#2976, Monday, December 26, 2022: Quick Chiang Mai update

Post 2976

- 12 years and 360 days since I started this blog -

Journal

(written Dec 26, 2022)

Read this once (it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 12 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a medical situation and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to helping me lose 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track since then. I started adding commentary after a while, but lately it has become infrequent. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling, except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty. And that's where we find ourselves now.

Time is flying by. A good time, for certain. I have a week left in Chiang Mai now. I'm already feeling a little wistful.

I mentioned in a previous post that the Monday night jam at Boy Blues Bar was my introduction to the Chiang Mai music scene. Sadly, the eponymous Boy has cancer, and has been in hospital out of town for the entire time I've been here. So very sad.

But he is coming back to Chiang Mai, and we'll be celebrating New Year's Eve at Boy's Blues Bar, and I will be house bassist for the jam and a band performance with some of my old expat and Thai musician friends.

I am so grateful for that opportunity.

I notice that I have been taking far fewer pictures this trip. Mostly it's because I haven't been going to too many new places. This is my fifth time in Chiang Mai. I've taken hundreds of pics on previous visit. This time? Dozens. And many are only of personal interest.

There is, however a new decoration on the moat, preparing for New Year's Eve.

Prepping for New Year's Eve on the moat looking towards the Tae Phae Gate, which is where the Sunday Walking Street Market begins, and very close to my guest house.This decoration is not the finished product. There's more being built close to the Tae Phae Gate (itself already a tourist - both Thai and falang - picture spot). I will keep updating the pics.

Speaking of the Sunday Walking Street Market, I decided to eat late breakfast there (See Food Log, below). Shuffling along in the crowds, I stopped to throw some Bhat towards the "Elder Musicians" who have been part of this market forever, and who have entertained me for years, on every past visit. There are others I have enjoyed, but these folks have two attractive things: A bass player (lower left), and a lead player who makes great rock'n'roll stank faces. Plus the music is just great. Fascinating. I stop and listen for a while every time.

A poor attempt to capture the feeling of the crowd at the Walking Street Market. It's amazing to me: The street is closed off at 4pm, the Market officially opens at 5pm. And the enormous cross-section of streets that participate in the Market are immediately crowded. Disney World waiting for the Space Mountain ride crowded. Stop-and-shuffle progress crowded. And, 80% Thai. Although a major tourist attraction, the Sunday Market is definitely geared to the local citizenry.

Another example of me not taking pictures (when I really should have been) was my attending a Christmas Eve party given by Ollie and Lulu. Some of my Thai friends and all of my expat friends were there. I played quite a bit, and saw a few people I hadn't seen since my last time here. I got to play with some old friends that I hadn't had a chance to play with this trip, as well as some brand new friends.

I live for that.

But I didn't take a single picture. Too busy playing, eating, smoking, talking and just having fun.

Luckily someone else - I don't know the photographer, it wasn't mentioned by the poster - got a couple of pics and put them on Facebook, where I could edit them, and steal them for your enjoyment here.

Making music at Oliver and Lulu's Annual Christmas Eve party. What a blast!

I kind of buried the lede there. Ollie's Christmas Eve potluck was a highlight of this trip. 

I've posted a few pictures of this wot - the closest one to the guest house I'm staying in. I walk past it several times a day - but this particular shot caught my eye as I passed one day during the 'Golden hour' (just before sunset), when the light is very warm, and the wot's night lighting had just come on.

Food Comment

Bhodi Tree Cafe's mushroom burger was really special. No, it didn't taste like a hamburger, but it was delicious in its own right, and the sauce on the burger, as well as the turmeric aioli on the side were both killer. And, I do appreciate the beautiful presentation.

I laid back big-time Christmas Day, only emerging, at 5pm, for a really, really late breakfast. I decided to 'forage' at the Sunday Night Walking Street Market, along with what seemed like the entire population of Chiang Mai (meaning, it was crowded, as always, although it seemed to me to be worse than usual - possibly due to it happening on Christmas, which means little to most Thai folks, but seems to have a similar commercial impact as the West. Go figure). I decided to make this food cart my first stop - that's my Thai omelet with rice in the lower left corner.

