So far, so good...

I've been living (and working) here in Chiang Mai for just over 2 weeks now and I am loving it. I've been going to school everyday for 2 hours learning Thai and I have already started designing/ painting. CM has a lovely, laid back vibe which helps and the locals have been very supportive with my attempts at speaking Thai!!

Notes from my sketchbook - Thai is a very difficult language to learn!

Here's some things we've noticed that are different from living in Australia (or the West) which you may find of interest:

On Thai television, it is forbidden to show anyone smoking a cigarette. It's OK to show a cigarette but whenever the person is smoking, their mouth is pixelated. Likewise with horror movies - even though Thais love their scary movies, they edit all the gory/ scary bits out of the movie!

Disregard for personal safety - it is not compulsory to wear helmets when riding a bike. In the first 2 days of this year, there were over 78 reported accidents. I rode a manual scooter for the first time last week and it was a real baptism of fire for me, especially during peak hour traffic! The clutch was a bit dodgy and getting used to the cars/ traffic takes a bit of getting used to. As well, there seems to be a complete disregard for road rules.

Image from www.robsteerphotography.com

Thais love their food which suits me right down to the tea! There are food stalls everywhere you look selling everything from freshly cut fruit to fried chicken and banana roti (delicious). You can eat very cheaply here in many different cuisines.

One of my favourites is Sashimi from Fuji Restaurant - the freshest Japanese food I've ever had for only $5.00!

Perhaps the biggest thing we've noticed since living here is that there is no aggression or 'me, me, me' mentality like in the West. You don't see any violence, there's no road rage and everyone generally gets on really well. There's a harmony here which is quite extraordinary - the locals don't earn or have very much money but they're always happy and smiling. There's a reason why Thailand is called 'the land of smiles'.