In Thailand, rather than New Year’s resolutions, people deliver “New Year’s Wishes,” something that you wish or hope for someone else. We found this out the hard way, when we walked in on Pan giving an emotional speech filled with New Year’s Wishes for her Matayom 4 homeroom last week. She ran up to us and forced us to give an emotional speech to these kids who can’t understand us when we speak. I should add that her co-teacher was videotaping the awkward speeches. Mine involved a lot of nice words like “fun,” “laughter,” and “happiness.” So, bloggers, in the Thai holiday spirit, my New Year’s Wish for you is that you all appreciate and enjoy the small (or big) adventures life hands you, and that you always accept the microphone when somebody asks you to sing karaoke. 
Before our mini-vacation, we had a very special New Year’s party with the faculty of the English department. Pan informed us about the existance of this party, that would take place at our house, two days before it occurred. God, Pan! Give me some time to clean the jungle house please before I have guests! At 4 PM on the nose, Sutham, Pan, Lun, Ning, and Noy pulled up to the jungle house in all their glory. Pan brought a Korean styyyyyy electric grill and a suki pot. A suki pot is a large bowl with a burner under it, in which you cook vegetables, noodles, tofu, and even meat. Although, I took a pass on the fish tofu. Pan also arrived with her full karaoke system, including speakers. Hilarity ensued. Sutham sort of hogged the thing, as he loves singing. At one point adorable, precious Ning said to Erin and I, “I want you to sing next. I like hearing native English speakers sing.” Apparently she had had it up to here with Sutham’s antics. Here is a video of him singing "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" which I have discovered is sort of the theme song of Thailand.
Even Camp came! Apparently Pan invited him because we had spent some time with him on Christmas, although she did make him leave at one point to buy more Coke and ice, and loved forcing him to take pictures of all of us. Poor Camp, can’t catch a break but smiles in spite of it. So maybe it was a little stressful for me, cleaning up the remnants of the fun (don’t want to come home from vacation to a dirty house!) but it was great spending time with our co-workers!
As many of you have seen from my large assortment of pictures, we spent New Year’s weekend in paradise. We flew to Phuket, an island in the south of Thailand, on Wednesday and after a pina colada toast on Patong Beach and a beautiful sunset, we were ready for live music. We found a large stage set up on the beach and realized that although it was December 30, the New Year’s party had officially begun. There was a “host,” for the music, stunt show, and bartending performances, a young Thai woman who had apparently learned to speak English by watching MTV. She said things in Thai accented valley girl lingo like, “They are like ready to rock alllll of you.” Or the classic, “I really like need like 3 people to come up on the stage and win these T Shirts. I like think there are like people raising their hands but to be honest, I cannot like see youuuuu!” She was a trip. We got to take in a performance by the popular Thai rapper, Joey Boy, and somebody named DJ Spidermonkey. I have included the youtube link to some video footage at the bottom of the post. I watched some Thai 19 year old college students dance in the most awesome way I’ve ever seen Thai people dance, (I ended up talking to them . . .they go to college in Phuket, obviously a party school, right?) and then two handsome young Brits came and sat with Erin and myself at our table.
Erin often says: never talk to anyone about politics, religion, or weird tattoos or jewelry (they always have sad emotional significance). All of these topics are buzz kills and conversation killers. Her theory has proven true yet again. The Brits happen to be in the army, living in Brunei (Erin had never heard of it, I wasn’t exactly sure where it was – strike 1 in the conversation). Then Jase (that’s not even a real name . . .) brought up American politics. “For Pete’s sake,” I thought to myself. “I might as well just say goodbye to these fellas right now.” For those who know me, know that as sad as it is, I have never had the political fire in my soul, and unfortunately for the conversation with Jase (not a name), Erin is similar to me in this regard. I don’t really know what he asked me, or exactly what I said. I know I mentioned not getting a lot of internet reception in Hangchat and coming from a conservative family. It’s like asking somebody how they tripped on the sidewalk, it just sort of happened and there’s nothing that could have prevented it. Within 5 minutes, the jolly old blokes had moved on to the Tiger Dance Club. To my dismay, I realized that Jase had left a nearly full beer behind. I must have been pretty awful for him to leave a nearly full beer behind. If I was at least bearable, he could have changed the topic and finished his beer in a few minutes. From now on, I will stick to my usual conversation starter reserved for these situations. “You know, I once won a karaoke contest in Boston . . .”
A few words about Patong. It was seedy, really seedy. There were probably more prostitutes than vacationers. And all the prostitutes have patrons, mostly obese, middle-aged, white men. Oh and there were male prostitutes too, who some of the girls thought were suit salesmen and Erin thought “was selling candy or something.” The beach was great, but one night in the town was more than enough for me, thank you very much.
