Koh Samui- SALA

 

After indulging in Six Senses we decided to relocate to a less organic resort. Sala Samui was right on point.We were recommended this place by a lovely couple Linda & Spence that we met at Sala Phuket and indeed we were not disappointed. Beautiful resort grounds, comfortable rooms, exellent service and a honeymoon treat made our stay.

10/9 Moo 5, Baan Plai Lam Bo Phut, 

Koh Samui Suratthani 84320 Thailand

http://www.salaresorts.com/samui

 Tel: 66-77-245-888

Koh Samui in One Day

One of the days on Koh Samui, we took a scooter and went to explore the island on our own. Being one of the biggest islands in Thailand, Koh Samui is much more natural in its character then Phuket and can be circumnavigated by car or bike in just couple of hours. We didn't have any particular plan, and went where ever the road would bring us :)

 Early morning, looking at the Big Budda from Bang Rak beach.

Ko Samui- Six Senses

Six senses resort. No more words are necessary.

9/10 Moo 5, Baan Plai Laem,
Bophut  Koh Samui,
Surat Thani 84320, Thailand

077-245 678

some more on Phuket- Pa Tong

Life on Phuket island burts at Pa Tong beach- the Cancun of Thailand, over commercialized tourist trap, but still a place you should see. This is a place where you find everyone and everything: bars, parties, deafening music from every corner, lady boys and girls dancing on bar's counter-tops to attract tourists; galleries, cheap stalls and travel agencies, street massages and more.
We came out here one of the evenings for some nightlife action-we saw it all in its beauty and ugliness.  Unfortunately not all the pictures survived and below is all i've got for today, however some basic guidance in words:
Most of the bars and action is concentrated on Soi Bangla. Few of the famous bars are Soi Katoey(famous for its lady boy stage, if any of you is interested :)), Soi Eric and Soi Easy(mostly australian crowd). Here you are likely see a lot of white men in their 50s with young Thai women, a lot of Israelis out of army guys looking for a free hook up and Russian tourist looking for a good bargain.

massages in the mall approx 12$ for 65 mins.

KOH PHI PHI

So remember this fantastic movie  The Beach (2000) with Leonardo Di Caprio still relatively young?

The Beach is Koh Phi Phi Leh shore line that became so famous after the movie came out. Incredibly touristic place but so far this is the most emerald water I've ever seen...

We started from island hoping and snorkeling on the way to the final destination.

There is something about Phuket

yes, yes, yes ... there is something about Phuket - SALA Phuket- a paradise on earth. This one is not to miss.

Just to give a quick preview, Phuket is the largest island in Thailand, a historical crossover between east and west. Today it attracts most of his tourists to the Patong beach-the center of its nightlife, never ending parties, tolerated prostitution, strong drinks and rest of activities of any kind. Fun, fun, fun for out of army Israelis :), backpackers from all over, party animals and men in their fifties hoping for a second Renaissance.

The real deal!

Hold on! Hold on! I almost forgot! If you are in Chiang Mai, and your pockets burst with green, please stay in Dahara Dhevi (from Mandarin Oriental). Here is...

A night of light...

As mentioned in the previous post, our occasion was so special that our resort couldn't help it but give us a night of light.  We had 3 lanterns to send out to the world and to make our wishes.. It felt so special and magic...Hope it all comes true... thanks Ratilanna..

 

TRIBAL MARKETING

Traveling to the northern tribes of Thailand was another unusual experience. Most of them come from Tibetan-Burmese-Chinese origin. Each one has their own culture, language, dress code :) and traditions. Extremely colorful. Rich with goods, poor with teeth...All the different tribes live in small villages, each about 15-20 households( their houses built on stilts, underneath which domestic animals are usually kept). Most of the tribes believe in nature, guardian spirits, soul and supreme substance. Agriculture practice (especially paddy fields) and hand crafting are the main sources for the tribes income. Oh yeah.. and the tourists of course...

Chiang long mai

Reading the NYTimes, while backlogging about the trip, I can not help but think that it was a great timing. However I'm truly worried about this amazing and beautiful country and pray for its quick recovery from the conflict and for its future well being.

The road to the silk

Though the most famous silk producers in the world considered to be China and Japan, Thailand has a big part in the industry as well, mainly due to the early efforts (back in the 60s) of Jim Thompson, American businessman, who was the first one to introduce Thai silk to the international market. Jim Thompson silk industry still stays the leading silk trademark in Thailand, but along with it you can frequently see independent silk villages spread around the country producing the silk on the macro and micro level and delivering its processing secrets to us.
So here we were at the silk village in Chiang Mai watching and learning the fascinating stuff from the women dressed in traditional sarongs like back in a days....
Silk production turned to be a very scrupulous and complex task, evolving multiple stages of growing and breeding the worms, preparing and extracting fibers, washing, drying, twisting and finally creating.. Most of it is a human hand work, excluding technology or electric machinery.

So here it is, the SILK WORM, which after being emerged from the egg, feeds from the mulberry tree leaves:

Doi Suthep or Know what you eat!

