One of the joys of living in Thailand is the 90 day ‘Visa Run’. No, it’s not a Fun Run to benefit Visa. Every 90 days we have to cross a border into a neighbouring country, walk around the local market and then cross the border back into Thailand. I think there must be mutual trade agreements, forcing Thailand to spew the expats and their money out into the neighbouring economies at regular intervals.

Our border crossing of choice is usually Mae Sai, in the Golden Triangle of Northern Thailand. The actual process of crossing the border can take as little as 30 minutes on a good day, and as much as 2-3 hours on a bad day. But we still need to get up at the crack of dawn to drive the 8 hours from Chiang Mai to Mae Sai to Chiang Mai round trip. In reality, the round trip ends up taking about 10 hours, because we have to stop so much for the kids.

We started this trip kind of late – we didn’t get out the door till 9:30am. It was my fault. I’ll take the blame.  Thanks to our new portable DVD player, the kids were occupied with Charlie and Lola, and Sean and I actually had a chance to talk. Bliss! Five and a half hours of talking, planning, reminiscing and dreaming. Due to 2 very long pit stops, we didn’t arrive at the border until 3pm.

Crossing the bridge over Mae Sai (Mae means River, so it’s the Sai River) into Taichilek, Burma, we headed toward the market area, not so much to shop as to give the kids a chance to stretch their legs. Immediately we were surrounded by tour guides. I laughed at one tour guide – “I take you to temple. Forty Baht.” I answered, “No.” He then turned to Sean, “I take you to temple. Hundred and Forty Baht.” Did I hear him wrong? No. He just upped the price within 2 seconds.

Keep Walking. Don’t look back.

Next, the hawkers closed in, before we even got to the bottom of the stairs.
“You buy cigarrettes? No? Have Malboro.”
“I don’t smoke.”
“Oh, have playing card. Saddam Hussein picture. American like!”
“No Thanks.”

Keep Walking, Don’t look back.

Whew. Finally we got through the chaos and could regroup. As we walked along, another Farang commented: “You guys are brave traveling with two little ones.” I hadn’t really thought about it, but this was the first time we had brought Timothy on this kind of Visa Run. Last year we didn’t get the one year visa, so we had to fly to Malaysia every 3 months.

Oh, that’s why this experience is so much more stressful.

It’s really a great adventure. When we told Samantha we had just traveled from Thailand into Burma, a completely different country, she was flabbergasted. “Yay! We get to go to Burma! Yay!” And of course, Timothy ‘yayed’ with her.

The kids dodged in and out of shops, while the locals ooh-ed and aahhh-ed at these cute Farangs. We had to buy a couple of trinkets for them, to avert meltdowns. I don’t normally do this. But it was hot. They were cranky. And a meltdown in the middle of a Burmese market isn’t my idea of a Fun Day. So, they both got cell phones. Sadly, Timothy’s is pink. But they continued happily walking down the street, chatting with friends from all over the world – Sonja in Norway; Bek in Australia; Nana and Grandad in America; Beky in Hungary; and even Kate in Chiang Mai. This delighted the locals even more. It also meant we had more hawkers following us down the street, trying to sell us more stuff.

Then we headed back to Burmese border control, picked up our passports and walked back to Thailand. Immediately we were surrounded by little boys begging. It’s really hard to ignore these kids. I know it sounds cold hearted, but even if we gave them something, they would not keep it. It goes to the mafia bosses that own them. We don’t want to perpetuate the cycle. 

The most stressful part of the day was reentering Thailand. The officer would only take one passport at a time (normally we can just give them the stack), and right when he asked me for mine, Samantha and Timothy decided to meltdown. So, we were trying to contain them, get passports and photos taken care of and look like the kind of Farang Family the Thai’s want in their country. At this border patrol, people have had their visa canceled and been refused entry, just because of they way they dress or their attitude they have towards the Immigration officer. Thankfully, all the officials were just laughing at us as we got the kids contained. We’re a great side show.

We hung out for a little longer, letting the kids run off some energy before we all piled back into the truck at 5pm. It was my turn to drive. Sean kicked back, listened to his audio book and took in the scenery along the way. He rarely gets to sit back and enjoy the view, cause he’s usually in the driver’s seat. We stopped at Big C Chiang Rai to give the kids a chance to play in the Play Port, and have some dinner. By 8pm, we were ready to book it home – no stops this time with sleeping kiddies in the back seat and Nerdy parents in the front, listening to a Star Wars Audio book. We were home by 11pm. Exhausted, we collapsed.