24.03.2008 House blessing

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House blessing

K's mom got up at 5 am. I decided to ignore it and go back to sleep until someone would ask me to get my ass out of bed - which was unfortunately only one hour later 😉 I got up and had a shower. Compared to what I had experienced during the past three weeks, this bathroom and shower were pure luxury. I enjoyed every second I spent underneath this warm water shower.

I wanted to help with the final preparations but no one had anything for me to do and I was told to sit on the couch and wait. I had no idea what this house blessing ceremony was going to look like so I just sat on the veranda and watched the others eagerly preparing the buffet and other things.

At 9.30 am K and the landlord took off in two cars to pick up the monks. When they were back I watched the monks get out of the car and enter the house. I was under the impression that they gave me disapproving looks. I wondered if I was allowed to have eye contact with them because I am a woman. I knew that I am not allowed to touch them under any circumstances but no one told me about the eye contact. Since I wasn't sure how to deal with the situation I came to the conclusion that it would be best to just sit still and look at my feet. Later on K told me that it would have been ok to look into their eyes. I guess I misinterpreted their serious looks.

The monks sat down in a semi circle on little foursquare rugs, in the living room where dining table and chairs had been removed. The one who sat at the left end took a ball off string, held on to the end, and passed the rest on to the others. In the end they were all connected through this white string. After they had pored themselves drinks, they started to sing. I assume that they were singing prayers. The songs were calm and I enjoyed listening to them. We were all on the floor in front of them, sitting in a tailor seat or either directly on our knees or with our legs next to our bottoms. As much as I was interested in every detail of the ceremony and although it only lasted about 15 minutes, at some point I just couldn't sit in either of these positions anymore. What can I say, I'm an office person and only accustomed to chairs 😉. Anyway, I decided to sit on my bud, put my legs in front of me and hug them. That however, does not seem to be a polite way to sit for I got a disapproving look from one of the other guests - if looks could kill... - I got back into a nice seat and wished that I had stronger back muscles.

After the ceremony we finally got brunch. The monks had their food in the house while the guests ate outside. While we ate one of the monks came out and started to draw a pyramid with dots on the wall on top of the entrance. Then he started to stick a sign made of gold paper on each corner of the pyramid. In the end he took a wooden birch, dunked it in water and besprinkled his artwork. Then he turned round and bedabbled me. I was so shocked because it was unexpected and because the cold water felt freezing on my warm skin. K thought that was really amusing and started to laugh at me. The monk said something in Thai and K told me, that I had just been blessed for good luck. The monk also blessed K and then walked off to bless all the others.

While K and I sat on the veranda I noticed that many of the guests wore a yellow shirt with the same logo on it. I had been surprised that the house blessing took place on a Monday morning and when K told me that most of them have to go to work after I just figured that they either worked in K's sisters or her husband’s company and that this was their uniform. K however explained to me that in Thailand each day has a different colour. The king was born on a Monday which colour is yellow. Many Thais wear a yellow shirt with his logo on it on Monday in order to pay respect to the king. I thought that that is very interesting and wanted to know what my colour was. It turned out to be my favourite colour green 😊 If anyone is interested in their colour, here's the complete list: Monday - yellow, Tuesday - pink, Wednesday - green, Thursday - Orange, Friday - light blue, Saturday - purple, Sunday - red.
It had been an interesting weekend and I had learnt a lot about Thai culture. In the late afternoon we drove back to Ayutthaya where we spent another night.

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Photos

The white string
(Pic by K)

Part of the ceremony
(Pic by K)

Sitting on the floor "comfortably"
(Pic by K)

Part of the ceremony
(Pic by K)

Handing out food to the monks
(Pic by K)

Mmm... yummy :)
(Pic by K)

Everybody hungry at the buffet
(Pic by K)

The yellow shirt clan ;)
(Pic by K)

Artwork
(Pic by K)

Blessing the house for good luck
(Pic by K)

Before departure
K, his parents and me in front of the newly blessed house.