24 Feb task #4 in Chiang Mai

“Take a group photo with locals.”

Surprisingly this proved to be more difficult than I had expected it to be. In all the smaller towns that we had visited so far we were among the few tourists so that it was very easy to connect with locals. They were always extremely friendly and interested in getting to know the nice American and German.

But Chiang Mai is different – it is so overrun by tourists that it is actually tough to find locals who are not either busy working or possibly rather annoyed with all the tourists around.

I was able to talk to individual people, such as “Nee”, who I bought a shirt from at her stall at one of the markets.

And then there’s “Hanna”, a really sweet girl who works at her uncle’s food stand selling Thai deliciousness with a big smile on her face.

Yes, even in Chiang Mai it is possible to strike up conversations with locals but unless you know where to go (away from the tourist sites) I feel that it will be difficult to mingle with a group of locals. It’s a good thing that we are staying another day – that will give me more time to complete this task. 🙂

So, as of right now I can not yet share a group photo with you. But I shall work on this task again tomorrow morning!

Nao la Fandie!!

UPDATE

Today we decided to go to Doi Suthep-Pui National Park. It is west of the city, and we decide to walk there. On our way up the hill to the entrance of the park we were slowly (very slowly) passed by a bus full of school children. Once they saw us they all started waving at us excitedly – which, of course, was returned by us. 🙂

We saw these kids again at the bottom of the waterfall where they had alredy started playing in the pools, refreshing from the 35C degree weather.

This is our group photo with a group of boys who greeted us with a loud “HI, HELLO!” 🙂