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#2974, Wednesday, December 21, 2022: Ruminations on traveling, music, friendship in Chiang Mai

Post 2974

- 12 years and 355 days since I started this blog -

Journal

(written Dec 21, 2022)

Read this once (it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 13 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a medical situation and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to helping me lose 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track - the weight has stayed off - since then. I started adding commentary after a while, but lately it has become infrequent. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling, except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty. And that's where we find ourselves now.

You'll have to forgive me if I ramble a little bit here. My days and nights are beginning to run together. I'm busy, having a lot of fun. And I'm stoned a lot (nothing new, but it feels different here, somehow).

I've gotten my share of playing time, and every single evening I've spent in Chiang Mai has been music-centered.

This, December, is the earliest I've ever been here. First time I came in February, next few times in January. then February again. Here, in the (Western world's) holiday season, my musician friends are busy. That's a good thing. I follow them around, because the music's so good.

I have lined up some regular playing opportunities, and when I'm not playing, my friends are, and I'm perfectly content being part of their audience. The music's so good. 

This is the ideal for me when I travel. Lots of music, and a lifestyle that, except for eating all of my meals at restaurants, reflects and extends my lifestyle at home, where live music - making or listening - is my highest priority, and is reflected in how I spend my time (in bars. I spend a lot of time in bars. At home and when I travel. No, I don't drink a lot.) (But I do drink.)

I've already introduced you to The Legendary Taco Bells: l-to-r, Willie Salomon, Dave Williams, Chatmatee Ketsuvan (Oo). The other night, when this picture was taken, I was reunited with Roddy Lorimer (guesting on trumpet). You probably think you don't know him, but you do. A classically trained Scot who became a first call trumpet player in London in the '80s, He was a founding member of Kick Horns, and has played with everybody from Eric Clapton to the Spice Girls. Check out his wiki, and you're going to find out you actually do know him, you just didn't know it. He's been living in Chiang Mai, Thailand for about 5 years, and I met him on my first trip here, where we bonded over our mutual appreciation for George Martin (Beatles) and Mac Rebbenack - Dr. John. When I found out he'd worked with them, I was starstruck.

When I was here for the second time, I took a cooking class. It was a lot of fun. The guest house I'm staying in this year is just down the block from the cooking school I took the class in, and a short walk to the wonderful market they took us to, to show us how to select ingredients, and to see the different and unfamiliar Thai products. Now, I buy almonds there regularly, and just enjoy the scents and sights.  

I know I said I wouldn't, but I said I probably wouldn't and here I am posting a few pics I snapped while walking through the stupendous Sunday Night Walking Street market. I would need a drone to adequately show how enormous this is. Every Sunday, vendors come from all over Chiang Mai and the surrounding areas. They set up their tables, tents, display racks, merch beginning around noon. How do they decide where along the kilometer-and-a-half section of streets, with more on the side and cross streets? I don't know, but that must be some system, because hundreds of them manage to make an appearance every Sunday, and most seem to have a fixed place to put up their wares in time for the street closing and 5pm official kick-off (it begins with an official prayer from the Government, during which everybody freezes for a moment - first time I've been there for that. 

There's music, too, and lots of food. It's the crafts that hold the most interest for me. This trip, because Walking Street is only a few steps from the entrance to my guest house (yet my place remains quiet), I took these pics as I walked through on my way to do music. My route meant that I walked almost the whole length of the market, and down the side streets. I couldn't help but snap a few pics along the way.

The Old Town part of Chiang Mai is/was a walled city surrounded by a moat. It is almost a perfect square. A substantial part of the 700-year old wall is gone, but the moat is maintained. In the past, I have stayed in the Northwest part of the city (inside the walls). This trip, I am in the Southeast. I went for a walk to eat at a favorite restaurant, Goodsouls Kitchen, in my 'old neighborhood,' which took about twenty-five minutes, with lingering and stops to take photos. These Wots and by-the-sidewalk shrines are what caught my attention during my trek.

