making the krathong

So our gracious and wonderful Thai language teacher, Ajarn Chatchawadee, offered to teach us how to make krathongs for the upcoming Loy Krathong festival here in Bangkok. I foolishly agreed to try my hand at creating a krathong. Okay, Ajarn did most of the work. A fun time was had by all!

Check out info on Loy Krathong at Wikipedia.

I do what?:

I did it:

The group:

Me and my favorite Ajarn:

Blog of the real thing (Loy Krathong Day!) will be coming shortly.

parents visit their favorite son, part ii

Well, I'll try to wrap up the parents trip report today!

Firstly, we went to the Dusit Zoo which turned out to be pretty fun! The only particularly notable thing I can remember after so long is my thinking that my favorite animal we saw, the "Red Panda" looks like it was created by God for an animated kids show. Seriously, look at that thing. Adorable. Anyway, we all had a good time, though we didn't opt for the peddle-boats that were for use in the pond occupied with monitor lizards. But I'm sure their docile... mostly.

We also went to Koh Samui. Islands are always nice of course. I was a little disappointed with the lack-of-clarity in the water, but it was still nice. We've decided that we aren't as much of beech people as some. We did have a fun tour of the island that included some fun stuff.

Mom en route.

A beach.

Our parents had a great experience seeing the obligatory elephants of Thailand.



In fact, we had an elephant show which was pretty interesting. The best point was when they asked for a volunteer from the audience. No one volunteered. For what seemed like an eternity it was just an awkward silence. Now, I think you've read enough of my blog to know who broke that silence and saved the day. Yes yes, yours truly finally sprang up when it became apparent that nobody else was going to. So I scamper down to the "stage" (read: concrete slab), and wonder what they are going to have me do. They told me I was going to play some soccer with the elephant. I figure, ain't no thang, and say alrighty. They put a soccer ball down about 20 feet from the goal and have me play goalkeeper against this elephants penalty kick. Its a regular size soccer ball and I figure it can't be that hard. So I am there, ready to block this thing and the elephant starts running toward the ball. It occurs to me, as this huge animal is running at me, that this is actually kind of intimidating. It dawns on me that there is an elephant going to kick a soccer ball at me and I just kinda freeze... as the elephant TOTALLY scores on me. Well that was embaressing. Next I try to score on the elephant... of course he just laid down in front of the goal. Still... there was a little hole I thought I could score through, in back of his front legs. I shoot, and he moves to block it. Well damnit!!! I'm sure I embarrassed all the Europeans there with my lack of prowess in "the worlds favorite sport" but, hey, I didn't see anyone else up to the challenge!

We got to see some monkeys and I got to hold an otter (cute!). We got to see a monkey harvest coconuts, while looking incredibly un-impressed with the entire situation. Oh, and we got to recklessly ride on top of 4WD vehicles in what was actually a pretty interesting ride! They definately needed the Jeeps that day, as the entire island was flooded:


And dad and I had a fun time dodging tree-limbs that threatened to knock us into the back of the truck as we rode on top.

Mom opted for the less-dangerous seats in back :) Despite the fact that she was the one who got blessed:

Dad and I:

We had a good trip, and then got to fly back (far superior than the 12-hour bus ride) and were reminded to not bring our Sword, Spear or Blowpipe, and Kriss onto the plane:


My brother remarked that he guessed it must be a double-violation if you bring one of those umbrellas with the sword in it. Good thinking.

Lastly, at the last second I managed to find some bugs for my parents to eat. They seemed to enjoy them... A little too much. I know they're good, but was it really necessary to lick the plate dad? Just joking! ... But seriously, they're delicious.


I wish I could have elaborated on how great my parents are and what a great trip it was, but I'm trying to catch up on all my blogging! Just let me say that their presence reminded me why I missed them so much and I can't wait to see them again! Miss you mom and dad! Will be home soon!!!

parents visit their favorite son, part i (joking, Chris!)

Yes, my parents came to visit me! I was extremely happy to have them here, and I'm sure they were glad to see a part of the world that is so hard to get to. We got to see quite a bit, and I think they got a pretty good feel for all the craziness of Thailand, that I've been working on documenting through this blog for the last five months (has it been that long!?!?).

