The week did not get off to a good start. On Sunday, as soon as we landed into Chiang Mai we grabbed a pretty rushed lunch and set off on a quest to find a home for the next 2 months. House hunting on the road is never easy so to sweeten up the process (barely haha) we had arranged a few viewings on Sunday, hoping one of the places would do. In Chiang Mai there are pretty much two main areas to stick around for longer – Nimman and old town. So, the viewings had us tuk-tuk around from the one side of town to the other, carrying our temporary houses on our backs (the backpacks) and it was fun (for a bit). It was actually our first tuk-tuk ride with Alexis, so we mixed the stress with a bit of fun and excitement.
We saw a few condos in Nimman which we really didn’t like. We saw a flat close to old town which we also didn’t like so despite not finding anything good on Sunday, we were hopeful that Monday would be THE day. And so Monday morning came … we left our bags at the Ban Khong Rao Guesthouse, which was a pretty nice spot to crash for the night, and off we were on a quest to find our next home.
The idea was simple – drive to the old town, walk around, talk to the locals and see what they’ll advise us. Spending the night in Nimman and exploring the area the day before were enough to know pretty quickly that Nimman wasn’t the place for us. It was busy, crowded with people and the traffic was completely out of control. It’s true that Nimman is the place with the most frequented, and supposedly quirkiest cafes in town and that’s where most gyms and co-working spaces are. But I just couldn’t imagine our life there at all. It was noisy from the road traffic but also the airport is a few kilometers away so even in the little time we spent in the area, we heard so many planes passing up which really wasn’t fun. So, we were set to find a place in old town.
Unlike Nimman, old town was quiet. Maybe even too quiet or at least that’s how it felt at first. But we loved the traditional houses, the lack of tall apartment buildings, the idea of living by a temple and honestly, just stroll the streets. People we spoke to before were saying that if we want to walk, we should go to Nimman but honestly, they couldn’t have been more wrong (in my opinion). You can’t walk in Nimman, unless you want to walk side by side with the traffic. Old town, however, has a lot of tiny streets which are almost completely pedestrian and contrary to what we feared, there’re a lot of places to grab a coffee, have a healthy sit-down dinner or pick up street food on the go.
So we wandered around Old Town and wow! weren’t we lucky. We parked our scooter by Vegan Society which is a friendly vegan restaurant in down town and after a short conversation with the owner, she recommended us exactly where to walk around to find a place. Always follow the locals’ advice and so, we did. That’s how we met our neighbor ❤ The sweet guy saw us walking around and asked if he could help … he could and he did. He took us to a friend’s house to see a room she had available for rent and called the owner of the house we eventually ended up renting. But gosh! it was all so stressful. We had a day and a half to rent a place and none of what we saw was close to ideal. The house we eventually rented had a kitchen but with no equipment, the living room was pretty empty and it has zero natural light which literally brought me to tears as I couldn’t imagine living in this “cave” 😂 … dramatic but I was exhausted and so stressed at the time! Eventually, the owners promised to brings things to cook, they brought a hammock, extra table to work from, and a few other bits and pieces that eventually made the house sort of homey. We really did so well and so much ❤
Anyway, the house was rented but not until Monday evening so lucky us, when we went back to pick up our backpacks from the Ban Khong Rao Guesthouse, they were already closed so there we were in an empty-ish house with no personal belongings other than the sweaty clothes we had on our backs, grumpy, tired and full on “ready” for this new adventure.😄
As the week went on, things were brightening up. We were quickly starting to enjoy the house more and more, and we were falling for the idea of truly living the local life. Around us, there wasn’t a single other foreigner so naturally, we attracted a lot of attention. Neighbors would stop by, have a chat, have a peek inside the house to see who these strange foreigners were haha and we were loving the change we had brought in the neighborhood. We even got the local ice cream lady pass on our street pretty much every day as she now had a loyal customer in the face of no other but the new French man in town, aka Alexis. 😂
Most of the work week saw us working away but each lunch and dinner we definitely made sure to start tasting the local food places and the northern Thai food which I knew from before was quite different (and better!) than the food in Krabi. We tried our first Khao Soi, coconut soups, green curries, gyozas and cheapest (just 35 THB) and most delicious pad thai which we picked up from the local market. Chiang Mai is undoubtedly the food capital of Thailand and we quickly verified that when one morning the French half of our household started craving for his French croissants and pain au chocolat. On Saturday it took us 10 minutes of scootering around to find the most well stocked French bakery Alexis could have dreamed of … even if we were indeed in France. So, we welcomed the weekend very happy and energised for a bit of in-town adventure, powered by not one, not two but 7 yum pastries haha
Living in the old town, we didn’t have to go far to get into some local explorations. So we set off for a day of temple hopping. During the week we had stopped at two temples at night but this was gonna be the first proper temple look-around and we were excited, especially Alexis who had never experienced the Buddhism and its temples before. First, we headed to Wat Jet Lin which we stumbled upon accidentally but quickly fell for. We then headed over to Wat Phra Singh Woramahawihan and the iconic Silver temple which definitely stands out from the rest of the temples in Chiang Mai for the silver, of course, but also the fact that due to an old Buddhist rule, women are not allowed to enter this temple. We capped the temple count at 3 as we didn’t want to get templed out from week 1 haha
But the week couldn’t end before a stop at Chiang Mai Sunday market and a reunion with our friend Carlos who shortly after us moved to Chiang Mai as well. The market itself was pretty impressive, spread along quite a few streets in the old town and covering them all with stalls from both sides. We were pretty surprised and amazed by the vibe and all you could find here (even street foot massage) and if you ask Alexis, we ended up going home pretty well stuffed that night haha
Honestly, though, after the week had with the house hunt, the getting used to everything in a totally new city (gym, supermarkets, places to eat, ways to work, etc), working pretty hard during the week, coming up to Sunday and meeting a good friend felt so nice. It felt like even though in 2 days we had changed everything, at least we had our good friend near us which was quickly making Chiang Mai and the whole change far easier to get used to. We were starting to like it 😊
