Songkran in Miami

Songkran or the Thai New Year happens to coincide with Easter this year and the Buddhist temple in Miami had a big festival planned. Since these festivals are a chance for us to experience Thailand with out the expense and time of a trip halfway around the world we love to go.

Here are some pictures from the festival. We did meet a couple of our Thai friends at the festival and for some reason Karl didn't take a single picture of our friends. Maybe we'll do that next time.

Getting a New Year's Blessing


A small Songkran parade








Several children performed traditional Thai dances


Here's Karl and I


Thailand is going through some difficult times with their government so unstable. Let us hope and pray that this New Year will bring more peace and security to the Thai people.

Return to Wangpikun

Yes, Karl returned to Wangpikun and stayed with some friends that we made while teaching there.

Here is a picture of Aranya; one of our former students.


Here is Karl with Aranya and her family. They are the friends that Karl stayed with. Aranya's grandfather lent Karl the hat for the picture.


Karl also met up with some of our other friends and even got to meet the school's latest volunteer teacher who had just arrived. He shared some of our hard won knowledge about teaching English in Wangpikun.

Loy Krathong in Sukothai

Karl spent about a week in Sukothai while they were having the Loy Krathong festival. For this festival, the Thai make small "boats" out of banana leaves and flowers. A candle goes in the center and it is floated on the river after dark.

As with any festival there are also fireworks, performances and parades. In the picture below, some performers take a break from their rehearsal for a picture.


The ruins in Sukothai were all light up for the celebrations.




Karl says that it was very hot during the parade so it understandable that some of the participants weren't exactly happy.




Karl also got some models to pose for him at that ruins.






I bet the models were happy to have a place to put their hats. They really don't look too comfortable and they are probably heavy too.

Pic, pic, ducks, more pics

I was looking at the emails Karl sent me this week and the subject lines read ... "Pic", "pic", "ducks", "more pics". For some reason, that seemed like an appropriate title for this post.

First, we have the pics Karl has been taking at the temples in the Angkor Wat complex with the traditional dancers.




These guys obviously aren't dancers but they were at the temple and Karl caught this quick shot.


Karl says that this little girl was trying to sell him a refrigerator magnet and she was successful. Karl wrote: "its hard to refuse such beautiful eyes"


This is a bas relief on the temple walls.


Karl also went to a shadow puppet show and even got to go behind the scenes.



Karl has also been spending some time just hanging out with the locals. Here are some pictures that he got at the market.




Now for the ducks ... Karl got this picture showing the creative method for transporting ducks to market on a motorcycle. Look closely, the ducks are alive and holding their heads up so they can get a better view of the scenery. Nothing looks quiet right when you are hanging upside down.

Living the Dream

So Karl is off living his dream (for a few weeks) of taking pictures in exoctic places. Here are some of the pictures that he has sent me.

Dancers at Erawan Shrine, Bangkok Thailand.


Worshipper at Erawan Shrine, Bangkok Thailand.


Royal Barges in front of the Grand Palace, Bangkok Thailand


Grand Palace at night with a passing boat, Bangkok Thailand


Aspara Dancer at Angkor Wat, Siem Reap Cambodia



Aspara Dancer at Bayon, Siem Reap Cambodia


Dancer in Peacock Costume, Siem Reap Cambodia

Experience Bangkok

There is a lot to experience in Bangkok and but it was so hot that we decided not to fill our days too full. On Thursday, April 19th we wandered around some tailor shops in the Silom area of Bangkok. We were really disappointed in what we saw as far as the tailors went. Most of the shops offered an entire “suit of clothes” in 24 hours for too much money. We knew there had to be a catch. The more legitimate tailor shops needed two weeks to finish a complete suit and cost even more money. We didn’t have two weeks so we gave up on the tailor-made clothes idea.

Friday we got to spend some time with Due. He is staying with his cousin Ying in a suburb of Bangkok and working to earn a bit of money before he starts college. Due had the day off so we met him and Ying at the Vimanmek Teak Mansion which was built for one of Thailand’s past kings. It is full of various items that have historical significance and many were possessions of past kings or queens. We took the tour of the mansion but were a bit disappointed that we weren’t allowed to take pictures. So, the only picture we have from Vimanmek is of a monitor lizard crossing the street! For dinner, we went to a fun restaurant near the Victory Monument. You order various ingredients and then add them to a pot of boiling stock. When everything is cooked, you scoop out what you want into your bowl. Due helped us order and he made sure that none of us went home hungry. It was good to see Due again and we really had a great time.




