Thailand: Hidden Gems in Isan: Nakhon Phanom

The view on our drive to Nakhom Phanom

My trip this weekend to Nakhom Phanom was incredible. I loved every second of it, and I really didn’t expect to. Nakhom Phanom is right beside Sakon Nakhon, only about a 45-minute drive. Honestly, my friend Devon and I went only because we knew another OEG teacher, Taylor, who lived there, and we didn't want to travel far.

First, let me just mention how we GOT to Nakhom Phanom. I was still at the school when Devon got to my apartment, so I told her to wait outside for me. While she was waiting, a girl named Fanta, who lives in my building (but whom I've never met), approached Devon. "Where are you going?" she asked, as Thai's love asking. Devon told her, and Fanta said, "Oh, I live 30 minutes away from there and I'm going home. I will drive you!" Not only did she drive to Taylor's apartment in Nakhom Phanom, but she invited us to her family restaurant on Sunday so that she could show us a temple nearby. On Sunday, she showed us the temple, we met her mother (who did not believe we existed... when Fanta told her, "I have foreign friends," her mother replied, "No, you don't." Her mother also will not allow her to take a cruise on the Mekong River because she told her, "You are too fat. You will tip the boat."), we ate free fried rice at her family restaurant, and then, on the drive home, Fanta stopped on the side of the road to order us drive-through-style coconuts, because I'd mentioned I liked them.

Our sunset Friday night

Despite the proximity to my province, Nakhom Phanom has a very different vibe. It attracts more tourists, likely because of how close to the Mekong River and Laos it is, so there are more bars and restaurants open late into the evening. As soon as we arrived, our friend Taylor brought us to a café and bought us beer and wine from the 7-11 next door, because it was cheaper than the café’s alcohol and “they probably won’t care.” We searched online for a couple minutes and last-minute booked a hotel in the area for $30 U.S. dollars for the entire weekend. Then his friend Alex (American) and Alex’s friend Pooh (Thai) joined us for dinner and drinks. Later in the evening, Taylor’s Swedish friends, who were all friendly and outgoing and sweet, joined us. They spoke English so well, it was like it was their first language.

New Swedish friends!

The next morning, we had deliciously sweet and decadent American-style pancakes (with fruit and ice cream and chocolate syrup and whipped cream on top), and then we rented motorbikes. Surprisingly, driving a motorbike felt very intuitive, and I had the hang of it within minutes. You simply twist the handle away from you when you want to go forward, and brake like a bicycle when you want to stop. I had moments where I thought, Oh my god, I’m going 60 mph and there is nothing protecting me from the pavement, but the bike felt incredibly safe (although I know it’s not).

As I began driving faster down streets lined with palm trees, picking up speed and confidence as I drove and enjoying the warm sun and cool breeze on my skin, it slowly dawned on me just how beautiful this country is. I felt increasingly happy, and as ridiculous as I probably looked, I couldn’t stop smiling. I mean, to my left I had old men standing far out into the rice fields, which glowed gold and expanded as far back as I could see. And then, to my right, I had the Mekong River and Laos' mountains, which were formed into shapes I had never seen before, like little humps, one after the other.

There was a certain beauty even in the dirty little side-streets we passed, with small family owned restaurants set up haphazardly and randomly, many of which had pink plastic chairs as décor and scrawny dogs hanging around by the entrance. People were lying in hammocks and children were riding bicycles in the street. The beauty was in the simplicity of it all, and also the novelty of it, for me: the clothes-lines set up and the coconut trees and all of the flowers I’ve never seen before, and the men who shuffled to the side of the road as we passed and waved, holding tight to their rice field equipment, and the chicken and cows who were wandering around as if they themselves also had nothing better to do on a Saturday afternoon.

Me and Devon

Then we stopped for ice cream, and continued on (which involved merging onto a highway, which was, again, not difficult) to a very tall wooden structure that had a golden Buddha at the top. The Buddha was impressive; the rest of the structure, however, consisted of meek-looking wooden sticks thrown together to hold the Buddha up, as if all of the money had been spent on the Buddha and then none was left over for the structure on which it would sit.

We spent the night back at this open bar on the Mekong River. We’d essentially gathered every foreigner in Nakhon Phanom: Alex and Taylor and the three Sweds, another OEG teacher, and four other foreign teachers who were doing a different program, I think called One World. We had fun, American-style: drinking shots of Lom Pun, which looks like the texture of a Pina Colada and is so thick you need to spoon it into your glass; singing along to the few Western songs the Thai karaoke-singer knew; and ending up at 7-11, buying thick croissants filled with ham and egg and cheese that they heat up for you in the 7-11 microwaves.

Interestingly, I asked one of my Thai friends about what type of expectations/intentions Thai men and women have when going to a bar and meeting new people, and she said: "It's not like America... I see from TV and movies what it is like... it's not like a one-night stand here. Here, if you had a one-night stand, the girl would probably force you to marry her, and you would have to pay a lot of money to the family for the girl. You always must pay the family when you want to marry the daughter, because you are thanking them for paying for her for all these years. Anyways, men would be nervous to meet a girl at a bar because they would be afraid she would become clingy and force them to get married, so it is not typical." I told her in America, men are afraid of women becoming "clingy," as well, but they simply won't answer the girl's text messages if they don't want to see her again. An American woman barely wants to suffer the embarrassment of sending two text messages in a row, I told her, nevermind begging the boy to marry her.

Devon and Taylor and I couldn’t find our way back to the hotel at the end of the night, so we waved down a passing motorbike. Three Thai men (at least 30-years-old) hopped off, and after handing over our hotel business card, one of the Thai men pointed to Taylor and then pointed to his bike. He ended up taking Taylor to our hotel to show him where it was, and then driving him back to us so Taylor could walk us (he also offered to drive the three of us on the back of his motorbike, but we quickly said no). For a language barrier that made it impossible to even introduce ourselves, it was incredibly nice of this man to help us.

The next morning, we ate breakfast with Alex and Taylor (who invited us to visit this weekend for a Thanksgiving feast!), and then took a van to Fanta's town. From there, we journeyed home together.

I'll write again soon! Thanks for reading.