An Ancient City (with the ancients - sorry Ma & Pa!)

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With the family (Corb's Ma, Pa and sister Toria) arriving the day before yesterday we organised a day trip to show them a little of Thailand, outside of Bangkok. It was a lot, hot day with loads of hilarity (thanks Torts) and in between we saw some temples.

I had thought that the temples would be more amongst the modern city, and I suppose they kinda were, but sorta at the same time in their own little fields so they kind of gave the impression of being in the middle of nowhere. The Chedi were pretty huge, and most of them we were able to climb up for views over the countryside. Otherwise the temples pretty much resembled others across Thailand and the ruins were pretty similar in style and feel to those at Sukothai.

A highlight was a monument to a former much loved King who had a fondness for fighting cocks. Customs has that people pray to him and once their prayers have been answered they give an offering of a rooster or giant chicken to his statue. There were giant chickens everywhere. Fantastic.

The tour also took us to an elephant kraal where we met a whole bunch of elephants dressed up in red silk with gold tassles and a baby guy playing football. The little one was kinda cuteeven though he stole all the bananas, but the adults were on very short leashes and seemed sad, if not a little insane. It was a drepressing experience.

At the end of the day we were herded back into the airconditioned van and chugged back to Bangkok. We had a delicious snack of sugar cane strands wrapped in a crepe and then a nap at the hostel before a night wandering the markets and checking out the breakdancing in the park.

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