Our next day in Chiang Mai was a cultural journey to Doi Suthep, one of the most important temples in the North, meaning when you tell a monk that you went to Doi Suthep, they all get super excited and look at you with a lot of appreciation. So the temple is located on the hill and opens up to beautiful views of Chiang Mai. Getting there was a little work out-306 steps up ,but the effort was well paid off by the beauty of the temple and its tranquil atmosphere.

On the way up, we have noticed multiple food stalls with fries, fried bananas, strawberrys and lots of other local food. Hunger was approaching, and going all the steps up on empty stomach didn't feel right...Hmm smells good, we said and decided to have some snacks. Strawberrys with sugar, salt and chilis looked interesting and some fries with chilis nearby. These were not regular fries, but they looked plain enough and nothing to worry about. Eating and wondering around a little more, we met a thai man, who happened to work in the states long time ago. Chatting a little about Thailand and New York, out of curiosity I asked what is the name of the thing that i'm eating? The answer was:"Ohh,, this is really good! It is fried pork skin!!!"""....
The following picture was taken right at that moment- my reaction was predictable...sh..t..what the hell??? as i was almost puking out all this fries i just ate. The lesson learned the hard way-Know what you eat!!
and never ever I ate without knowing what it is.....

Mo Chiang Mai

We were completely caught in between adventure and relaxation, so we had no time for the blog. But here we are again. So our next stop after Bangkok was the Northern part of Thailand, city of Chiang Mai, where we spent our next 4 days.We were looking for a combination of culture and adventure at one, and we started from the elephant training camp. Northen Thailand is considered to be the center of elephant farms and we couldn't resist. During our day with elephant we learned to be the "mahouts"-ones who take care of elephants, were feeding them, washing them, learning to ride them etc. The bonding was strong! hope the camp takes good care of them. Note: thai elephants are significantly smaller than African ones, their life lengths is similar to humans, they are very smart and have an excellent memory, so when feeding them don't favor anyone, and give everyone equally, otherwise beware of being boxed!! :) Don't worry it didn't happen to us :)

Some vocabulary:
Pai=go How=stop Qwe=turn Nolong=get down Dee=Good job Feeding Manoy:
 

Leaving Mandarin Oriental never easy...

So the day has come to leave Mandarin Oriental Bangkok to Chiang Mai-Northen part of Thailand. This wasn't easy.. and even painful...Our stay was flawless...it was amazing...it was a paradise. Thank u Mandarin for amazing accommodations, incredible service and amenities, but why why why to charge 20$ for internet per day???!!! :)

New wing Lobby:

Eat whatever floats....or all the roads lead to falafel

Our next day was well spent at the Damnoen Saduak -floating market outside Bangkok. The market operates on the weekends only and accumulates the most delicious thai food you could possibly crave. All the food is being cooked on the boats by locals and sold to the wondering tourists and thais as well.
Observation:
it is really hard to express the colors and the vibe with an amateur camera, Nikon d90 would be more then appropriate here.
 

Thailand- the land of smiles or the land of smells?

Rudyard Kipling, "The first condition of understanding a foreign country is to smell it"

Yes Thailand smells. No matter where u go, u will smell it. The smells can differ from the most wonderful ones like orchids and lemongrass to food smells( which can be also very different) to literally garbage. And it is not hard to imagine that money smells like orchids and poverty like a dried salted fish. Though there are some rich people in Thailand (about 40%), there also some poor ones that in a good case live with 200 Baht per day(6$).

:(

this smells!

Bangkok continued...

After visiting the grand palace we proceeded to Wat Pho-The reclining Buddha or the "Chilling Buddha" (Donny's invention). Gold Plated Buddha is 46 meters long and 15 meters high, and is designed to illustrate the passing of the Buddha into nirvana.
So here it is- pretty cool:


An Observation: Thais love their king, no matter what they do or how they live, everybody talks about their king with a great appreciation and love, phenomenal.

Fried banana stall-we love the king:


Wat Arun-the Temple of Dawn, a representative of Cambodian style architecture was the next stop:


the view from the temple:

after visiting the temple, we got nicely accommodated at the Deck cafe on the other side of the river, sipping cold drink and enjoying the view.
The Deck,
Arun Residence,
36-38 Soi Pratunokyung Maharat Rd tel: 02 221 9158

in btw the temples we have passed by the amulet market where u can find an amulet for any occasion in life!!! they are sold in different sizes, colors,shapes and supposedly will protect u from anything u need. We didn't buy any as we are an amulets of each other :)






exhausted after a long day, we headed to a local spa place and got an amazing one hour massage for literary 15$ each.

An Observation:

after all these and another temples to come, we were amazed by the level of detail and ornamentation they include! Dear fellow designers and architects, it is incredible! Today we are in a new age of design when minimalism and simplicity ,technology and systematical approaches prevail everywhere, but this ones are unbeatable! And sadly or not, no technology can beat a cheap labor. this elaborated designs represent an enormous,incomprehensible,tedious work that is done by human hands, and it proves again, THE GOD IS IN THE DETAILS!