happy birthday to....

As you may know, the King of Thailand is highly revered by the people. In addition to being the longest-reigning current monarch in the world (61 years on the throne), he is also the longest-reigning ruler in Thai history. He has ruled through tens of different electoral governments and military reigns, and seems to be the only timeless fixture of the Thai government.

On December 5^th, Thais celebrate His Majesty’s birthday which is affectionately referred to as Father’s Day (though some argue that the title of the day is reminiscent of 1984. If you were not aware, every Monday, what seems like the entire population of Bangkok wears yellow polos, in support of His Majesty. You can imagine his birthday would be no different, and this is how getting off the ferry looked:

(The sign says “Long Live the King”)

Walking to school:

But the festivities themselves took place in Sanaam Luang (roughly translates as Royal Field), which is across from Thammasat. Steve and I went to muay thai practice, then over to check things out, and were confronted by so many people, we couldn’t even get close to the free muay thai fights.

Steve took the opportunity to try some new foods, here’s a sugary corn thing:

The crowd gathered to watch the king drive by; here they are forming in front of the Grand Palace grounds:

On the other side of Sanaam Luang:

By far the best picture was taken by Steve, and I am very grateful to him for taking it. It kind of sums up how I feel sometime, about being a farang in Thailand:

In case you didn’t catch it, here is the same photo cropped slightly:

That’s all for this post. In case you haven’t heard, it looks like I’ll be finishing up my blogs from Iowa, because my flight was moved up… to tomorrow! Love and miss you all!

your also not gunna believe this...

I forgot to mention that on the day of the arrival of my parents, I had another strange occurance in the sois (walkways/alleys), next to the khlong (canal) around where I live. You may remember that the last occurance was a swarm of bats--fun. This time I have witnesses to an even crazy-er event.

So, Laura, Tyler, and I are walking through the sois. Its dark, and I see something in the canal out of the corner of my eye. I look, fall silent, and stop Tyler and Laura. Yes, in the canal, is a 6-foot+ snake.


I know what you're going to say about this drawing... Yes, the water is FAR TOO CLEAR to be in any khlong, and yes I omitted the heaps of trash floating down the canal. But other than that, its pretty much 100% accurate in my memory. Now, because the water was so filthy, we couldn't see how long the body of the beast extended into the water, but I place the snake's length at a conservative estimate of infinity-feet.

I suspect it was either a Burmese or reticulated python, both of which I have heard of inhabiting urban areas in Bangkok. We alerted the local Thais living nearby (strangely enough, one of the phrases I know in Thai is "big snake!" ... I really didn't think that one would come in handy, but here we are). They didn't seem too impressed by it, and probably caught it and ate it for supper as far as we know.

Then we went on with our day, in awe of ever-interesting Thailand.

youre not gunna believe this...

This post has been a long time coming. A few weeks ago, I was checking my (highly recommended) Google Analytics account and noticed I had a rise in hits coming from search engines. Now, this blog is primarily for friends and family to check-up on me while I'm in Thailand, so I was a little surprised to see that anyone using a search engine bothered to drop by. I waited a few days and the trend continued so I searched for "muay thai practice" myself (my #1 returning search string) and... what occurred next was like something out of a movie...

I was on the first page of results from Google.

I thought to myself "I have arrived." I couldn't believe it, and it still is a mystery why I am there. Even more amazingly, I'm still there! Go and check--its awesome! Just my "everyday blog" from one muay thai practice! I guess I should probably edit the post and put that video of Brian in there, I have a feeling people are not too impressed with the still pictures of me hitting the bag and the the paragraph that accompanies them. Nevertheless, I'm still excited about my "success."

Even more amazingly (yes thats the second time I've used that phrase this post), my page comes up before the WIKIPEDIA ARTICLE FOR MUAY THAI! I rank above my beloved Wikipedia!!!


A new strange trend has also emerged... now "ryan t. alley" ranks second on keywords returned from search engines for my site. Hopefully there isn't an infamous "Ryan T. Alley" rising in the media...

Okay, thats all for my elation.

fix

Fixed the videos for tribute to Sophia and Brian in action at the recent Muay Thai Graduation blog. Check them out! Also fixed miscellaneous missing links.

krathong day

Today (okay, this actually happened a while ago!), we got to put our krathongs to use and participate in a great holiday of Thailand. We took a boat up the Chao Phraya to place our krathong. It was fun and at the end there were fireworks!!! Anyway, I got a bunch of mediocre pictures. Enjoy:

Liam took the opportunity of making his krathong to romance some locals:


I took the opportunity to finally get some pictures of the Rama XIII bridge:


Here’s Wat Arun by night with my favorite spectacle on long night bus rides—bare fluorescent bulbs in different arrays, sometimes colored by a thin, clear coat.


