We got off to a later start today, but this town has such a great vibe that we don't feel any need to rush. We've been wanting small town Southeast Asian life and this certainly is a small town.
- It has a whopping 10,000 people.
- It recently got it's very first traffic light.
- It has one main street & a few side streets to make it a proper grid.
- It has 3 markets (a morning market, a day market, and a night market - obviously).
Armed with our not-to-scale map, we set off to find the day market. We've read that it is quite the experience. Markets are abundant throughout Southeast Asia and they all have a similar structure. There is a dry area that is just for fruits & grains, a wet area that is for meats, and a few random stalls just to make it interesting.
We came into the Luang Namtha day market ready for anything. First, the dry market. Pretty standard stuff. Lots of fruits I don't recognize. Lots of vegetables I don't recognize (sidenote: did you know that they have eggplant here that is the size of a golf ball?). Lots of interesting tribal people in traditional clothes. So far. So good. So Southeast Asia normal.
Second, the wet market. It wasn't the pools filled with live fish that grossed me out. It wasn't the cages of poultry that grossed me out. It wasn't the bag of dead chicks that grossed me out. It wasn't the frogs that grossed me out. It wasn't the big ass insects that grossed me out. Oh no. It was the grilled RATS on skewers that grossed me out. Little grilled rats with their little incisors showing! Eew! My having to eat rats on the Amazing Race would be the thing that would make me yell, "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here." I have met my food nemesis. Who eats rats?? They are carriers of the plague for Pete's sake!
Now Pallavi & I are a little concerned as to what exactly was the mystery jungle food we had eaten at the night market the previous night. It was some sort of green vegetable (we think ratten) and it had some sort of meat? One should never be guessing if a substance is mushroom or liver or lamb. The only questionable food in life should be baby food vegetable & meat blends. Nothing else! God we hope that mystery meat wasn't rat!
After the day market, we thought we'd go for a walk and see if we could get to the village that was marked out as within walking distance from the day market on the map. As we walked, almost immediately after we left town, we entered in a hill tribe village. Paved roads gave way to dirt ones. Stone houses gave way to wooden ones. Little boys rolled tires down the street using sticks. Fields freshly planted with rice all around. Who would have thought that after searching all over northern Thailand for villages and hill tribes that we could reach them just within a 10 minute walk from our hotel!
That night - clearly identified chicken skewers for dinner!
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