Videos. Also, 'Grumpy-Dad' makes an appearance in these!? 3 days of Jay being sick, with no sleep or food will do that. And the boys playing with fire surrounded by 1000's of people? That, too.
Sawasadee!! That’s how you say hello here in Chiang Mai, Thailand!! A few days ago we went to the Yi Peng Festival and it is three days long! The first day was the night after I got my tattoo where few people set off lanterns in the sky… YEP that’s right! They are called Sky Lanterns (thus the title) and so the first night we headed down to this big street that winded and turned but never broke off and just walked down it looking for something. Well ‘something’ came! We started hearing funny music first. Then we saw these guys walking down the street holding advertisement banners and people taking pictures of anything that moved! Then a police car teared down the street (we were sitting on a curb by then as the street was like an overflowing cup!) and…wait. Did I say tearing? I meant BARELY crawling down the street, siren on honking at all the cameras on tripods and in owner’s hands on the street saying MOOOVE!!!!! After it, came a car with four mega-MEGAphone speakers on top blaring out music that was SUPA LOUD!!! Next came a kinda float thing that had a ladder and people were climbing up it SO MUCH that the truck barely ever moved!! Behind it was another music-blaring car and then 5 minutes later another float came with a like 30 year old woman sitting at the front elaborately dressed and behind her a few feet was what looked like her 10-year-old daughter in the lotus position EVEN MORE elaborately dressed! Behind them was… EVEN MORE tourists!!!!!! They all had cameras out and were snappin’ like there was no tomorrow!! It was CRAZY!! We left because it was too full! It was kinda boring because we couldn’t see most of the floats because of the wall of bodies blocking our way!!!
We headed for the river bridge and stopped there to watch the Krathong (pronounced Grah-thong) float down the river! We later learned they were an offering to the water goddess and an apology for dirtying the rivers and a thanks for the supply of water. Max and I only saw two lanterns that night go up but they were only (what Max calls ‘little red spark’s) dots in the distance. Jay saw more but we were asleep by then (like 10:pm!)
The next day was Sky Lantern Day!! We were so excited but in reality we did NOTHING all day! Jay was sick so we just stayed at the hotel. (wellllllll… Jay DID book the flights to NZ! Hanoi (Vietnam capital) to Singapore to Sydney to Christchurch, NZ) but that was pretty much it except for me finishing my City of Lost Souls by Cassandra Clare!! But at night we headed to the second bridge and bought three lanterns. There were 1000's of people all around us! I let one off and it was amazing!! Then Max did one and we both did Jay’s last one cause he wanted to film/picture us!! We stayed to watch some more Sky Lanterns for a little bit and one actually got caught in a wire!! They used a hose to take it out but I thought it was going to catch fire!!! On our walk back we bought a fifth Sky Lantern for Jay but he wasn’t feeling well so Max and I set it off instead AGAIN!
The next morning it was Loy Krathong which is the third and final day of the festival and Max and I played Chinese Checkers with each other most of the day and also did some school work. After Jay got some energy we took to exploring the Night Bazaar and then completely forgot about the complimentary Krathong we had taken from the Reception and left on the front steps but whatever!!! We had lost fun exploring the Night Bazaar so it was ok anyways! Max and I also got Chicken ’n’ Chips at a ‘restaurant’ and Jay had nothing. We never really get drinks here like we did in Bali and Cambodia and some of Myanmar because it’s super-overcharged for fruit drinks-almost like Canada’s price!!! That night was the end of the Yi Peng festival so all these woman were dressed up fancy. The next day we woke up to quite a change! All the festive lights had been taken down and Chiang Mai wasn’t as lit up as before! Still it was nice that the Night Bazaar was literally a stones throw away from our hotel (I could hit the shops with a stone thrown out of our third-floor window!) and we went down there to look around for no reason! Max and I got another fish massage! (See: Bali! Bali! Bali!) It was AWESOME!! The fish were actually pretty big (for minnows!) so I was a bit scared at first! After we ate at a bar-like restaurant and Max got an un-cooked burger! It was red and raw inside. Jay made them take it back. I got spaghetti. After jay asked me to go get a picture of a guy with a CRAZY beard so I got a selfie with him! We are about to go to bed now and it’s like 9:30pm so I’d better get some sleep for the 7am wakeup tomorrow to head to the Elephant Sanctuary!!
La kon (Goodbye!)
Sullivan