Chiang Mai was one of the places that for me, offered the best food, whether it be a quick bite at the night market or a proper lunch or dinner in a restaurant. I especially loved the soups. I actually can’t name a favourite, because I would feel I am not giving proper credit to all the other types.
Now this one in the photo is a wonton soup, ubiquitous all over East and Southeast Asia. The wonton itself is a type of dumpling originating from China, filled with some kind of meat, and boiled. Besides the wonton, the soup contains vegetables (cabbage, celery etc), some noodles and some more meat and, as expected, lots and lots of spices. I just love it. This one cost 50 baht in a nice little eatery in the centre of Chiang Mai in Thailand.
Now what follows here is either related to this wonton soup or not at all. I still have no idea, several months after the “incident”. What happened is this. I ate the wonton soup for dinner, despite the fact that I was not hungry at all, but it looked so delicious that I just couldn’t resist. The problems started the following morning: a terrible headache and dizziness, and I needed to drink so much water that I seriously started to worry. Litre of after litre after litre, and still wanted more – but then, in cases like this, your body will know what it needs, so I kept drinking (and visiting the bathroom a zillion times between bottles).
Of course I was trying to find the reason why I had these symptoms, and my first idea was that it was a cold or a flu, especially because a few days earlier I did catch a cold because of the stupid air conditioning, which was blowing cold air directly onto my bed. But then, I started to think Oh my god, maybe I have dengue fever – now why exactly dengue fever, I just don’t know, but when you have every kind of problems with your head and can’t really think clearly, just about everything seems possible. I immediately opened my insurance policy on my laptop, with the phone number ready. But I hate calling insurance companies, banks, offices and authorities, so I waited.
And then of course another idea: but why, I simply have an upset stomach! Although a rather mild version of it, because the only time I’d had indigestion before was in my hometown (you see, you don’t need to blame everything on Asian food), and that was really terrible. In comparison, what I felt now was nothing to worry about. Then I also talked to the owner of the guesthouse about it, and he gave me some white liquid to drink (no, not that type!), which helped me a lot. So luckily, no calling the insurance company was necessary, no visits to the pharmacy or seeing a doctor, after just two days, it was all gone. But then the question remained: was it caused by the wonton soup or not? I was so worried about it, that I didn’t dare to eat any type of soup for at least a week after this. But then I actually went back to the same wonton soup place and had lunch there – without any issues.
And as for the dengue fever or zika infection, unfortunately, I have experienced that, too. Read about it in this post.
