23.03.2008 House blessing

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House blessing

Still no idea when Karl was going to get here. At this point I didn't care because it was weekend. K was off work and invited me to join him and his family on a trip to his sister’s house blessing ceremony in Chon Buri. Yesterday I had to check out at noon and since I was only going to meet K in the evening, I spent the afternoon on the bench in front of my back packer and tried to read. I have to mention that it was really really hot and therefore extremely hard to concentrate. At some point an Australian girl joined me and we started a conversation. It was good to talk to another traveller and exchange experiences.

K and I met in the city. It's incredible how much I had progressed since my arrival. I felt a lot more secure travelling around on my own and wasn't as scared anymore to get lost. We had a meal before taking a van to Ayutthaya where we spent the night at his parents' house.

K's mom admitted that she has a hard time remembering my name and that I need a Thai name anyway. From now on she'd call me Fa Sai (beautiful sky).

This morning I had to get up at six. When I got downstairs I realised that the others had been up for quite some time. Everyone was really busy preparing things and packing. I just sat at the table by myself, had breakfast and was unfortunately of no help.

Around 8.30 am we were all set and ready to go and started our two and a half hour trip to Chon Buri, south of Bangkok.

K's sister lives in a new neighbourhood where one house looks exactly the same as the other, except that they are painted in different colours. They're really nice houses though. At the entrance to the neighbourhood they had a security station with a barrier and about 16 monitoring cameras.

I was introduced to K's sister and brother in law. They’re really nice people. I immediately liked the house and felt comfortable at the place. Shortly after us more family and friends arrived and I was introduced to everybody as Fa Sai.

When the crowd was complete we had lunch. As it is typical in Thailand there were about eight or so dishes on the table. None of which I could recognise. They were all eager to explain what to find in each bowl and tell me how spicy the dishes were. I could swear that they made fun of me because I can't eat very spicy meals. If a European person considers something spicy an Asian person would probably regard it as a little mild at the most.

We spent the rest of the afternoon hanging around. Because the weather was really hot we were just lying in chairs and on the couch like dead flies. It was simply too hot to do anything more. At some point I wondered why we had to arrive so early since the ceremony did not take place until the next day. But I guess it's tradition. At some point K and I just feel asleep.

In the late afternoon K grabbed one of his brother in laws guitars and started to play. I wish I could play the guitar but I don't think I'd have the patience to practice. He gave me a song book and we started to pick songs. Unfortunately I didn't know many of them but we found a few and started to sing songs like "Yellow Lemon Tree", "Yesterday" and "Love me Tender". Though K has not got the best tactfulness and we're both not the best singers it was a blast. We laughed so so much.

At some point while sitting on the couch I noticed K looking at me from the side. I turned towards him and asked what's up. He told me that somehow my hair looks shit since I got to Thailand. Was that supposed to be a compliment? Don't you just have to love him?!

In the evening another one of K's cousins and his friend joined us for dinner. They seemed to speak better English than the others and it was nice to talk to them.

Since I knew that I had to get up early in the morning I already went to bed at 10 pm. At our arrival we were assigned to two rooms. They told me that I was going to share my room with K's mom while he was to sleep with his father next door. I wondered if they split us up in order for me to have the nice room with the comfy bed and the air con (what luxury!!!) whereas the guys slept on the floor in a hot room or if that simply looked better than K and me sharing a room. Anyway, I didn't complain for I was happy to spend the night in this really nice guest room.

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Comments

[K]

Room
It was no bed and hot with lots of mosquitos room !!! WHAT A LUXURY ME!!! Ha ha ha [-_-]/ K

[Fabinie]

Mosquitos
Oh come on, like they'd really bite you. I only feel sorry for not having air con. Other than that you have no reason to complain ;)