Oooo that's spicey

Spicey is hotter than this

Another week in Thailand, another week in paradise.

The temples, the sights, elephant trekking, shop at the world famous night market, white water rafting, cookery school, yoga school, learning how to massage and meditate. All these things of course I haven’t done one but if you want to know a decent bar followed by a decent disco I’m your man.

Chang Mai is an amazing place in so many ways not least how there are not more fatalities daily on the roads here, in fact I have not seen an accident yet. 70 percent of people use motorbikes, the rest tuk tuk or cars. There are no road markings, seemingly no laws on overtaking or indicating and very rarely do you see a crash helmet being used.
The biggest number of motorcyclists travel in 2’s though I have spotted many 3’s and am hoping to see my first ‘4 passengers’ on a motorcycle very soon. I as yet have not had the courage to rent a bike, I value my life to much I guess and handily Marcus is a great driver.
Did I forget to mention that there are strict drink driving laws here, if you are caught in charge of a motorcycle at 6 in the morning not drunk you could face a severe penalty, though as I have always maintained, there’s nothing worse than having an accident when you’re sober.


The food continues to amaze, none more so than tonight. A few of us were guided by a Thai couple to an all you can eat Thai buffet, which you cook yourself. The deal is get a table and a white hot furnace is bought to your table whilst you wander off, grab a plate and pile it full of things you would like to eat. I counted over 12 types of fish including all the old favorites’, sea urchin, octopus, ink squid and bizarrely jellyfish (not the nicest to be honest).
One of our guides was called ‘O’ and I promise you he reminded me of a Thai ‘Homer Simpson’, specifically the episode where Homer sues an all you can eat buffet claiming he left hungry whilst the owners claimed ‘he was more animal than man’. The same sentiments came to me with regard to O as he demolished buckets of food with the only pause being whilst he cooked his next piece of meat or fish. Also I really have begun to learn that Thai chilies are in fact a lot stronger than their western counterparts and only once a day now do I leave a table screaming holding my throat and grabbing the nearest liquid to douse the burning (admittedly its often a chang beer).

Speaking of embarrassments the pecker seems to be enjoying himself and whether it’s the heat or the food whatever, he’s in Thailand to look at the sights too. I have an oil massage (6 quid for 2 hours) every day with the same women, ‘Sopsi’ and at the same moment everyday the pecker pops up to say hello to her even though he’s never invited. Luckily she’s used to it now so even though I blush and cover him up its quite obvious to us both that there are now 3 of us in the room. I fancy Sopsi something rotten but because of my erection embarrassments I haven’t had the courage to ask her for dinner, though she is a single Mum and has dropped hints that an invite might not be refuted. I even went and fired a bullet before my last massage thinking if I went without a loaded gun I might get away with it but no, John Tomas turned up bang on cue though not at full attention, he was a little sleepy.

Around the corner from where I am staying is the most fantastic vegetarian restaurant so although I’m partying quite hard the food intake has been healthy and wholesome. I will attempt the Thai cookery school next week methinks but no promises at this stage.
Found the most fantastic bar with Marcus this week also.
The Riverside Café has to live bands on and trust me when I say they were excellent. They did covers of all the old favorites’ (we are the champions, when we were young etc) and I was amazed at how tight the bands were. They covered one of my all time favorites ‘Love Foolosophy’ by ‘Jamioqua’, I think only the great man could have done better.

On the plus side my bartering seems to have improved immensely. Whenever we go out for a game of pool we will inevitably be approached by young children (I’m talking 4 or 5) who try to get you to buy a necklace made of Jasmine. After intensive negotiations I have managed to lower the price from 20 baht (30p) to 10 baht (15p).
I think I may also be losing weight though that is entirely due to the heat and humidity; even a fat git like me manages sometimes to go for long walks and burn off a few ungainly pounds. On one of my walks today I wandered into a festival at a Nepalese temple where they were inducting young men into monkdom. They were all young boys (again 4 or 5ish) all dressed up in the regalia, wearing full make up and nail polish (apparently the prettier you are the luckier it is) and were being carried around so that their feet didn’t touch the floor. Later they were all put into a type of Bedouin tent and had their hair shaved off being dodging school for a month and instead going to the temple to learn about monk stuff. Amazing




Monky business

On the sport sides of things I couldn’t be happier; Thai TV caters to every English sports fan’s whim so last night we watched Chelsea nab a draw, England snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, the previous night watched the Milan game and tonight I’ll be off home to watch the masters.
On Saturday I caused quite a stir in a boozer by doing something I thought I had stopped long ago. Chelsea were playing Watford away and were looking like they would be lucky to just get a draw but would you believe with 2 minutes of injury time gone we popped up and scored the winner. Cue the Spillanester jumping from his stool, taking his top off and waving it above his head whilst running around the bar wildly screaming yeeeeeesssssssssss!!!!!! Much to the total disbelief and shock of all the staff. The last time I did this was 2 years ago at Stan James when the dark looks I received from the gaffer PF convinced me I really should stop doing this. What can I say, I’m not sure if it was the noise or the sight of a little fat Buddha with glasses screaming yes that shocked them more.


The attitude to ‘farangs’s (westerneners) surprises me everyday here. The people are so kind and gentle and accommodate us with no prejudice or concern whatsoever. Though the only Thai I have mastered so far is, sa-wat dee cup (welcome/hello), Chock Dee (cheers) and khorb koon cup (Thank you); it seems to be enough.
The Ladies especially seem to like us which is nice seeing as I find Thai women awfully attractive, they are so much more feminine than their western counterparts and have a devilish sense of humor to boot. My friend from Stan James, Russell constantly keeps asking me about the lady boys and although I’m sure he can find specialist websites for that sort of thing the latest news is yes Russell there are Lady boys in Chang mai so get yourself over here.

One big no no over here is abuse of the King in any shape or form. If only one young Swiss bloke had paid attention to that rule. He was caught spray painting a beard on a poster of the King and was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. Harsh but if you can’t do the time don’t do the crime.



Finally the timetable for a typical night out here

8pm dinner, often phad thai for about 30p

9pm bar for game of pool and flirt with the bar girls

11pm rooftop bar for a fishbowl or a bucket that is a concoction of Thai whiskey, vodka red bull and coke

12am bubbles or hotshots disco dancing to trance house stuff

2am Spicey’s

5pm onwards oblivion

I say oblivion but often if a complete stranger doesn’t offer to give me a lift home I will mange to walk home and stop at the roadside shop at the bottom of our road buying the locals a can of beer, have a chat with them and play with the stray dogs.

Spicey’s is the club of dreams (and wet ones at that).
It is a mixture of Thai bar girls who have finished work and Thai locals and students who want to dance. The music is hit after hit with me normally reaching ‘lets go mental’ stage when ever the dj plays ‘Jump around’ by house of pain; he normally plays it at least 3 times a night.
The only fights are between the girls and drinks cost a quid.

The only thing in there I still find strange is when one goes to the toilet, I nearly caused a fight the first time I went. As I began my piss two blokes were on me, one patting the back of my legs the other rubbing my shoulders, yep there are masseuses and hadn’t my friend Andy been in there to tell me so all hell would have broken loose. The pressure to piss straight is immense as the guy doing your legs does not wear a visor to protect him for splash backs. They also crick your neck which probably isn’t a good thing as I doubt they are qualified chiropractors, they then hand you a towel after washing your hands and are delighted when you give them both 20p, it’s a different world out here.