For New Year’s Eve we met up with some friends from the program, had a nice dinner, then went back to the Beach Party for yet another concert (BigAss, a VERY popular rock band, a favorite among our students) and more fireworks than I’ve ever seen in my life! It was lots of fun. For those of you who weren't aware, there was a full moon on New Year's Eve. It was also a blue moon, which means there were two full moons in the month of December. A blue moon happens once every 18 years, but it may never happen again on New Year's Eve in your lifetime! Thai people are very into full moons. Apparently this may have contributed to the size of the party!
A few words about Patong. It was seedy, really seedy. There were probably more prostitutes than vacationers. And all the prostitutes have patrons, mostly obese, middle-aged, white men. Oh and there were male prostitutes too, who some of the girls thought were suit salesmen and Erin thought “was selling candy or something.” The beach was great, but one night in the town was more than enough for me, thank you very much.
For New Year’s Eve we met up with some friends from the program, had a nice dinner, then went back to the Beach Party for yet another concert (BigAss, a VERY popular rock band, a favorite among our students) and more fireworks than I’ve ever seen in my life! It was lots of fun. For those of you who weren't aware, there was a full moon on New Year's Eve. It was also a blue moon, which means there were two full moons in the month of December. A blue moon happens once every 18 years, but it may never happen again on New Year's Eve in your lifetime! Thai people are very into full moons. Apparently this may have contributed to the size of the party!
Then we ended up staying out until 4:15 am. How did this happen? We went to some dance club and one of the boys from our program was paying for our drinks. Where is all of his money coming from? I certainly don’t have any extra baht lying around, especially after a vacation to Phuket! Boys! 
And, a part of my New Year’s Eve that will never be forgotten is Carlos. Not to name names but Teacher Katie (one of our long lost CIEE friends,) met a ‘friend’ at her hostel who she invited out. Carlos was an Australian man who for some reason, accepted her invitation although none of his friends did. He came out with us and often stood there awkwardly while we talked to our CIEE friends. We constantly felt pity for this poor guy. We kept asking ourselves, “WHY DID CARLOS COME OUT????” I tried to strike up a conversation with him, but it was almost too pathetic. I will add that Carlos was dressed head to toe in white, with running sneakers, and a lanyard with his keys on it. “Carlos, that lanyard is killing me.”
The day after New Year’s, we managed to roll out of bed at 7 (AM!) to catch the ferry to Koh Phi Phi Don. This is the island, next to the island, where Leonardo, my boyfriend, filmed his movie The Beach. Sadly Leo couldn’t make it to visit me, his girlfriend, for the New Year, but I forgive him because he’s just that handsome. It was a lot more heavenly, peaceful, and scenic than Patong, although we were pretty tired from the previous night’s festivities. We visited two of the island’s beaches, the central Hat Tonsai, and the more remote and a bit more upscale Hat Yao.
There’s not much else to say except that the beaches were amazing, (despite a bout with heat rash, ew) it was so great to visit with and catch up with all our CIEE friends, and it was one of the best ways I can think of to welcome the arrival of 2010 (2553, in Thai . . .something having to do with Buddhism, according to Lun). Put “Visit Islands in Thailand” on your 'bucket list' (the vocab term I have assigned Lun for this week). Here is a video with some more pictures and concert excerpts! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imhOzmNywS4
Happy New Year everyone!
And, a part of my New Year’s Eve that will never be forgotten is Carlos. Not to name names but Teacher Katie (one of our long lost CIEE friends,) met a ‘friend’ at her hostel who she invited out. Carlos was an Australian man who for some reason, accepted her invitation although none of his friends did. He came out with us and often stood there awkwardly while we talked to our CIEE friends. We constantly felt pity for this poor guy. We kept asking ourselves, “WHY DID CARLOS COME OUT????” I tried to strike up a conversation with him, but it was almost too pathetic. I will add that Carlos was dressed head to toe in white, with running sneakers, and a lanyard with his keys on it. “Carlos, that lanyard is killing me.”
The day after New Year’s, we managed to roll out of bed at 7 (AM!) to catch the ferry to Koh Phi Phi Don. This is the island, next to the island, where Leonardo, my boyfriend, filmed his movie The Beach. Sadly Leo couldn’t make it to visit me, his girlfriend, for the New Year, but I forgive him because he’s just that handsome. It was a lot more heavenly, peaceful, and scenic than Patong, although we were pretty tired from the previous night’s festivities. We visited two of the island’s beaches, the central Hat Tonsai, and the more remote and a bit more upscale Hat Yao.
There’s not much else to say except that the beaches were amazing, (despite a bout with heat rash, ew) it was so great to visit with and catch up with all our CIEE friends, and it was one of the best ways I can think of to welcome the arrival of 2010 (2553, in Thai . . .something having to do with Buddhism, according to Lun). Put “Visit Islands in Thailand” on your 'bucket list' (the vocab term I have assigned Lun for this week). Here is a video with some more pictures and concert excerpts! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imhOzmNywS4Happy New Year everyone!
No comments:
Post a Comment