My reward. Winner, and still champion, the raw brownie from Goodsouls Kitchen still stands as my favorite dessert. This has already made a couple of appearances in the Food Log section, so I thought it made sense to show it at the conclusion of my walking-to-get-it photos.

Finally, some night shots taken on my way from Guest House to bar or restaurant. Or both. And, always, music.

Food Comment

This is a bowl of oatmeal with coconut milk from one of my new favorite restaurants, Nice Kitchen. It also has fruit and seeds and coconut pulp and it was delicious and when they put it in front of me, it just seemed so like an abstract Zen design. Everybody oohed and aahed, and I had to take a snap.

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#2973, Sunday, December 18, 2022: Getting some rhythm in Chiang Mai

Post 2973

- 12 years and 353 days since I started this blog -

December 16, 2022, having coffee in my garden-spot coffee nook at UN-Irish Cafe.

Journal

(written Dec 18, 2022)

Read this once (it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 12 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a medical situation and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to helping me lose 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track since then. I started adding commentary after a while, but lately it has become infrequent. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling, except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty. And that's where we find ourselves now.

The first guitarists I played with in Chiang Mai were Boy, owner, host, and house guitarist at Boy Blues Bar, and Oliver Benjamin, author, humorist, founder of Dudism, also a regular guitarist at Boy's.

Boy Blues Bar was ground zero for my music-making in Chiang Mai. I met almost all my Chiang Mai friends there, or was introduced by someone I met there. I am sorry to report that Boy is very ill, and those Monday night jams are... on hiatus.

But this trip, my very first chance to play was again with Ollie. Our friendship has transcended Chiang Mai, we keep up with each other on FB.

I mention this because I know Ollie will read it, and I have to make up for not mentioning him (by name) in the last post, in which I only referred to him as "another friend" (who) "texted  me to come play bass at a favorite hangout." Only a good friend does that, and I publicly apologize for the slight, Ollie. 

We got a chance to play together for a good long time at that same place the other night. It was the most playing I've gotten to do this trip. 

Here I am at C. U. Corner, a favorite hangout of mine, playing with Ollie, who is not in this picture (which I didn't take). That's John on lap-cajon. It's always fun to play with Ollie - I've probably played more with him than any other guitarist in my travels. Also: He's a good friend, a good hang and one of the most interesting people I know. I mean, the guy founded a religion!

I am enjoying the neighborhood I am staying in this trip. It has a lot going on, and is the neighborhood I spent most of my time in on my previous visits, when it was a cab ride away.

Of course, every neighborhood has its assortment of wots (Buddhist temples).

These two wots are less than fifty yards from my guest house.

The musicians I've been hanging with are really making a big impression on me. It seems like in the almost-three years since I was last here, everyone has upped their game. Musicians I played with back then seem markedly better now than they were. No exceptions.

The musicians I thought were good to very good are now great. My friend Oo is one of the best drummers I know of. And he can do it on a full kit, a three-piece cocktail set (the typical set up in clubs), or a single snare drum. He is so good, no matter what he's playing, you never think about how he's doing it. If you're me, you just marvel at his talent.

He's a busy working musician, and also my best friend Dave's best friend, so I've been seeing a lot of him, having meals together and in the audience, as well as occasionally getting a chance to play next to him, which is a joy. 

He and Dave are in a trio led by Delta blues guitarist Willie Salomon, The Legendary Taco Bells. Dave came up with the name. This group is so awesome, I called my friend Frank back in NY to try and get him to hear what was going on. Didn't work very well. Too bad. I might have better luck making a video next time. I've already seen them twice, and will be seeing them at least once more this week. 

Willie Salomon (left), David Williams (center) and Chatmatee Ketsuvan (aka Oo - right), are The Legendary Taco Bells. Yes, I'm a fanboy.

