Interlude: Biking around Chiang Mai

Being significantly less dense than Bangkok, it was actually safe (and recommended) to bike around the city. It's a relatively small city so it will take anywhere between 15 to one hour to get to anywhere you want. The biggest challenge is the intense heat and the cars/mopeds ruling the streets. I was armed with my 1.5 litre of water, hat and backpack, rented a rather medicore 21 speed bike for 50 baht and started to bike around the city with my friend. The first 20 minutes was quite easy as I was hugging the side walk and avoiding all the cars that were double parked, until I had to cross two 3 lanes streets in a row. I saw my friend crossing the street without stopping her bike with ease as I was too scared to do such a thing and hopped off my bike praying I would cross the street without becoming road kill. I felt like the frog in the video game frogger, waiting and waiting for the right opportunity to cross the street. The first 3 lanes wasn't too hard as there weren't that many cars, but the 2nd one had an additional challenge as 2 lanes of cars merged into the 3 lanes which doubles the amount of cars and mopeds. I waited for 10 minutes with the sun blasting on my head, waiting for an opening. After a while, I basically closed my eyes, started to cross the street and screaming for my life as I was crossing the 3 lanes, looking at the drivers and begging them to not run me over. My heart was pounding, the adrenaline was pumping through my veins and my friend was laughing with me as she went through the exact same experience as me a week ago when she started to bike the city.