The Start of December

These past few weeks have been filled with very interesting events, first off we had Loy Kratong festival a few weeks ago, which is the lantern festival and water festival.  It was raining this evening, so unfortunately were could not let off the lanterns, but another water of the festival is the sending off of a boat of flowers  with a candle in the middle, which is to give thanks to the water on the earth and to say sorry for polluting it.  I went with my host mom and sent off the little boats of flowers and saw a beauty and talent competition, where all the girls were dressed in Traditional Thai dress and sang a traditional song.  This was very interesting because it happened that the following day I was going to be dressed in a traditional Thai costume from the time period of King Rama 5 (late 1800’s) and get my makeup done the Thai way, with the pale face painted on and the eyebrows filled in and a whole lot of eye makeup.  I was dressed this way because it was sports day at my school and they had a parade at the start of the first day to introduce all the colour groups.  As a foreigner they were very excited to dress us up and make us walk at the front of the parade, carrying egg shaped things that represented the king and queen.  It was a lot of fun and the Thai students were so amazed that we (the three exchange students at my school) were dressed in Thai costumes and had our makeup up done it felt like we were minor celebrities, because they were obsessed with getting our photos but it was a lot of fun and I hope I get to where more traditional Thai outfits soon!

It was The King’s Birthday Wednesday the fifth of December, and a lot of people were out around town wearing yellow in support of the King, as well as there was a huge gathering of people in Bangkok in front of the palace, where they king who has been sick and in hospital gave a speech to the huge crowds, all the Thai people thought it was very emotional and were very happy to see the King out and about.  Today also doubled as Father`s Day so not only were the Thai people giving respects to the King, but to father`s everywhere.  My host dad went out and played golf on this day off, so a typical father`s day, my host mom also had a yellow shirt for me to wear so I blended right in with the Thai people, except the pale skin of course!

This past weekend, I was over at my friend’s house and her host dad came up to us and said it was time to go we are going to my friend’s house for dinner, no warning or anything, but it was interesting I met people studying in Bangkok, and another student of the 4500 at my school. However that is what some of my days are like, no warning and then we are off on an adventure around Korat or even the nearby towns. 

This past Monday was very interesting as my host family was having the official opening of their new coffee shop, the monks came and blessed the place, showered it with water droplets and then friends of my host family came and ate a lot of food ( as with any Thai celebration there is always lots of good food).  Then in Thai tradition the youngest of the family hosting the gathering get to wash the dishes, so as one of the youngest, myself and two others, sat around three buckets and washed to our hearts content.  It was actually quite nice to be completely immersed in the Thai culture enough for them to think of me as part of the family instead of a guest.

This week, was filled with interesting activities at school, on Thursday we had a day learning about religion from two monks who came to our school, so teach my grade about what Buddha had taught them and how to lead a good fulfilled life.  That evening there was a barbecue festival in Korat and in the town center, they had an entire western scene set up as the stage with life performances and meat cooking everywhere.  They also had Johnny Cash playing in the background which was a little strange to walk by the speakers and hear his voice coming out of it because usually they have remixes here that they play of all the famous songs.

Finally, Friday my entire grade at school went to the national science, IT and Natural History museums in Bangkok, we then went to Dream land, an amusement park in the afternoon.  At Dream Land, they had a snow town, so I got to go sledding and play in the snow for a bit then head back out into 30 degree weather, it was quite and experiences but a lot of fun! I got my one snow day in for the year.

I am now off to the Northern Part of Thailand with rotary for Christmas, so it should be interesting seeing how all the exchanges students react to not spending a Christmas at home.