Muskrat goes to Thailand: Typical Me

Typical me, I have been slacking off on these blogs. Hmm… reminds me of college and how I would always turn papers in late. Funny how some things don’t change. So I am going to do a quick recap of all that’s been going on in the last couple of weeks. Wow I guess I have to go all the way back to thanksgiving weekend.

Thai’s obviously don’t celebrate Thanksgiving and so we did not get off of school. It was just a regular day at school and so I didn’t really think too much about the fact that I wasn’t at home with my family, stuffing my face, and watching football. I did though, wake up at 3 AM Friday morning my time (3 PM Thanksgiving day Eastern time) to skype with my immediate/extended family while they were celebrating thanksgiving together. Its pretty amazing that I can be half way around the world and still be able to see and talk to everyone for free thru skype. Thanks Skype!

The day after thanksgiving, teachers kept asking me if I was going Nakhon Phanom (NKP) after school. I kept saying no, just thinking that they were curious about what I was going to do on the weekend. At the end of the day, I packed up my stuff and started walking home. Before I got out of the building another teacher asks me if I was going to NKP. Again I said no, but asked “why?” The teacher replied “for the party.” I told them that I didn’t know about the party and so I didn’t think that I was invited. Then it dawned on me, this party must have been why everyone kept asking me if I was going to NKP. Someone just forgot to tell me about it. So once again, it was the famous Thai last minute heads up. But I am starting to adapt to the culture and so these last minute changes/notifications aren’t bothering me any more. I just say mai pen rai to myself and go with it. That’s exactly what I did in that situation. I hopped in the car with out asking any more questions, just curious to see what was going to happen next.

That night, we went to this really cool festival (not so much a party but I guess the teachers didn’t really know what else to call it). The festival was put on by local high schools to celebrate their different cultural/ ethnic backgrounds. There were 8 different ethnicities represented at this festival. There were Chinese, Vietnamese, Laotians (not sure what the proper name is for Laos people), and 5 different ethnicities from the surrounding area in Thailand. Each group had an area set up to demonstrate traditions that were unique to their culture. This included clothing, food, reenactments, full size replicas of homes, and of coarse music and dancing. It was extremely fascinating to see all of the various cultures within the same general culture. The best part of the festival was that it was not for tourists. It was for the local people to celebrate their own history. Here are a bunch of pictures.

Older Vietnamese women in their traditional wear

Younger Vietnamese women in traditional wear... no surprise with who I wanted a picture with

Thai traditional outfits...

I was the one approached for this photo. People were asking to take photos of me as much as I asked to take photos of them haha

Lighting a famous Thai Floating Fire Lantern... haha just made up that name. I asked multiple times what the English name is but never got an answer... so if this name sticks I want some credit

They light them and release them into the air, same concept as a hot air balloon... not sure where they end up?

Traditional Thai pole dancing...??? haha not sure what else to call it

These guys were great... invited me in for some whiskey which I gladly accepted

A different traditional Thai pole dance... this was pretty amazing. I have tried to put a video of this dance right below but I am not sure if it will work

The next day, Saturday, all the volunteers got together at Peter’s house and had our own potluck thanksgiving dinner. It was fun and we even got to eat some turkey, mashed potatoes, and gravy (didn’t even compare to Muzzie’s gravy though). Even though I am in Thailand, it almost felt like I was back in the states. It didn’t matter that we sat on mats on the floor to eat, or that it wasn’t actually thanksgiving because thanksgiving is about whom you celebrate it with not where or when you celebrate it. I got to celebrate it with my family, my new Thailand family, and so it was as good as a thanksgiving away from home could be. Nothing can beat thanksgiving at home with your family.

… yada yada yada… the next weekend was a three day weekend. I didn’t do much, just chilled all weekend. Highlights were sitting in my hammock for the first time since orientation and eating octopus for breakfast… and they wonder why I normally stick to my bowl of cereal.

This past weekend was another three day weekend and so Peter, Rita, Heather Johns and I went up to Nong Khai. I was very excited for this trip because it was going to be my first real ‘traveling experience’ in a foreign country, Thailand is the first foreign country that I’ve been to. Since we’ve been in Thailand, we haven’t gotten to explore anywhere on our own. Everywhere we have gone, we have been in a large group being led around following a schedule. That’s not my idea of traveling.

So this trip, we planned nothing except to leave Friday and to come back Sunday. We had no idea what bus to take, where we were going to eat, or where we were going to sleep. We did bring our Lonely Planet guide book but I am starting to dislike using guide books. The problem with using a guide book is that you tend to only go and do what the book says instead of actually going out and exploring a new place. Guide books don’t list every single place to stay or eat. They just list a few so just because something isn’t in your guide book, it doesn’t mean its not there. We found this out in Nong Khai when we found a really nice, cheap, water front, place to sleep that’s not in the guide book at 730pm Friday night on a holiday weekend… not bad for a bunch of newbie travelers.

We made it to Nong Khai with no problems except that there wasn’t a bus as early as we hoped for and so we didn’t get to Nong Khai until after 6 pm. Friday was constitution day and so there were a lot of tourists in the city when we got there. We didn’t think about this when we planned our trip and so when we went to our first place to stay…where our guide book told us to go, it was all booked up. We went around to few others places with no luck. We headed down the board walk glaring into our guide book for the next place to check. We were about to begin panicking, when we stumbled into our hidden gem of a place to stay. It was called ‘Wanna Guest House’ and it had a clean room above a shop with our own big balcony over looking the Mekong River. It was a perfect home base for the weekend.

It was a great weekend. Nong Khai was a cool clean town with a lot going on. We went to Sala Kaew Ku Sculpture Park which was built by a mystic shaman. It took him 20 years to complete the sculptures of Hindu-Buddhist imagery. It was very impressive and the highlight of the trip. Here are some photos from the park... these pictures aren’t mine because when I packed my camera I conveniently forgot to get the battery off the charger where I had put it the night before… so if any of the photos are out of focus don’t say anything bc it might offend Heather or Rita… Haha just kidding Rita and Heather, they are all beautiful photos. (...photos coming soon to a blog near you)

A Novice, or a young Buddhist monk, climbing a tree with a machete in hand

An ancient Buddhist Temple that is now in the middle of the Mekong River, it can fully be seen at the end of the dry season once the water level drops significantly