Here are my beautiful parents in front of the two-tiered sky-train lines at Siam Square:


I took them to all the major sights (Wat Phra Kaew, Royal Palace, etc...) and showed them wonderful Thammasat and the surrounding amulet markets on Tha Phra Chan. One interesting place that I hadn't seen before their coming was the Vimanmek Mansion, reportedly the largest golden teak building in the world. It was a very beautiful building and had a very uncharacteristic (for Thailand) tour, in English, that was pretty decent!

The building itself was really beautiful and had an interesting architectural style.

Mom and I:

Dad and I:

I also finally made it to Wat Arun. Lord knows I should have made it there long ago as it is located off of the same street I live on! It is still one of the most confusing buildings in Bangkok to me. From a distance it looks very old, but up-close the bits of porcelain and ceramic that construct it make it look like it was cobbled together yesterday. It has to be old, one of the temple buildings housed the Emerald Buddha for a time before it was moved to Wat Phra Kaew. If anyone knows anything about this building don't hesitate to post a comment please! Dad and mom remarked that it was reminiscent of the Grotto of the Redemption in our own Iowa. Speaking of which... I need to see the Grotto of the Redemption.

Wat Arun is nice because you can climb it. Its fun. The stairs are steep... really steep:

Here is mom clinging to the banister (a wise decision):

And myself:

On our way out, dad inspected the bamboo scaffolding erected to work on a surrounding building. He was very impressed with that unique blend of Thai resourcefulness and danger:


More tomorrow!

laos trip report, part iii: the adventure out...

Well, I know what you're going to say: Ryan, we thought you died after your first two Laos entries. Well, don't worry. I made it back fine, only to be confronted with one of the busiest months ever. I'm here to make things right!

In my last post I mentioned that an adventure would soon befall me on the Bolaven plateau. This was no lie. I set out in the morning to head back to Paxse, seeing another waterfall on my way. The morning started out very nice with beautiful mountain streams and brooks, all babbling and clear.



I then made my way onto a dirt road that was to lead me back to a town I had already been through before going back to Paxse. I know what you're thinking... but a dirt road in Laos, isn't that a bad idea? But look at this thing--it looked great, so well-maintained:



Never mind the water buffalo and children--I'm used to that stuff. After a few kilometers it still looked great:



Okay, so maybe a slight red flag should have gone up when I didn't see anyone else, but this is the least populated area of Laos, right, maybe there just isn't anyone to use the road around. So I kept on.

I passed over this bridge held up by big stones--neat.



About 30 kms into it disaster struck. I got a flat. Well that sucks. I'm in the middle of nowhere Laos with a flat tire. But it gets better. Not only am I in the middle of nowhere, I'm in the archetypal nowhere. Also wonderfully, road conditions have VASTLY deteriorated with ruts so deep in the road I'm afraid to slip into one. It becomes painfully clear I will be seeing no four-wheeled vehicles on this trip. It occurs to me that even if I find someone, they probably won't be the kind of person who has a spare on hand, now, will they?

On this count I was indeed proved correct. After making my way slowly through a further evaporating road, I spot some huts by the side of the road:

Hi piggy (you can see the road in the background--a fully functional bridge!):



Now, believe it or not, how to approach indigenous peoples isn't covered in grade-school so I'm a little worried about my actions. I walk around the area where their campfire is--the ground is littered with the bones of the little animals that also scurry around the camp. Luckily I don't have to knock on the hut, a man is outside and sees me. I motion him to come with me cause I don't know how to say "Oh hey man, I've got a flat, could you help me out?" in Laos. He understands and comes with me and sees my motorbike. He nods and says some stuff--nice, he's seen one before. Here is where it gets weird. He motions me to look at this path leading into the woods. Here's the path:



Now you can imagine my skepticism. I am silently thinking to myself: how can you possibly think that the solution to my problems lays on a little dirt path leading INTO the dangerous jungle? I mean, what in God's green Earth could lay down that path that could possibly be good for me!?!? But this guy seems really nice, so I go down the path. Eventually the path gets too rocky to utilize my motorbike (yes I road my scooter down it... with a flat).


