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Today we opted to have a lazy day by the pool as Chris wasn't feeling too clever and we'd all had a tiring day yesterday. So after breakfast we nabbed ourselves 3 sun loungers in the sun and stayed there relaxing, sunbathing and reading for most of the day, with swims in between to cool off - it's a hard life! Chris spent most of the afternoon asleep in the room, so Dave and I decided to go out and see one of the temples while he slept and come back later so we could all go out to eat.
We caught a Songthaew to Wat Phra Singh, the most well known temple in Chiang Mai, and had a good look around. In the main temple, we saw a giant gold Buddha, the biggest we've seen so far (wait till we get back to Bangkok…) and next to it a monk was leading a prayer and blessing a few locals (after which he took a call on his mobile!). At the other side of the giant Buddha was a monk sat crossed legged, looking out into the rest of the temple. There were a few people near him taking photos, and as I got closer I discovered he wasn't real and was actually made out of fibreglass! It looked so lifelike, I couldn't believe it was a model. Dave was sat down nearby so I went to tell him my discovery - he was as surprised as I was! It turns out he was a very famous monk who died aged 99 after being a monk for 77 years, so he was well worthy of his shrine - must be quite weird for his family to see though! In another of the temples we found more of these amazing fibreglass monks. As Chris said when we told him about them later, Madam Tussaud's are missing a trick, they're much better than their waxworks!
After having a good look around the rest of the site, we stopped for a beer and some spring rolls at a nearby restaurant, run by an older ladyboy with long purple fingernails, too much makeup, but still an unmistakeable man's face! She looked a bit put out to have to serve us as she seemed to be engrossed in her newspaper and TV!
Back at the hotel we found Chris and headed out towards some food stalls we'd seen around the corner form the hotel. We enjoyed some nice cheap street food and then headed back to the hotel for an early night - sleeper train back to Bangkok tomorrow so we'd better make sure we sleep well tonight.
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