On Sunday night, I arrived back in Chiang Mai after a little over five weeks living in the outskirts of Pai. When I arrived here in July from Hanoi, I remember feeling soothed by the city’s “chill” and “green” character — temples and cobblestones forming a tender contrast to Hanoi’s chaotic traffic and searing heat. After immersion in small-town mountain life, Thailand’s so-called second capital hits the senses somewhat differently: a veritable concrete jungle, crowded, dense and loud. In Pai, familiar faces cropped up in almost every cafe and public space. It was almost reminiscent of my student life in Durham, where it was was impossible to walk to a class without bumping into friends and acquaintances en route and being pulled into conversations. Conversely, Chiang Mai’s Sunday night market was a heaving sea of strangers.
Pai’s townsfolk wear things flowing, colourful and soft to touch, with healing crystals dangling from various bodily orifices. Here, sartorial choices are more monochrome, less likely to be found on the set of a psychedelic music video. While I arrived in Pai and felt somewhat scathing of the wishy-washy hippie haze - as detailed in my previous post - this cynicism was gradually replaced with a love for the town, surroundings and kind-hearted people I met there. The saying "if you can't beat them, join them" came to mind on several occasions: donning my own new set of crystal jewellery and loose fit cotton trousers covered in "Om" signs; sipping herbal tea to the beat of impromptu drumming circles and conversations about the meaning of life/ that really crazy mushroom trip someone had last night; telling travellers passing through I had been in Pai a month and seeing their eyes widen, wondering what I could have possibly filled that time with after visiting the obligatory three tourist attractions (canyon, viewpoint, Buddha).
Weed does form a large part of Pai's "culture", but it's not compulsory. For those who enjoy writing, art, music, or other creative pursuits, living in the sleepy countryside for affordable prices offers the chance to focus on one's craft amidst stunning natural beauty, burdened by infinitely less financial pressure than in the UK, US or many European countries. It is this aspect of Pai that made my time here particularly special: waking up every day to greenery and mountains, the view always unique due to ever-changing cloud formations that could either be wisps far above, or a fat grey wall kissing the tops of houses, obscuring all visibility beyond the immediate. I am grateful to how Pai allowed me to slow down and appreciate the natural world. The poem below was written while sitting on my porch, enjoying the reflective peace that staying in an entirely deserted resort afforded me. I had spent the previous day in deep discussion with a ceremonial facilitator who works with plant medicine - predominantly psilocybin mushrooms, rapeh and cacao - to help connect people with spiritual wisdom and healing. Now the challenge remains to take forward a sense of the mountains’ calm and grounding energy with me on my journey through cities and ferry ports carrying an ever-increasing multitude of baggage (the literal not the metaphorical sort)…
Part of all
All just is -
I’m a part of that all -
The leaves which bloom,
and they that fall.
The building works
and chirps of birds,
their songs an answer
to my words.
The dog that naps on my front porch,
the rain - and moonlight’s midnight torch.
Earth is splendour. Revolves, evolves,
beyond what human minds can solve.
We all belong somewhere in this all.
Outside apartments’ concrete walls,
outside the trap of minds and fears,
in a dance outlasting human years.
When you see yourself in the veins of a leaf
some weight is lifted from your grief,
an opening - like summer flowers -
the ego’s cries relax their power.
And awareness is born in the sphere of soul:
not fractured, but home within a whole
yet also whole within itself,
a paragon of loving health.
So I’m linked to you, and you to me
and in knowing this, we grow more free.
Words are awesome, yet also fail
to reach behind that hooded veil -
to part from thinking, and to feel;
to close eyes, and let insight light what’s real.
When I’m unconscious, broken, blind,
I’ll let the trees and winds remind
me that I’m always home.
A soul and body, spirit shining through bone.