Here's me playing pirate:


Here's one of the river-float light displays--yes, its Thammasat's!


The moment of truth is coming... here I am lighting the candle and incense on my krathong:


And here I am releasing the krathong!


Here's the crew on the boat:


The underside of the Rama XIII bridge:


The crowd by the Rama XIII bridge (note the fire-lights in the darkness):


And again:



Fireworks at the end!!!



At the end of our journey I couldn't help but notice my favorite building in Bangkok. Its visible to Bangkok residents from the river near Saphan Taksin and from the BTS Sky Train station there. Its at the far right in this picture:


You may notice that it looks like it is straight out of a Tim Burton movie. Thats because the building was abandoned during the financial crisis of 1997. The building looks especially macabre because as it rises, the color of the stone it is constructed of darkens, until the top ends abruptly, complete with rebar reaching out like rusty snakes from the top of the building. Its been one of my little city-companions throughout my trip here, and I thought it was worth a mention.

Anyway, thats all for now. Will try to update as often as possible, and have everything up before I come home.

The spotlights...

muay thai graduation

Well after a semester of trying my best to learn some of the local martial art they gave me a certificate. I like to call it my ass-kicking certificate...

The certificates were accompanied by someone who I assume is a semi-big-wig at Thammasat. He gave a pleasantly amusing speech that concluded with a paragraph that sounded strangely like “With great power comes great responsibility…” Sort of a “use your powers only for good” thing, I guess.

The best of this semesters fighters were invited into the ring to do a round against the pads for the audience that witnessed the ceremony. Our own Vanessa Morais was selected to represent the ladies, while Kazuhiro of Japan (himself a practitioner of karate), Wicter of Sweden (a kickboxer), and Brian Fair of Norfolk, Virginia (ex-military and athlete, grappling enthusiast, and all-round badass), were selected to represent the men:

Kazuhiro (on the left) can kick himself in the back of the head, while Vanessa (second off-left) can slam a revolving door:

Wicter and Brian doing the traditional ram-muay (dance-fight, as near as I can translate). Wicter can build a snowman out of rain, and Brian once killed two stones with one bird.

And here is Brian ready to rumble. You know how leading hand-sanitizers claim they kill 99.9% of all bacteria? Brian kills 100% of whatever he wants.

And here is Brian in action: I forgot to mention, he can speak Braille.

There are plenty of other friends from Muay Thai, of course. Here’s Brett, from Australia; giraffes were created when he uppercutted a horse. He’s seen here doing what I assume is the traditional Australian greeting, but beware, I’ve heard it said that when Brett gives you the finger, he’s telling you how many seconds you have left to live.

Oh, and then there is Steve. Funny story about Steve, he was actually on Wheel of Fortune, and was the first person to spin. The next 29 minutes of the show consisted of everyone awkwardly standing around, waiting for the wheel to stop. Sophia is next to him in the row behind, she once won a game of Connect-Four in three moves, Vanessa (behind and to the right), can play the violin with a piano; below Vanessa is Peggy, they say the quickest way to a man’s heart is Peggy’s fist; right of her is Brian, who we already discussed, is the only man who can punch a Cyclops between the eye; then there is Kui, she was actually charged with murder in Story county, but the charges were later dropped, when the judge realized Kui does not “attempt” murder; then there is me; then there is Kru Deeng, the only time he was ever wrong was when he thought he made a mistake; and lastly, there is coach, who can strangle you with a cordless phone.

It was a nice ceremony and I’m really happy I did muay thai this semester. I’m still not that good at it, but at least I learned a lot and kept in shape. I am actually really interested in continuing to learn muay thai, along with my preferred orthodox boxing, and I have lots of other martial interests now: French savate, kung fu, and fencing; all look like fun. I’m happy that I have a little international influence in my workout now. In fact, being exposed to other international students has made me interested in rugby, too (despite the fact I still don’t understand the rules). Though I must admit, it would have been a nice change to see an American football game just ONCE when I was in Thailand (sorry soccer fans!).

Well, I’ll continue trying to catch up on blogs before I come home (its January 9^th, those of you wondering!). I don’t have internet access right now so posts may be made in fits-and-starts. Oh, and I’m bringing lots of presents home everybody…