I got to play a few numbers with Ollie and Oo at the Legendary Taco Bells' pre-concert jam. Dave's imitation Mustang short-scale bass looks child-like on me, but plays and sounds just fine.

Yesterday I had my Steinberger bass's gig bag repaired. The extraordinarily good job was accomplished on what appears to be a mid-20th Century treadle-powered sewing machine. The poor tailor doing the work had apparently smashed her thumb and was complaining and demonstrating (I speak no Thai) how she hammered it and how painful it was. Still, she did an extraordinary job, at a cost of about $3.50, including tip for excellent service (under duress).

It feels like I'm finally getting my rhythm in Chiang Mai, pun intentional. When I travel, I often feel that adjusting means just that: getting into a comfortable daily rhythm. I don't have a plan when I get to a place. There may be some things I want to do (usually involving restaurants or music), but they aren't scheduled. I rarely include touristy items on my to-do list (although some are inevitable. I am a tourist, not an expat or businessman).

Getting comfortable just living in a place is my goal for every place I visit. I am lucky and grateful for that luck to be able to do these things. The only reason I can is that I am independent and fairly self-contained. With no dependents, no partners, I only take my self-interest into account when I decide what to do and when to do it. 

I've been traveling internationally for more than fifty-three years. I can count on my fingers the number of times I've had a traveling partner for any long trip. I'm good alone, always have been - for better or worse. 

Yet, I don't seek solitude, ever (I don't have to, it finds me enough of the time). And, although I might travel alone, I don't stay alone. I make friends. And I have the best friends. 

Food Comment

Smoked salmon and scrambled eggs, and mixed fruit with muesli and yogurt, beautifully presented at Chiang Mai Breakfast World.

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#2792. December 14, 2022: Lovin' me some Chiang Mai

Post 2972

- 12 years and 348 days since I started this blog -

December 5, 2022, Los Angeles

Journal

(written Dec 10-12, 2022)

Read this once (it won't change for the rest of the trip(s): I'll be linking this post to Facebook. If that's how you got here, here's some background: About 12 years ago I started this blog as a food journal. I had a medical situation and needed to lose weight. Initially, that's all I did here: Journal my food intake and my weight. It contributed to helping me lose 20+% of my body weight in 6 months, and continuing has kept me on track since then. I started adding commentary after a while, but lately it has become infrequent. 

While I'm traveling, I let go of the weight-tracking and food journaling, except for food shots when I've eaten something interesting or pretty. And that's where we find ourselves now.

I got to Chiang Mai, Thailand, the hard way this year. I had booked the best flight ever, in terms of duration and stopover minimization, but it was not to be. A few days before I was scheduled to depart LA for Chiang Mai, the airline called and said my flight from Taipei to Chiang Mai (the second leg of the one-stop flight from LAX) was canceled. They were going to have to reroute me through Bangkok to get me to Chiang Mai the same day I was to have arrived.

Almost exactly what happened on my way to LA, but this time they knew before we were in the air.

So it goes.

I got here. That's what's important, right? That the flight from Bangkok to Thailand was on a new shoestring airline and was very uncomfortable stopped being an issue the minute I was on terra firma in Chiang Mai. 

To be replaced by my being unable to find my lodgings. 

I walked up and down the street, past my guest house, four times (while overdressed in a long-sleeved shirt and sports jacket, in 84 degree heat, with a fifty pound backpack), and when I finally found it (thank you, friendly Thai lady), they were waiting for me. Check-in was wonderfully quick, my room  was clean and ready. And air-conditioned. Sigh. 

I was last here in January of 2020, right before the pandemic lock-down. Almost three years. Initially, I didn't notice much of a change. Then I did. A big change.

Last  June, Thailand legalized weed. Not only did they legalize it, they gave farmers plants and seeds. Immediately, weed stores started opening up at a high rate. Right now, Thailand is the most liberal place on the planet in regards to cannabis.

And it is everywhere.

I'm smiling (and stoned) as I write those words. Now, I've never had any difficulty getting weed anywhere. Ever.