During our entire trip we’ve passed up buying some souvenirs because we didn’t want to carry them all over Thailand. We have heard about the Jatujak (also spelled Chatuchak) market and that you can find anything there. So, Saturday we went to Jatujak market to do some shopping. It is a huge outdoor market and with out a map of the place you will get lost. We focused on one particular area of the market and even that took almost the entire day. We didn’t find everything we wanted so we are planning on going back next Saturday. The market is only open on weekends and weekday mornings so that will be our next opportunity. You may be wondering why I chose this picture to put on my blog. Well, for one it’s the only picture I took at Jatujak and I only took the picture because my sister, Ruth who is currently house-sitting for us is going to be moving to St. Louis Missouri. At the time, it seemed like a good reason to take a picture! By the way, Ruth recently set up a blog of her own at us4palmers.blogspot.com. Many of the stores at Jatujak are named after American cities or movies. The “Dances with Wolves” store was a bit amusing with all the Native American paraphernalia.

Our reason for not returning to Jatujak on Sunday was the Khohn performance at the National Museum. Karl has wanted to get pictures of a Khohn performance since his first visit to Thailand over 20 years ago. When we visited 3 years ago we attended a performance and his camera wouldn’t work! So, this performance was not to be missed. The cheapest and easiest way to get to the National Museum actually requires a bit of back-tracking. We took the Sky Train from its northern terminal to the southern terminal then got on the Chao Phraya Express to go back north along the river to the pier closest to the National Museum. We walked the rest of the way through an Amulet market that is set up on the sidewalks. At this market they sell a variety of amulets that will provide you with specific kinds of protection. As we walk by we see people scrutinizing amulets to determine their authenticity.

Upon reaching the National Museum we stopped to buy some snacks and started talking to another customer. It turned out that Ubon was also going to the performance and to our surprise he treated us to some cold water and paid our entrance fee to the performance. The performance wasn’t strictly a Khohn performance. There were several dance troupes performing and it started with a group of kids playing traditional Thai instruments. The evening progressed through a variety of traditional Thai dances; some performed by young ladies and others by young girls. They mixed in a few Khohn and Lakhon performances. One was quite fun as it was a story that involved some monkeys causing mischief. The monkeys were played by four young boys who did a wonderful job acting like monkeys! Karl took a lot of pictures and I even tried to get a few short video clips. My little camera can take video clips but I hadn’t really thought of doing it before. I don’t know why because it would have been a great way to capture things like the train in Samut Songkram. I guess we are just going to have to come to Thailand again!

After the performance, Karl and I walked the short distance to Wat Phra Kaew. The temple was closed but Karl wanted to get some night pictures. I really like taking night pictures. Well, Karl takes the pictures and I watch. What makes night pictures interesting is that when you use a long shutter speed, only some things are actually in the picture. Karl purposefully took pictures while cars were passing and yet all that shows up in the picture are the headlights or taillights. If Karl uses the flash and a long shutter speed, there is a ghost image of whatever was there when the flash went off. I think you can see what I mean from some of the pictures here. What was fun for me was watching what was happening in the street as the picture was being taken and then seeing how it showed up.

At Victory Monument, Karl setup his tripod again and we took some pictures of the monument from the pedestrian walk that is around the traffic circle.



On Monday we tried to return to Jatujak but when we arrived we found it closed for the day, we then decided to take the Sky Train down to Jim Thompson’s house. Apparently, Jim Thompson was responsible for making Thai Silk world famous in the 1950s. He disappeared in 1967 and now his house is a museum with an attached store which sells Thai silk. When we got there the house was closed and the store was open but everything looked closed so we didn’t even go into the store. We wondered to the end of the alley and watched some commuter boats go up and down the canal there. Bangkok really has an impressive public transportation system. There is the Sky Train, the subway and the Chao Phraya Express. They all interconnect at different places but service different areas of Metropolitan Bangkok. If the place you need to go isn’t within walking distance of one of the stations, there are buses, tuk-tuks, motorcycle taxis and regular taxis. Finally, if you need to get some where that is along one of the many canals, there are a variety of boats that will take you there. All of this doesn’t exactly make getting around Bangkok easy but that is because the area is so huge! It is a lot easier than it would be getting around Florida if you didn’t have a car. When we took the Sky Train back to the terminal station we saw that there was a huge traffic jam and we didn’t want to try taking a taxi back to our hotel. So, we boarded the subway to a station that was closer to our hotel and out of the traffic jam.

We didn’t do very much on Tuesday. We did get a visit from our friend Wick and his family. They were in Bangkok to pick up Wick’s wife from the airport. She was returning from an extended trip to Chicago where Wick’s sister lives. We got to chat with them for a few minutes before they had to leave for Nang Rong. Wick commented on how much traffic there is in Bangkok and we had to agree. Sometimes it takes over an hour for us to get from the main tourist attractions to our hotel.

That afternoon and evening we walked around the area and did some shopping at a local market. Besides finding a cute pair of shoes, we also watched a man who was making elaborate designs with hard candy. He had created beautiful butterflies, weird-looking beetles and many different kinds of animals. While we were there he made a turtle. I purchased a monkey who wore a hat and was fishing; I thought it was really cute. We also found an Italian restaurant and stopped there for dinner. Their pizza was pretty good. Karl says it was the best pizza he’s had since we came to Thailand ... it's the only pizza we've had since we came to Thailand!