Loi Krathong....Down by the River

ERRRROOO! I'm writing this as I sit in the teacher's lounge. I'm done with all my classes for the day and now I'm just waiting for school to end. Only one more hour til the end of the day.........HOLLA!

So if you've ever heard or read or seen anything about Thailand, you would know that Thai people love celebrating some shiz! Like...a lot. The whole month of December is full of holiday celebrations. Last Wednesday was the king's birthday and that meant no school! I got to sleep in which was awesome, but sleeping in for me here is no later than 10 am. It's really disappointing because in high school and college I could sleep much later but now I guess I'm a "grownup". Gross.

Anyway, a couple Wednesdays ago ( November 28th) was Loi Krathong! We had school that day but it was still a fun time. If you don't know what Loi Krathong is allow me to explain via wiki and my own personal description. It is a festival celebrated annually throughout Thailand on the full moon night of the twelfth lunar month, the tide in the rivers is highest and the moon at its brightest. 'Loi' means 'to float,' while 'kratong' refers to the lotus-shaped object which can float on the water. So every year, all the Thai gather at a river with their krathongs in hand, light a candle on it, silently make a wish, and release their krathongs in the water. People also release 'khom loy' (floating lanterns) into the night sky to celebrate. If you ever see people do this at weddings these days, they totally stole this from the Thai culture. Below are some pics you might recognize of the celebration.

Releasing the krathongs in the river

Chang Mai festival of lights

That night, one of the secretaries at our school, Jenny, offered to take us to the Loi Krathong carnival in Suphanburi. At the festival, there were all these elaborate krathongs on display that were so fancy and creative. Here are a few pictures I took of them. 

Bridget and I and the krathong artists

These are just ridiculous...

There was also a pageant for Thai children to participate in aka "Toddlers and Tiaras...Thai style". Their makeup was insane and their costumes were so colorful.   

This pic does not do justice to the amount of make up I saw on these kiddos...

Thailand's "Honey Boo Boo" child

Below are pictures of Me and my krathong, making my wish and releasing it into the river. Fingers crossed that my wish comes true;)

1) Jenny and I 

2) My Beautiful Krathong
3) Bridget and I and our Krathongs

1) Lighting my krathong
2) In line to release and make a wish
3) I'm pissed that people keep cutting in front of me...not cool
4) Releasing my krathong in the river...

We ended up meeting up with a lot of the other English teachers and they had two lanterns that their students had given them. They were nice enough to let us partake in the flying lantern release.

After the festival, Bridget, Eric and I headed over to some of the local street fairs and got our grub on. We didn't really eat dinner before the festival so we were hungry. 

p.s. The beer here sucks...I'd give anything for an amber ale at this point.

Loi Krathong is a great holiday celebration here and I had so much fun participating in the festivities. Can't wait to celebrate some more holidays with all my peeps here in Thailand!

“Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we'll die” -Dave Matthews 

Good lord I can't believe I just put that fratastic Dave Matthews quote on this...oh well in this case it's true! Until next time...