First night in, I met up with my friend Dave, who was one of the first musicians I met in Thailand, a very good bass player. His friendship has gone a long way toward helping me make my way here, and I'm grateful. He has introduced me to more Thai musicians than anybody else, including Thai musicians, lol.

Tonight he was playing a gig with another friend, Oo, who is my best Thai friend, and one of the best drummers I know, and Willie Salomon, who is the trio's leader, a delta blues-style guitarist and singer, and a first-rate performer. It was great to reconnect. 

After completing my 26-hour trip, I overslept my 6:30 pm alarm and didn't catch up with them until the end. 

All smiles, we went for my first Thai weed bar experience. While we were smoking, another friend texted  me to come play bass at a favorite hangout. I got to reconnect with some more friends, a welcome/familiar hangout, and play a few songs before I ran out of energy. I'd slept about six hours from the time I left LA, thirty-six hours and nine time zones earlier. Also, stoned. Have I mentioned that?

The room I got through AirBnB is in a guest house in a different neighborhood than on my previous visits, and it looks pretty interesting. There's a lot more going on, but my guest house is on a quiet street that happens to jut out from one of the biggest streets, the one they close off every Sunday for the famous Sunday Night Walking Street, a big, no huge, street market that exists for 6 hours every Sunday. It is a major tourist attraction, but one that is also enjoyed by Thai locals. 

I have posted a lot about it before, and barring something new and interesting, probably won't be posting about it again, but I do enjoy going and it's amazing that it's twenty yards away, but my street is so quiet you wouldn't know. 

This is the Rendezvous Old Town Guest House, at 3/1 soi 5, as you can plainly see by the sign over the entrance between the Old Town Barber Shop and the garage. What, you don't see any sign or address there? Right. Me, neither.

The patio at UN Irish Pub, where I've been having breakfast most of the time since I arrived. My chosen spot.

A little eye-candy from the Sunday Night Walking Street. I know, I said I probably wouldn't post anything but this just caught my eye and, you know, made me look. Now I've made you look.

Next day, Oo was at a motorcycle rally in the mountains that surround Chiang Mai, and he invited David and I to come with.

It was a beautiful ride, and when we got there, it was, well, huge. Huge and with a lot of campers. I'm not sure whether the promoter picked the theme or it was the name of the sponsoring group, but it was a 70's (Peace symbol here) Motorcycle rally. Or something. There was also a big stage, with lights and a sound system to match, as I found out during a jaw-dropping sound check.

A little mountain scenery just outside the concert/camp grounds.

There's my friend Dave, taking it all in. There was a lot to see in every direction.

I was fascinated by this Bizarro-world chopper. Every bit of it but the engine was totally rusted, and the engine was worn, too. Yet, someone had ridden it to the Meet. Bravo.

The stage was big, about seventy feet across. The sound system was big. The lights were big. In fact, huge, and there were a lot of them. A lot!

This is a fairly far-away shot of the stage just after sundown. Remember what I said about the lights? Another thing. I'd estimate somewhere in the neighborhood of 4-5,000 attendees, only two of which weren't Thai. David and I really stuck out in this crowd. Children pointed and laughed. As usual, I was stoned, oblivious, care-free.

What better way to open the show than a fire dance? Actually, I have hundreds of good answers to that question. Maybe you just had to be there. But if you were, it was pretty cool.

I'm going to leave you with these shots of the band. The sound was spectacular, the lights, too - they even laser-lit the surrounding mountains! Oo was incredible, and the rest of the band really put on a great show. I'd previously met everyone but the bass player. These are all excellent musicians. 

Food Comment

The Bodhi Tree Cafe is a little vegetarian restaurant/yoga center right near my guest house. You're seeing the end of my breakfast there, with a raw chocolate/cheesecake with mangos. It was good, although it isn't going to take first place from Goodsouls Kitchen's raw brownie, my favorite dessert since I first had it. Goodsouls has conveniently opened up a new location a short walk away from where I am staying, too. 

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