So now I need to leave my motorbike behind while I traverse the jungle on foot. No prob. So I start walking around in footpaths in the jungle, and the only people I came upon are two naked kids who were scared to death of me, and a topless woman straight out of National Geographic. I suddenly think about what I'm doing and decide "Yeah, there probably aren't any mechanics out here." So I head back to my waiting scooter. Lo' and behold but my friend is there, he goes into the jungle and motions for me to wait. Logically, I just assume he's getting the local shaman to breathe life into my wheel. Amazingly he comes back with an air pump. It doesn't fit, which is fine, because I'm 99% sure there is a giant puncture in my tube somewhere anyway. But man, one-thousand points to this guy for trying. I thank him as profusely as you can with nonverbal communication. I threw in "kap jai yai yai" which is Laos for "Thank you very very much," but to be honest, I'm not so sure he spoke Laos at all. I received my greatest shock on the way back through the footpath to the road. As I was getting on my scooter, two men walked into view down the path (that I had to leave through).

They were carrying guns.

Hahah, I pretty much just threw that in for dramatic effect; however, I must say that I was immediately pretty damn scared. I mean, a guy just led me down this path, and now I see two guys blocking my way out with guns. After a few seconds of panicking I took a closer look. What was with their guns? As they came closer I got a better look at the guns--a nervous task, mind you--and realize they were about four-foot long muzzleloading, single-shot rifles from what had to be a hell-of-a-long time ago.

Where the hell was I?

I realized they were just coming back from hunting. They were surprised at me (the feeling was mutual), but just walked past.

I decided to hoof-it to the road before Joe-Hunter realized I saw his wifes chest. Probably not much of a threat since she was topless anyway, but I'm not taking any chances--Lord knows how good of a shot he is with that revolutionary-war-era antique. So I made it back to the road and went on my way. Still with a flat, and now an amazed look on my face as I considered the shirt-less, electricity-less, reliable rifle-less society I had just left behind.

I continued on my way (still with my flat) and a weird thing started to happen. As I made my way on, I began to see more and more huts, still without any sort of technology. But, bit-by bit I began to see an evolution. Eventually, I saw steel mixed with bamboo to make huts, then some of the huts were nicer and almost house-like. There were more people, too. It hit me that it was exactly like I was watching human evolution, on a single road, and that the farther I progressed, the more advanced it was getting. I kept going and this proved to be true. When I reached the part of human evolution that began to have simple mechanical transportation (scooters!), I pulled over at a rudimentary store-like building and the guy changed out the tube on my motorbike! Woooo! I was afraid what the bill would be--I didn't have much money. He grabs a stick and writes the price in the dirt... I get the bad news:

10,000

10,000?!?!?! Oh, wait, that's ONE DOLLAR. How the heck do you even get a scooter tube for one-dollar? Much less the tube and the time you invested in repairing it? I gave him 20,000, he seemed really pleased.

Oh, by the way, there are so many ridiculous waterfalls in Laos. Here's just a random view from the road:


So I made a little better time now that I had a fully-functional motorbike. The road got terrible. And by terrible I mean, it was finally paved, which you would think would be a good thing. But instead, the paving was of the paper thin sort that was RIDDLED with pot-holes, some of which were over a foot deep. All the scooters (including me) had to constantly weave from the far side of the road to the opposite side. Funny to think I actually ended up making slower time on the paved road with a fully functional motorbike than I was with a flat tire on the dirt road!

Oh, and I got another flat.

No joke. Anyway, another dollar later, everything was right as rain.

I had enough daylight to check out Tad Fane. What an amazing waterfall... It is just stupid-big. Imagine if you were trying to float down one of those two little streams and then came out here... yipes. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves:





By the time I got to Pakse, I just relaxed on the banks of the Mekong for a while before getting a good nights sleep. I was treated to dinner by the family that owned the guest-house, which was good because I only had enough money for the bus ride home. I ate as much as I good and had a horrific bus ride the next morning, made worse by the hunger! But I made it home.