Happy Halloween!!! See above for some Thai interpretations of what Halloween consists of. Of course, when I think Halloween, I think alien space man.
Well, we have survived our first weekend in Hangchat. As another “farang” (white person) at the elephant center informed us on Saturday, often when one embarks on such an adventure, the first week is exciting as everything is brand new. Then, after a week or two, a certain amount of depression sets in as one may become frustrated with certain lifestyle changes or, dare I say it? . . .homesick. I think we began to feel this a little bit – see my below post – mainly because of our isolated location. But I always get cheered up after an afternoon or evening out with some of our Thai friends, I love having the opportunity to meet new people!
On Friday night Lun, (my favorite Thai so far!) took us along to her niece’s 15th birthday party. Erin will elaborate in the next post.
On Saturday we went to . . . everywhere . . . with Pan. Yikes. First we went to the very famous elephant center in Hangchat with both Pan and Lun. Unfortunately, the ladies had the wrong time for the elephant show, so we only caught the end, but then we went to the elephant hospital and got to meet some baby elephants! The littlest one was only 21 days old!!! Pan almost wet her pants. Pan is a nurturer to the max. She sees us as her little charity cases and sort of treats us like little adopted stray puppies. Seeing her interact with the infant elephant, however, made me feel a little bit better. She treats all of God’s creatures like this, not just us. Please enjoy the video.
I must admit, I’m really not an animal person, but that little elephant was one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen. Then Pan forced the mahout (elephant trainer) to stand next to us for a picture, while she was taking the picture. Naughty 1 year old elephant was sticking it's trunk in her purse (I hate when that happens).
Then we headed to a very famous and ancient Buddhist temple just outside of Lampang.
It was beautiful, and Pan loved telling us about the history of the 1,300 year old architecture. Then we went to a marketplace in Hangchat, which is apparently very famous. I really could have done some serious damage with the shopping, lots of beautiful souvenirs and chotchkies priced cheaply. I even had a goal of something I wanted to buy: something to hang on the bare walls of my bedroom! I’m starting to go crazy from looking at the white walls. I found a lovely and big fan made out of cloth for only about $5 that I was just about to buy, when Pan came over, told me I wasn’t allowed to buy it, and said I can do better than that in Chiang Mai. Oh really, Pan? Are we going to Chiang Mai today? I don’t really want to wait a month until I can get a decoration for my wall. Granted she probably just doesn’t want me to get taken advantage of. But $5 for this decoration was very reasonable . . it was huge! And I really don’t care about the quality. I just want something to look at when I’m in my bed besides the geckos climbing my walls and ceiling. I was a little peeved. Then, Erin wanted to buy a purse, and Pan completely shut her down. “No we don’t buy, we look, OK we’re leaving.” THANKS FOR TAKING US TO THE MARKET, PAN.
Then we went to a ceramics outlet. . .literally it was like being in HomeGoods or something. Erin and I are still a little confused about this pit stop, especially since we weren’t allowed to buy anything. I think Pan just wanted the free coffee.
Finally, we had dinner in Lampang with Sutham, Pan, the former (now retired) principal of the Hangchat Wittaya, and a school board member who is responsible for some of the furniture in our “bungalow,” as the principal likes to call it. Can you say ‘euphemism?’ So now, I will be referring to our Jungle House as our private bungalow. The school board member is going to try to arrange for us to have internet in our bungalow. This guy’s awesome.
Posts and photos about motorbike instruction to come shortly!
No comments:
Post a Comment