( Overview
/ South East Asia
Full tour day in Chiang Rai. We paid £1,000 baht to do everything in one day as we are only here for 2 nights. The trip started at 8am and the first stop was the White Temple. This was designed by an artist who is known as the most famous in Thailand.
To make the temple more interesting for new generations, the artist has included superheros and pop stars as demons such as Michael Jackson and Jack Sparrow in the artwork/ drawings. The white colour signifies purity and is different to the usual gold colour of the temples here.
The only gold parts of the temple was the toilet and this lucky well. It has the star signs dotted around and I didn’t notice until after I had put my money in that I was directly opposite Scorpio ♏️. Must be good luck right?
The second stop was the blue temple. Designed by an artist who was inspired by the white temple man - apparently copying is a good thing here! The design inside was very similar and modern. The blue colour was chosen because it represents tranquility. It is known as the temple of the dancing tiger
The third stop was the black house. Designed by an artist who used animal heads and horns to create antique furniture. Seemed to be a lot of animal cruelty here though which wasn’t great. We saw buffalo’s on a lead tied to a tree in the hot sun :(
Long neck village - a very strange experience. Paying money to go in to see where people live seems a bit strange. It seems very run down and poor but at the end of the tour i got chatting to an American who pointed out that one of the little girls had an iPhone…
The brass rings are put round the ladies necks in the tribe to signify beauty. It started because it is supposed to stop tigers from attacking round the neck. Around 80 women in this tribe still wear them. They only come off if they go to hospital. Girls as young as 5 have to wear them
I bought these earrings from the long neck village. They are made of brass
Next stop was the tea plantation. We could see how the different types of tea were made and we could also taste them too
Golden triangle - this is the place where Myanmar, Thailand & Laos all meet in a triangle. This is where lots of opium trading used to take place back when it was legal in Thailand. 1988 is when it became illegal because the king’s grandmother saw that lots of people in the country were sick
Some cute doggies everywhere we go
Opium museum - the museum showed how opium is made and used and the effects of it. It starts from the poppy seed and can only be grown in high up mountains. It is dried and then condensed into a brown powder and made into heroin or morphine
Thought this story was quite interesting…
After a LONG day we were starving so we went straight to a Khow Soi restaurant and then walked through night markets. I really want to buy a Thailand football shirt before I go on to Laos but they are all so small! We went to a reggae bar and had a couple beers but was knackered so had an early nigh
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