I went to the Mae Sot bus station, got rushed onto bus that was just leaving with not ticket.  This pissed off bus attendant lady.  Why didn’t I have a ticket.  How was I supposed to know what seat was mine?  As she passed out the snacks, she purposefully skipped me.  Once again I think about how everyone is constantly telling me that Thai people are the nicest people on the planet.  I think they are just like all people on the planet, some are nice and some are not.

My hotel in Tak is nice.  I spent most of my time on the computer trying to plan where I’m going in a couple days.  Final decision – Indonesia – Flores Island for some diving and a day trip to Komodo Island.

Friday night, Noi came up to Tak to have dinner.  She brought Pim with her.  Pim wanted to go have Korean BBQ.  Noi asked if I had ever had Korean BBQ before and seemed quite surprised when I said I had.  She still doesn’t quite understand how big and culturally diverse America is.  I think I can honestly say not one restaurant I’ve eaten in in Thailand would pass a US health inspection.  This one was right up there. They put charcoal in the table, added a grill thing on top and gave you a teapot of a brownish liquid.  I’m not sure if the liquid was water or oil.  I’m hoping it was oil.  You poured the oil in the bottom part of the grill thing and that became like a hot pot.  Instead of ordering what you want to put on the bbq, you went up to a salad bar like thing.  There were vats of raw meat and vats of veggies and vats of mystery food.  You grabbed a basket and loaded it with what you wanted and went back to your table to cook.  It was tasty.  I didn’t get sick.  I have hardly gotten sick here.  After dinner we went to the river to walk on the bridge.  Noi was on a roll and was just cracking jokes and heckling kids.  Pim was doubled over laughing.  I sure am going to miss both of them.

I have too much stuff.  I decided to mail some more home.  I dragged a bag full of it to the post office just to find the post office closed at noon and it was 1:00.  When I got back to the hotel, the staff helped me find a box to put it all in.  The next day I carried the heavy box back to the post office and managed to get it sent off all by myself!  Hooray – small victory.  I will probably make it back to the US before it will.  So, if anyone wants to wear panda hats and play Mahjong with me, you’ll have to wait until February or March.

Saturday night I had dinner with Tip, her husband and kids, her mom and sister, Ging, Ton (the student that attended my monk classes) and a Russian lady.  The Russian lady is Fai’s English tutor on weekends.  I was excited to meet her until 5 minutes in when I realized she was going to talk my ear off to the point where I didn’t get to talk to my friends.  She wouldn’t stop talking and she is not a happy person.  After dinner everyone went home and I went to the river to see if any Loi Krathong activities were happening.  They had the street blocked off and bleachers set up along the street.  There were students sitting in the street forming words.  I have seen this a lot (like every 15 minutes) on tv.  People are forming words, or the King’s symbol or hearts or combinations and then taking photos.  It’s kind of like mourning flash mob.  Once again, it’s such an interesting thing to see nothing but black (and some white) clothing.  It felt weird in the airport, but it was even more apparent here.  Even the street vendors and shops have nothing but black.  Everyone was in the bleachers or sitting on the sidewalk or standing, waiting for something.  So I found a spot and waited too.  Tip’s mom was there, saw me and handed me a candle.  As quickly as I saw her, she was gone.  Ok, now I’m a participant.  I have a candle.  Then groups of students started walking down the street like a parade.  They had banners in front of each different group and the student all carried krathongs.  A krathong is a floaty thing to float candles down the river.  It might be a coconut shell or something made out of banana leaves.  They are decorated with flowers or other beautiful natural materials.  I saw some made of ice cream cones.  Some were plain and some were elaborate, made to look like ducks or swans.  There was a giant krathong on a flatbed trailer that came down the street too, but other than that it was just students, thousands of them.  I saw no one from Sam Ngao, but I ran into Kru O.  She’s the lady I met at the retiree’s ceremony a couple months ago.  She introduced me to her husband and daughters.  Kru O told me there were close to 5,000 students.  More standing around, then we all lit t he candles, then singing, then standing around, more singing.  Kru O gave me her krathong to float.  I need to put fingernails or hair and 1 baht in the krathong, make a wish and put it in the river.  The sight of 7,000 krathongs floating down the river at once was one I looked forward to.  It was more like a line of krathongs flying down the bank of the river with maybe one in 50 still lit.  It was still impressive to see, but not photo worthy.  I didn’t see the giant krathong go.  Not sure if did.  I think they should set the whole thing on fire.  It would be a floating bon fire.

Sunday night I went to the river again to see what might be going on.  There was a decent sized market.  There were people standing around with candles.  There were announcements and singing.  There was one group of students in the street.  It was like a mini mini version of the night before.  In the pavilion there were many giant krathongs on display.  Tomorrow night is the actual full moon and main night of the festival.  I’m curious what it will be like.

(c)All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore