Songkran and My Birthday

    So there is this big water festival in all of Thailand. It basically is Thailand's New Year celebration. I know it is weird time, but that doesn't make the festival any less fun. It is actually scheduled on the hottest part of the whole year for Thailand, and those days (13-15 of April) just happened to be right on my birthday. Now some cities in Thailand celebrate for a longer period of time, but my city just celebrated it for the three days. Basically the festival starts out with a light sprinkling of water over the hands of respected people, such as monks, parents, and grandparents. Then, right after the hottest part of the day, starts the onslaught of a huge water fight. I mean everyone is involved, and no one is safe. I even had an old lady through ice cold water one me. Another part is to put powder on the faces of the opposite sex. I don't really know what the tradition was about, but I had a lot of fun with the whole thing. And my birthday was apart of it!

So another tradition is to sort of give the Buddha statues a bath with a special liquid. 

This was the light sprinkle of my host grandmother. She in return blessed me and wish for a good future for me.

This was the start. My host mom bought us all shirts just for the festival. They basically said make me wet or I'm not afraid to get wet, but in Thai.

We got right into it right away. There were people lining the streets wherever we went. We couldn't make it anywhere without getting soaked.

We road around in the back of a truck the whole time, giving us the upper hand. That is until we had run out of water and had to refill.

Basically if you road a motorcycle you got bombarded with both water and powder, and there was no way to escape being drenched.

This is the powder thing I was talking about. Anyone could come up to you and ask to put it on your face. It was an interesting experience.

And this is what you end up after getting powder on your face...

Just some overview pictures. We did have a water gun but only one.

Another overview. We really had lots of fun.

There was this really cool place that had a foam maker. They allowed anyone to go run a jump in it. The only bad part was accidentally eating some of (Yuck!).

This is what songkran can do to you. This is a before and after photo, but no I didn't get punched I swear.

   The last day was my birthday. My host mom took me to a temple early in the morning to give food to the monks and to earn merit for my life. Thais believe it to be very important to do earn merit on special occasions like a birthday. After that we went to get ice cream (what I didn't know was there was a cake as well). Then it was a normal day of songkran with water and all.

The traditional merit earning activities I did on my birthday.

My birthday celebration at the ice cream shop.

    After it was all over we were all pretty tired. We went to the local social place to relax, and we found that they were having a puppet show. I got one cool addition to my birthday...

If you look closely you can see the people behind me controlling the puppet. It was really cool.

We all took a group picture with it as well.

      We all headed home after that, tired after the long songkran tradition. What a great end to my eighteenth year of life. Now I'm looking forward to the next big thing coming my way: my parents and older brother coming to visit me right here in Thailand! I can't wait, and I'll be sure to post about it. Till then...

North of Thailand

     The beginning of this month (April) started with a huge trip, all organized by Rotary. It was a multiple day trip to the north of Thailand. I thought there might be few boring museums and not fun places we were to go, but let me tell you that even the museums were awesome and kept me captivated. All of this was only amplified by the fact that there were over 30 exchange students all together going with me. I just have to say I had a great time!

    The trip started out with everyone meeting at the secondary airport in Bangkok (not the big international one, but the other one). We all converged onto the airport, and we made huge lines checking in. The airplane was also another experience...

Imagine having 30 plus teenagers (who all know each other) on the same plane. The only thing the plane had going for it was that most of us were extremely tired from traveling to Bangkok first.

    After the eventful flight we landed in Chiang Mai. We went to our hotel, and got ready to go to a dinner with a traditional Thai show added to it.

There were Thai dancers, man made dragons, and even knife jugglers. It was pretty interesting.

     We headed back to the hotel and that was the end to the first day. The next day we got right into it and went straight for the elephant center near Chiang Mai. There we saw an elephant show and got a great elephant ride over a river and through woods (but not to grandma's house).

Elephant show was great! It had elephants doing tricks, playing sports, and even painting.

The river was intense, but apparently the elephant had extremely sure footing.

These guys got a little scared when their driver jumped off, ran to the bathroom, and let their elephant room free.

  After the elephants, all the exchange students went for an nice ride down the river near by. We went white water rafting!

Look fun?

  After that we went to a calmer place, and did some relaxing...

Well at least I thought it was relaxing. I tried to take a nap with one as a pillow.

Yes these are real by the way. We just weren't allowed to go near their heads or touch their front paws.

We went and had dinner after that, and that ended the very eventful second day.  The next day we got up, packed, and headed to Chiang Rai. On the way we stopped at a hot springs and the famous white temple of Thailand.

This is what the hot springs looked like. I had to try it out with just my feet first. (And if you Culver viewers notice, I'm wearing my Culver t-shirt!)

I finally let go and just put my whole body in. It was hotter than a hot tub, and I got a little dizzy after a while. 

This was the white temple. I had been before (I think I have other pictures on the blog of it), so I didn't worry too much about pictures. It was still as cool as the time before.

   After lunch we went into the country side and visited the hill tribes of northern Thailand. One of the tribes was even the people who use the neck collars in their culture to represent beauty.

Some of the tribes put on a little musical performance for us.

They said that the girls (the ones that wear the collars) start out very young. This picture shows just how young.

At the exit they even had a collar that anyone could try on. I don't think it made me any more pretty...

   After that we went to our place to sleep, headed out for dinner, then return and ended the third day of our already exciting trip. The next day we headed for Mae Khong river, or the Golden Triangle (the border between Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar). There we took a boat ride and actually got to walk in Laos for a little while.

The nice sign depicting where we were. There was an actual piece of land in the shape of a triangle in the middle of the river, which you can sort of see in the back ground.

The boat ride over was nice.

The only Asian (non-Thai) exchange student we have. On the trip we roomed together, and he kind of became my little brother.

We basically went to a small market on the bank of the river in Laos.

They had really cheap whiskey, but it had snakes and scorpions in it. I of course bought some, but only for my host dad.

The boat trip on the way back. We got to see a little of Myanmar that time.

   After that we headed to the opium museum, and no, there were no free hand outs. It was actually really cool. It reminded me a lot of the Lincoln museum in Springfield, Illinois with all of its interactive and movie capabilities. Sadly enough they didn't allow for any pictures...  After lunch we went to an art museum that was called the Black House Museum. It was pretty, but it also had some weird art inside.

The outside and front of the museum.

I don't believe this was made for sitting...

Some of the strange artwork that we saw there.

    We went out to dinner after and then ended the fourth day. The next day we woke up and went to another intense adventure: Ziplining!!! 

In the middle of putting the zip line gear on. It reminded me of my summer job with the Boy Scouts.

The district youth exchange vice-officer.

One of the exchange students from Venezuela taking his turn.

   After lunch we went to our place of resting: the supposedly number one home stay in all of Northern Thailand. It didn't let the title down. The people were nice, and it had a great view.

The view from my room at the home stay.

 We spent the rest of the evening there. They fed us a great meal and showed us another traditional show. That ended the fifth day.  The next day we spent the morning in the home stay participating in traditional Thai activities.

In the morning we went to give food to the monks of the temple in the home stay. I believe it was almost too early...

     After the morning's activities we left for our next destination: Pai. The route to get to Pai was an interesting road...

This is the best way to describe how we got there. It really did turned that much, but probably not in loop-d-loops.

   The trip there lasted basically the whole day. When we got to Pai we went straight to the place we were going to sleep. It was great; we had the whole place to ourselves, and the workers were all very nice.

This was what we saw as we walked into our individual rooms. Elephants!

The Brazilians taught me a Brazilian card game.

This basically shows that we had the whole place to our selves. Such a good time.

That night we went to the Pai walking street and just enjoyed our selves in a relaxed mode.

Nice shops to buy really cheap ok quality stuff.

My friend, Joao, trying on an earring.

    That ended the sixth day of the trip, just a little over half of our entire trip. The next day we woke up relaxed. We headed out late, but headed to a great destination: the Pai canyon.

It was beautiful, but so dangerous. Here I am basically standing on a peninsula, but instead of water surrounding me on three sides its just air.

   We spent the rest of the day resting at the resort in Pai. At night they had a big dinner/party for us. We found out that the party was to celebrate all of the birthdays that were in April (which included me and three other people). They even had a cake...

Instead of eating the cake, we had a giant food fight with it. It was the best way to spend the evening.

    That was the great end to the seventh day. The next day we headed out of Pai on a long trip back to Chiang Mai. We got to the Chiang Mai lake for lunch. Then, after, we headed to the same hotel we stayed at before we left for Chiang Rai.

This was what the tables looked like at the restaurant on the Chiang Mai lake.

    After we got back to the hotel in Chiang Mai, we headed out for dinner in the Chiang Mai walking street/market.

This had all of the foreigner food you could want. I of course choose the Subway.

The market was full of stuff to look at and buy.

 That ended the eighth day of our trip. The next day we traveled to what is said to be the highest point in Thailand.

We gathered for a big group picture.

    We walked around for a while. Then we headed off for our next destination: the gardens of the King and Queen (I think). It was at the top of a mountain.

This is a great picture of me wandering by myself.

There were two separate peaks, and they both had temples at the top like this.

     After we headed back to our hotel, and had another night at the Chiang Mai walking street. This ended the ninth day. The next we got up, packed and got ready to leave. Before we went to the airport we headed to the Chiang Mai zoo...

This was the entrance. I think they added great emphasis on the fact that the elephant is the national animal of Thailand...

We got to go to a panda viewing area. They are always cute.

After the pandas, we got to go to a "winter-land". They didn't have animals there, just a place for us to play. It was so much fun.

After everything was done, we had a wile to walk around by our selves. I found a loose peacock. It was pretty cool to be that close to such a colorful bird.

   After the zoo we headed to the airport for our flight home. Everyone was tired, and it showed on the plane.

Just some of the sleeping exchange students.

    We reached Bangkok, and everyone went their separate ways. It had been a great trip that will be hard to forget, and we were all tired and ready to be home (wow I'm thinking of my Thai house as home now). We got home just in enough time for us to rest before our next big event...