Live rabbits, mice, eels, toads, snails and fish. Uncovered meat including pig trotters and snouts. At least twenty types of fruit and vegetables I don’t recognise. Buddhist monks. Burmese men in sarong skirts. Girls with yellow incense on their cheeks. Hill tribe women with goods on their heads. Buddhist temple in burmese style. Mosque.
All within 500m in the border town of Mae Sot, 6km from Burma/Myanmar.
I arrived in Mae Sot late afternoon and met some Canadians at my guesthouse (unfortunately headed in a different direction as I planned).
We wandered around for a bit, then ended up in the burmese restaurant opposite the guesthouse. We shared an awesome tea leaf salad (which included dry peas), and I ordered a burmese dish of tofu and vegetable tempura served with a peanut sauce. Soooo good!! Also had a banana and black sesame smoothie.
Later a band (two thai or burmese guys and a canadian) performed some songs by Neil Young, Santana and Bob Marley amongst other things.
And a burmese man planned violin while his friend sang a traditional burmese song.
The next morning after a western breakfast of a bagel with scrambled eggs, I wondered around the market (description above!!), checked out of the guesthouse and then made my way to another burmese restaurant which was mentioned in the Lonely Planet. It had some things written on the wall in ‘english’, but I still didn’t know what it all way, and the staff didn’t speak more than 5 works of english. I understood that the snack and fried goods on the tables were Khajar Khaju.
I tried to ask if there was meat in them, but only got an answer that one type had potatoes. I thought what the heck and decided to try a few. One definitely looked like a sweet pastry. The potato one was like a samosa. And another I tried was sweet, a bit cakey. Also ordered a milo, which was made with water and I only discovered the sweetened condensed milk when I got to the bottom :D
Was a nice lunch! While there I had a short conversation with a burmese man who spoke a little english. He whispered to me that this place was expensive… I paid 20 baht for my three snack and milo. :/ That’s 65 cents.
After lunch I wandered to the Sorngtaaou stop for Um Phang. I was advised to go here and not at the bus station, as I’d be full by the time we got to the bus station. They were right. See this post for my adventure to Um Phang.
