Two nights ago - sushi in hong kong, bolt for shenzhen airport. sojourn in Hades. last night - fitful sleep on slightly too small bus, leaving me with very, very sore buttocks (I had no idea that was even possible). How about now? Lying back in a garden on a borrowed laptop, listening to backpackers talking in french about their liking for marijuana and water running from the fish pond. where am I? I am in a 150 baht a night guesthouse in chiangmai, switching to a 100 baht room tomorrow night. that's 5 bucks US for the former, 3 for the latter. I have a bed, a fan and the sound of running water. The bathroom may be outside but it's pleasant to the point that I plan on adopting a two shower a day schedule if I don't fall asleep first.

it wasn't all good today - I rolled into chiang mai at 7:30 am with nowhere to stay, and ended up getting breakfast at one of the guesthouses and then alternately napping and reading foucault's pendulum, making an already odd book into a truly surreal one. Actually, the best part of the novel may well be its annotator, who has revealed a great deal about himself. His name is Eliot, he is 50-something, a wannabe writer, homosexual, a whiskey drinker, disorganized and evidently in the process of creating his masterpiece. The book is littered with notes such as "Use" or "NO" or passages that he thought particularly autobiographical, notated as "Me, Eliot". He seems to know a great deal about Eastern religions. It actually reminds me a little bit of Pale Fire, Nabokov's work where the erstwhile annotator effectively metamorphosizes into protagonist. Ironic that Eco already used Nova Zemlya and Ultima Thule in the first 100 pages...

so far chiang mai has been the perfect solution to my Hades doldrums. At 11:30 I met up with mameow, who traveled for an hour to meet me and didn't even mention it, and we spent the rest of the day wandering around together. Her english isn't great, but I gradually felt that to be less and less of a hurdle. She took me to the go-to tourist spot in chiang mai, the beautiful temple on the hillside whose thai name escapes me, and then we also played some crossword! She is also responsible for me finding the awesome guesthouse and in general having any idea what's going on at all.

the city somehow achieves a balance of foreign and local. the pace is markedly laidback. tourists and local farangs sit around at cafes in the old city and look quite happy about it as well. there are temples left and right to go with delicious street food, way better looking than bangkok. the climate is just a little bit milder, the guesthouses are much more bang-for-the-buck and it actually seems possible to find one's own quiet nook. I feel a lot better about Bangkok than I'm letting on here, but Chiang Mai seems to suit my current temperament and desires out of life.

Here is my plan for the rest of my time in chiangmai:
tomorrow - take it verrrry easy. walk around and see the sights. sleep.
tomorrow night - maybe try to hit up a khantoke joint? go watch muay thai? each of those is about 13 bucks US. Hell, I should really do both.
thursday - friday...debating going trekking into the hills which is pretty much what all tourists here end up doing evidently. 40 bucks for two days including food. Only worry is that my body has been complaining at me if I walk around too much, in which case I should get a massage...

I suppose it's not quite as cheap as I was hoping altogether. but while I'm here it seems so foolish not to take advantage in order to save 30-40 dollars...

and coming this weekend...

the scrabble tournament! mameow told me a lot more of the details today. For instance, the entry fee is 5 dollars US, while top prize is 300. and the open division will likely have 20-25 people. wow! however, it won't be easy because some heavy-hitters are reputedly showing up...charnwit and amnuay will be there for sure, with possible sighting of pakorn and panupol (though they might be headed to india). in any case, it's evidently 18 games, with a finals consisting of 2 more games! additionally the tournament will be starting at 10. I like it already. dear god, I will be getting my scrabble fix for sure. and maybe just maybe I will earn back the money I've spent on this trip...