a buffer for our shit tire that did not make it.
-very drunk cambodian man with long hair and long beard is hanging out at the mechanic. he wants us to drink his beer with him. we say no. he brings us a chang anyway. luke opens it with his pocket knife and breaks the glass. shows crazy drunk man and asks for a glass. instead we get a new bottle. luke and i proceed to drink a warm chang beer (not the best even when cold) while they fix our tire. drunk man speaks really close to luke's face. asks us things about how long are we here and where are we going and where are we from. tells us he is cambodian. keeps repeating "handsome," beautiful," and "happy" amongst other english words. after each "happy" we must cheers. one of the 6 mechanics comes over to check on the drunk man and translate a bit. all is well so he goes back to supervising. luke and i are in hysterics. good thing the tire popped. it cost us about $15 to meet this crazy dude.
-finally make it home. dinner and shower. i was literally covered in pollution and soot and helmet hair after nearly 4 hours on the bike.
-poker game. luke wins 600 baht, which cancels out our tire debts for the day.