Jan 1: Saw wa di bi mai!!! (Happy New Year!)

Gooooooood morning, everyone! Well, good evening if you're reading this from the US. As I'm sure you already realized, I did not blog yesterday, due to the sheer amount of stuff we all ended up doing. No meetings again (which makes sense, I can't see anyone wanting to spend their holiday doing meetings). But we all rose from our beds and shined (more or less) as we treked out to a ferry that would take us to a pier next to the Grand Palace. Grand, yes. Tricky, yes.

The Palace was built in the 1700s if I'm not mistaken as a new residence for the king. Getting in in the 2000s is a bit of a snag though. Because of the holiday, people were out in droves despite incredible heat. Also, because of its status as a supre tourist destination, it came with all the fun of any highly respected cultural center: more than one ticket to get in, confusing lines, and some tourist traps. Alas, at least one of our number was told that her jeans would not suffice in protecting her modesty and was forced to 'rent' a ankle-length skirt (which I don't believe was returned, ha ha). Furthermore, we began to notice that the facility was free for Thais-- who do, as another one of us mentioned-- have more of a right to be there than any of us. When we first entered, we went into the temple complex, which houses the "Emerald Buddha" (actually jade, but that's a whole nother interesting story). It was immense and full of splendor. Enormous Thai-style buildings reverberated in the heat of the day, shining with mirrors, gold, and colorful artistry. The building which housed the jade Buddha statue with his golden throne was dark and huge and full to the brim with people (no pictures allowed, sorry guys!). Several surrounding buildings had lovely art on them as well, from depictions of the Lord Buddha's life to what appeared to be a history of the Thai kings.

Upon leaving that area, we moved on to the Palace complex itself. Guards with rifles and white uniforms stood around every gate. Statues of elephants lined the stairways. A large, trimmed garden sprawled out in the middle of it all, encircled by a drive large enough for several carriages and SUVs. We're talking big.

Generally, most of us moved on from the palace to nearby Wat Po, a famous temple housing an enormous reclining Buddha. And when I say enormous, I mean HUGE! It would take several of me (about 5 feet tall) stacked up on top of one another to reach the tip of his nose, let alone the top of his head. Depicted in gold, the reclining Buddha image is used to refer to his achievement of parinibanna/parinirvana, which is the state of being achieved by an enlightened being (having achieved nibanna/nirvanna already) once they 'die,' so to speak (althought the word 'dead' kind of miss represents the whole definition of nibanna and parinibanna). The overall concept is that this is the greatest achievement made by any man in our known history.

Devotees have many ways of showing their appreciation of his achievement at Wat Po, from leaving coins in the monks' alms bowls (lined up along the back wall) to burning incense to leaving little bits of gold leaf on smaller replicas of the statue to leaving flowers near the Buddha. Most of us decided to donate coins to the bowls of the monks who lived on the complex.

After seeing the Wat complex, most of us sought out lunch in some form or fashion. Shoshanna, equiped with a new parasol, lead myself and some others across the street to a small restaurant with some good eats for vegetarians and meat eaters alike. Lauren, Suzy, and others headed over the the street with many Westerners with a name I can't pronounce (Kow something or other) and found some yummy food there as well, along with some dresses for the girls and I believe a stuffed character from a Japanese cartoon show for Jon. From there, we all split up in odd-end directions, so whatever I say from here on out is subject to further story telling by others.

Shoshanna, Alexis and Amanda headed back the way we'd come, taking the ferry down to the main pier, connecting on the sky train, and making it back to the hostel with some time to plan for later events. Lauren found a shop that probably is owned by the same Israeli guy who owned her favorite shop where she lived and worked in Nepal. Meghan and I went to Ban Baat, a square where a few families still aid monks by making alms bowls without machines, in much the same way craftsmen have for thousands of years probably since long before the historical Buddha lived (it was amazing, and I highly recommend it to anyone. The head guy there was very friendly, had printed sheets describing their craft and heritage in English, showed us several beautiful bowls way beyond the means of an American student, and sold me a bowl he was in the midst of making, using the time that his work-peer finished it up to demonstrate how the process works. One pot, two days!).

Shortly after 4PM a group of us (all the 'vegies': Shoshanna, myself, Suzy, Lauren, Alexis, and some non-vegies: Amanda, Ben, Bri, Meghan) went out for tea in Central World, an enormous mall complex at the heart of the city, where all the New Years festivities and crowds would gather shortly (apparently, malls are kind of like the enormous plazas of Europe-- where everyone goes to gather. Or at least they like to fill the streets surrounding the malls with people and shrines and decorations). We only had an hour, but it was amazing! We each got one a piece of several sweets and delicacies, all delicious, some weird (whatever the purple thing the non-vegies got is just beyond me). Biscuits with whipped cream and strawberry syrup, marzipan, lemon curd mini-tarts, etc etc etc, along with our individual choices in tea. No need for dinner, this was it!

Due to time constraints, only those who didn't go to tea were able to get to a Muay Thai boxing match. Fan, Alex, Tom, and Christy (I'm pretty sure) all went and had a blast from what I hear! Although they were first misdirected to a rather abandoned Lumphini stadium, they ended up at another stadium closer to downtown and saw plenty of action. Sounds like one kid was knocked out in his first (of 5) rounds. Sitting in the second tier, they could see all the craziness of all the different levels. I believe the 3rd tier was described as being like hyenas they were so excited, making this deep 'aye' chanting sound! From there, I think they stopped at Suk 11 to change and then headed back out to the Chid Lom (central world) stop to see the 'ball drop' so to speak. Shoshanna, Meghan, Bri and I had already been over there during our (succesful!) mission to get a new camera charger for one of our number, and just at 7:30PM it was enormously crowded. Due to the early hour, I haven't heard what happened but I'm sure it was great!

I think Bri, Timmy, and Ben went to a nearby club later in the evening to bring in the new year. A group of us stayed near Suk 11, walking around and getting some ice cream, and stayed up talking as 2010 arrived.

10 years since the new millenium. Saw wa di bi mai! See ya in Chiang Mai!