Monkeys, Snakes and Insects in Mae Rim

Mae Rim is a district starting a few miles north of Chiang Mai. It has villages and populated areas, but it feels like the countryside. September is still the rainy season, and though it hasn’t rained much, the green tropical vegetation is restful and very beautiful.

I have given myself two Saturday excursions to Mae Rim, using a tiny three-person tour company. Wanpen is a bubbly woman in her mid-forties, and one of my conversation pals on my daily walking street. She sold me the tours. Her younger brother “A” was my driver. Wanpen’s husband works together on the admin with his wife. I loved driving up and back to Mae Rim with A, as he was so very quiet and shy that I could babble on in beginner Thai as much as I wanted. I purposefully learned the word “introvert” in Thai to describe him, which delighted his older sister—not only because it was true, but also because a foreign customer had come up with the word.

The first trip, on September 29, 2018, we went to the “Monkey School” and the Snake Farm. They were both shameless tourist attractions, with “shows,” and animals imprisoned in soulless small cages. The Monkey School featured pig-tailed macaques, who were very intelligent, and very ill-treated. Here is a link about them:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_pig-ta… I was happy to leave that place.

But afterwards, the Snake Farm was much better—probably because snakes have fewer physical requirements than the macaques. Being able to hold a very young python was a delight! So strange and so beautiful. The “show” was really quite amazing, as the snake performers were deadly poisonous cobras, and the snake wranglers were undeniably skilled and brave.

My second excursion on October 6th was especially amusing. My memorized vocabulary had increased by 130 words, and every day I’d practiced speaking quite a bit, so A and I could cover more topics. We discussed foods we loved and hated, to eat or not to eat insects (he wouldn’t, I would), the most valuable breeds of dogs in Thailand and how much they cost (his Labrador just had six puppies, to be sold for about $50 apiece), and his plans for opening a street food restaurant serving international dishes. Mind you, I was speaking in short sentences, “Dalmatians, how much?” ($1550) “I didn’t eat cicadas because they were too expensive.” Etc.

My one “attraction” was the Siam Insect Zoo, where I spent two and a half hours! There were beautiful display cases of pinned insects to show taxonomy, simple but not dumbed-down explanations of insect behaviors and life cycles, and many many live insects in different sections: tarantulas, crickets, butterflies and stick insects were featured. The staff members all spoke English, and proved amazing abilities to charm even the youngest children. And there were many children! One young Thai mother, a graduate of Penn State who settled back in Chiang Mai, told me that she was tired of taking her very young children to play in the mall. “We’re branching out,” she said.

Both outings ended with a trip to a marvelous vegetable market. The stand I frequented both times was run by twin sisters. The first visit, twenty pounds of vegetables cost $3.25. The second visit, it cost $10.50. It’s because I bought lots of local mushrooms! And then A and I could chat all way back to Chiang Mai—thirty minutes with the Saturday traffic. The main topics were the different places he drove to all over Northern Thailand, and how he and his wife were going to divide up the restaurant chores. Happy days!Read more