I Left My Heart for Pai

Before my itinerary was Thailand, Cambodia/Lao, and then Vietnam. But when I came to Pai, I knew that I would spend some times here. From the beginning, I fell in love with this place already. It was true, most of my traveling time I spent in Pai. I stayed there for two weeks.

Pai is a little town in the big valley located in Northern Thailand, between Chiang Mai and Mae Hong Son. So the view from the town is mountain, so beautiful. But too bad when I was there, the leaves were not green, maybe because it was not the season. But still beautiful. :) The place was so relaxed, good place for laid-back people. And the spirit of Pai itself, I think, was hippy. It was cool! And the weather was also nice. Though during the day it was very hot and in the night it was fucking cold! People there were nice, they didn't treat me badly like in Bangkok, though they still thought that I was a Thai girl.

It was a touristic place, both for local and foreign tourists. But still nice. It was not as crowded as Khaosan, for sure. And it was not that expensive there. We stayed in a private bamboo hut for 150 Baht/day.

In the center of the town, normally activities started in the evening. The walking street turned out to be a shopping area. People sold many things, from food to accesories. Pai also had many bars and restaurants, and they were all cool! Always had live music every night. Even they played music in the street. Awesome! Moreover, I love wooden stuff, and almost all the bars and restaurants there had wooden decoration inside. Splendid!

When I was there, I didn't go to any tourist attractions like elephant riding, jungle trekking, and etc. I only went to the river to had water massage, to the canyon to saw it by myself, and to the hot spring to relaxed myself. It was funny when we were about to go to the hotspring, we almost ran out our petrol. And way to the hotspring was so challenging, up and down, and from the main road, it was pretty far. We were afraid we couldn't make it and already prepared ourselves to sleep in the jungle, more challenging though. hehe.. But we made it!

Like I told you before, in the night time, it was fucking cold there! That's why we need campfire! Never in my life I saw campfire inside the bar, but you can find it in Pai. ;) And there was one bar, Bamboo Bar! That place was cool. People only came there around 2 am - 6 am. There were three campfires inside the bar. But the music -sometimes- was cheesy. Sometimes people brought their own guitars there and played it, but they didn't turn off the music! Errr.... But that bar was cool! Really cool! I spent most of my nights there, drinking, talking to people, or just sitting around the campfire. And if I wanted to have the real live music, I could go to almost every bars. Because every nights they had live music. My favorite was duo Aom and Norbert. Aom, a hippy girl with unique voice, and Norbert, an eccentric guy who played his guitar excellently.

When I was there, there were two parties. One was in the art gallery, hippy party. The other one was reggae festival. Awesome! I liked both of the parties. In the art gallery, first time I saw fire show. It was incredible! And because the ticket for the reggae festival was expensive, so we didn't get it. But we had fun outside the venue, because people were jamming there, dancing, drinking... Fuuuun!

When I was about to leave Pai, I felt so sad. It was the longest time I stay in one place when I'm traveling. And it felt good. I was sad because I had to leave when I already knew the people there, when people knew me already, when I felt so attach to the place. It was sad...

Even I'm thinking to stay in Pai for good. Well I'll come back, sooner or later. :)

Meet and Break!

Well, now I'm going to tell you about my love life. Feel free if you want to skip this part.

This traveling was somewhat like a couple holiday. Because I had a long distance relationship with my ex-boyfriend and we didn't meet for two months. So we expected this holiday would be nice.

But life is really a big surprise, eh? Instead of felt happy about our met up, we broke up after 10 days together! We broke up in Pai and I didn't know why. I really left my heart for Pai. Pai gave me both good and bad memories.

Actually couple holiday is boring. And no one would talk to couples! So when we were together, altoghether three weeks, we spent only two of us. And somehow we both couldn't do like we always did before when we traveled alone. It felt not the same. But I still happy. I was happy because finally I could meet him again. But might be he was not feel the same way. I didn't know.

He introduced Pai to me. He has been there three years ago. And it was awesome he said. But when we were there, everything was not the same anymore like three years ago. And I knew he felt disappointed about it. But things are changing, we can't expect everything to be the same forever! So I thought when we were there he trapped in his own memories with Pai three years ago. It was so painful for me. Because he was there, but I couldn't even feel him! I knew his mind and his heart were not there with me.

After we broke up, it was very hard at the beginning. I didn't have someone to talk to and I didn't want to ruin someone's holiday by whining about my love life. So I kept it by my self. I had to be strong! I decided to stay together with him for the next 10 days. I knew it was gonna be painful for me by choosing to still stay together with him. But on the other hand, I realized maybe it would be the last time we met in the real life (well I hope not). So I wanted to spend it as long as I could. And since then, I started to feel jealous with another couples! Because they looked happy with each other, they seemed to be ok. Why we couldn't be like them??

Well, now I know next time I would never ever traveling with my boyfriend anymore! Ever!

Hitchhiking, Addictive!

I tried my first hitchhiking in Pai. It was fucking awesome! I got addicted to it.

My very first hitchhiking was a motorbike, only for short distance. Since then, altogether I hitchhiked three times in Pai. And the most cool hitchhiking experience ever until now was from Pai to Chiang Mai!

We decided to hitchhike because I wanted to experience the real hitchhiking. So we walked out of Pai. Some cars stopped by but they couldn't take us in because they didn't go to Chiang Mai. After almost half an hour walking, finally there was a car heading to Chiang Mai. So we got our ride, a cool pick-up!

At first, I was a little bit sick, because I didn't get used to it. But after some times, I could sleep good on the back. :) If we took bus, it took around four and a half hour from Pai to Chiang Mai. With hitchhiking only two hours. Better, faster, and cheaper it was for free! I want to do it more...

More picture from Pai

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