I love Chiang Mai for many reasons, it also is a very familiar place. People come here to die, to find themselves, to let their hair down and some embrace the idea of the hippie lifestyle and some even turn feral.
A new traveller has arrived, the Chinese traveller and I cannot imagine what runs through their brains when they see the freedom and chaos that is Chiang Mai. Their society for the most part is very ordered, although things are changing as we all know, but when you see some of the fresh Chinese faces it can be amusing.
The selfie culture is very strong in China and everywhere you go at the moment you see many Chinese in the usual dozen poses and positions that must happen so that you can post them on the Moments pages within Wechat, which is similar to Facebook. These poses are practised and perfected over time until they become perfectly natural and this is a sign of a seasoned traveller.
All these “natural” poses can take quite some time to master of course and it can be quite funny watching the process. Posting your life on Moments or Facebook is for many their life, I too have been guilty of posting a picture or story or two but I don’t prepare the shot to make myself look fantastic…. I don’t need too😊
What I like about the Chinese is that many of them are fashion tragic’s anyway and you can spot them quite easily when you travel, but in Chiang Mai some have embraced the local style and they just don’t look that comfortable within themselves, in fact they have the same look as some of the old westerners that come here and do the same, mind you they look way more ridiculous.
I’d like to turn feral but I don’t think my self esteem would let me, I have to admire some of these old folks. I saw one lovely old couple yesterday that looked as if they had been together forever and they were maybe in their late 70’s or early 80’s and they had on their hippy clothes and were shuffling around but the difference was is that they looked very comfortable, they were not trying to look cool….. they were cool.
This is what I mean about many of the people you see on your travels, some are cool, very cool and they are out there but then you get the ones that are trying so hard to be someone that that will never be and it can look so sad and a little bit funny at the same time. But you know it keeps me amused and both my mother and I used to often “pass remark” on what we saw stroll by.