Songthaews, Chorizo, and Acoustic Guitar

Chiang Mai is a busy city. Lots of people, lots of cars, lots of bikes, but a paucity of good parking spots. Like the San Francisco of Southeast Asia, only without the cable cars. Chiang Mai's public tranportation of choice is the song-thaew; literally translated "two rows." It sounds more fancy than it is. Picture a small pickup truck with a camper on the back, except instead of housing a mini fridge and a pull-out bed, it just has two long padded benches--the aforementioned, "two rows."


A few song-thaews run on specific routes similar to buses. Most make their own routes based on where the passengers are going. So you have to hope for a group of people who are going in the same general direction you are.

We had heard that Chiang Mai was putting on an International Food Festival at the Airport Plaza Mall. We had also heard that you could take a yellow songthaew from our neighborhood to Airport Plaza. On Saturday we decided to give it a try. We were a bit nervous as we waited. Did we need to speak to the driver? How would we know when to get out? How much did it cost? Did we pay at the beginning, or at the end? When the time came, the driver slowed without rolling down his window, so we shrugged our shoulders and just hopped on. It was almost full at first, so Justin stood out on the back and held on; an exhilarating experience at 40 mph. Thankfully, Airport Plaza is a popular stop, so we had plenty of experienced riders whose lead we could follow.


After getting our fill of German, English, Italian, Spanish and Peruvian food and drink our next task was to make it across town to the WonGen Kafe for an art show and open mic night being put on by our friends at CDCC. There was no direct songthaew route, so navigating there would be a bit more tricky, besides the fact that neither of us had ever been to that part of town before. Luckily, the coffee shop is across from the main gate for Chiang Mai University, a major landmark any driver was sure to know. It took a couple of tries and a tuk tuk driver who thought he could majorly overcharge us--(we were wise to his game), but we finally settled in the back of a songthaew with a group of people going our way. We sat with rapt attention to the drivers' route, ready to spring up at the moment he took a turn in the opposite direction from where we needed to be. Only distracted momentarily by the conversation between a British boy and a Thai girl he was obviously trying to put the moves on. In the end, success! Perhaps for the British boy as well, I don't know, but definitely success for us. Beautiful art, fantastic music, and delicious fruit smoothies greeted us at WonGen as our reward.