Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Bangkok continues to be quite cool and reasonable empty. Apparently many Thais leave the city to visit family in the country over the New Year. Norm reports this is not the case for Christmas week so if you are heading this way be advised and come for New Years.
We had a lovely young woman as a guide yesterday to take us on a look at some temples(wats) in the old city. Named Nu for short she spoke very good English due to her schooling with the nuns at a Catholic Girls School . She is however, a practicing Buddhist and one of the temples visited was her own temple where she had been the day before to pray and medidate to celebrate the New Year. It would appear the Buddhist monks are much revered, and she said one hopes their sons become monks even for a few years. Apparently young men are also supposed to spend time in the military so I am not sure still how the time is found for all this. The statues of Buddha come in all shapes sizes and coverings and each seems to hold a special place and meaning for their devotees.
Nu was quite disappointed that at one stop we could not go inside as there was a celebration for the temple Abbot's 80th birthday. But we were just as fascinated with the birthday lunch going on in the tents outside. The temple Monks were being fed, then temple members and throughout all this lots of people who just seemed to have turned up for lunch-no one will go hungry at the wats-
Karen and Norman's housekeeper(Montah) is up very early each morning and leaves a donation of food for the monks that come by every street and take the offerings back to their temples.
Norman is off to join Karen(who has finally been relieved from her news covering duties in Pakistan) for a few days of R and R on a beach in Goa and hopefully, all being well,will join the rest of us for a few days at the end of our India trip.
We heard today that His Majesty's much beloved old sister has passed away after a long illness. There will be a long mourning period and it is not certain if this development will delay the formation of the newly elected government. Mr. Taksin,the prime minister ousted in the military coup a few years ago, and whose party appears to have won the recently conducted election, has left his home in UK where he now owns the Manchester City Football team (Thais are quite soccer mad and this was a very good way of letting the Thais know he was still very much around!) and just happens to be hanging out in HongKong dropping little musings to the local press each day. It will be most interesting to watch this play out and just when and if, the army will pass on the government.
We ended our Bangkok stay with a beautiful dinner cruise on the River. Norm suggested we by-passed the large touristy dinner tours , and book on a diinner evening on the smaller restored barge, sponsored by the Marriot resort and we are indeed grateful for the suggestion.
If you come to Bangkok this is a stupendous night, really a great Thai dinner and beautiful service , passing the hotels palaces and temples are graciously and majestically lit. If I only had one night in Bangkok this is how I would spend it.
And so we say good bye to Bangkok just for now.
We had a lovely young woman as a guide yesterday to take us on a look at some temples(wats) in the old city. Named Nu for short she spoke very good English due to her schooling with the nuns at a Catholic Girls School . She is however, a practicing Buddhist and one of the temples visited was her own temple where she had been the day before to pray and medidate to celebrate the New Year. It would appear the Buddhist monks are much revered, and she said one hopes their sons become monks even for a few years. Apparently young men are also supposed to spend time in the military so I am not sure still how the time is found for all this. The statues of Buddha come in all shapes sizes and coverings and each seems to hold a special place and meaning for their devotees.
Nu was quite disappointed that at one stop we could not go inside as there was a celebration for the temple Abbot's 80th birthday. But we were just as fascinated with the birthday lunch going on in the tents outside. The temple Monks were being fed, then temple members and throughout all this lots of people who just seemed to have turned up for lunch-no one will go hungry at the wats-
Karen and Norman's housekeeper(Montah) is up very early each morning and leaves a donation of food for the monks that come by every street and take the offerings back to their temples.
Norman is off to join Karen(who has finally been relieved from her news covering duties in Pakistan) for a few days of R and R on a beach in Goa and hopefully, all being well,will join the rest of us for a few days at the end of our India trip.
We heard today that His Majesty's much beloved old sister has passed away after a long illness. There will be a long mourning period and it is not certain if this development will delay the formation of the newly elected government. Mr. Taksin,the prime minister ousted in the military coup a few years ago, and whose party appears to have won the recently conducted election, has left his home in UK where he now owns the Manchester City Football team (Thais are quite soccer mad and this was a very good way of letting the Thais know he was still very much around!) and just happens to be hanging out in HongKong dropping little musings to the local press each day. It will be most interesting to watch this play out and just when and if, the army will pass on the government.
We ended our Bangkok stay with a beautiful dinner cruise on the River. Norm suggested we by-passed the large touristy dinner tours , and book on a diinner evening on the smaller restored barge, sponsored by the Marriot resort and we are indeed grateful for the suggestion.
If you come to Bangkok this is a stupendous night, really a great Thai dinner and beautiful service , passing the hotels palaces and temples are graciously and majestically lit. If I only had one night in Bangkok this is how I would spend it.
And so we say good bye to Bangkok just for now.
# posted by katie @ 7:24 PM 
