Muay Thai and Chilies

After a very nice Christmas morning, I got sick for a few days with Bali Belly.  Boo Hoo.  But I am better now and have a bit of catching up to do. Here are pictures of our fun in Chiang Mai.

Muay Thai is the big sport in Thailand. Apparently when there is a big match the whole country grinds to a halt as everyone is glued to their TV. We went to see a match and it started with the young ones. They start training at 6 and have matches pretty soon after that.  Red boxers won this match.

Similar to boxing, but with kicking allowed, the matches were a lot of fun to watch.

 For a half-time show they piled a bunch of fighters into the ring, put blindfolds on them and let them loose. It was quite amusing.

We went to this fight to see Perg. He trained Ali, Wendy and Jim while I was sick and appears to be a fierce fighter.

Here is Ali being obnoxious and not letting me take her picture.

We headed out to the nearby farms for cooking school. These are water towers in a small village that got my attention.

We decided to go a cooking school together. We started with a tour of the farm to see, smell and study our fresh ingredients.

Ali and our instructor Benni. She was a lot of fun and very patient with me in the kitchen.

Benni teaching us about the birds eye chili, my new friend. It is what makes food around here Thai spicy.

Ali posing with some Jackfruit.

You wish you could see me with an apron cooking something, don’t you. Since I can’t take pictures of myself you will have to way for Ali’s post for that.