Thailand - May 2009
May 26, 2009
Having rolled in from Portland the evening before, it was somewhat effortful to get rolling and re-packing. Most of the day was devoted to errand-running and laundry-doing, but D and I were largely finished by dinner. Our bags were laden with a little more than I’d originally anticipated (e.g. 2 extra pairs of shoes for Mom, dance costume with jewellery, etc.), but we were largely under the weight limit. After tearing ourselves away from Gizmo’s woeful eyes, we joined a Dad in a cab and headed off. We checked in with surprising speed and blew through security—either travelling at night is the best time to do so or they’re getting lax in their security protocols. We had three hours to kill, so we hunkered down next to every laptop traveller’s best friend, electrical outlets, and started “The Matrix”. Seeing as our flight was set to depart around 2am, it was not difficult to become appropriately drowsy for the flight. Once boarded, the three of us were swiftly blanket-swaddled and sawing logs. Surprisingly, we managed to sleep for a good 8 hours. I then occupied myself with browsing the activities on my TV screen. D found the original Pong, and we were able to play each other, rather spiritedly, across our respective screens. Several hours later and we were landed in Taipei. Stepping off the plane and into the “terminal embarkment tube” (D), you could already feel the humidity. We hauled our stuff through the terminal, marvelling at its aesthetic diversity, everything from orchid displays to a Hello Kitty-themed gate (mercifully, not ours). After a brief putter around the Net, I broke out my GRE flashcards and quickly became disheartened as it dawned on me how little I remembered from Math 12. I decided to move over to vocabulary, things like “panegyric” and “alacrity”. After finishing off the Matrix, we were soon ushered back on board our plane bound for Bangkok. A few hours later, we were passing over the rice fields and canals of Bangkok. After disembarking, we grabbed our baggage and eventually found Mom and her good friend Suay waiting for us. The air was palpable as we stepped outside, like swimming through pea soup with damp car fumes thrown in for flavouring. Thankfully, we had a delightfully air-conditioned chauffeured car service, who delivered us and our extensive baggage to our hotel.
May 27, 2009
Khun Yai house...to come
May 28, 2009
to come...
May 29, 2009 (Marriage day)
The day started relatively uneventfully—breakfast, shower. Unfortunately, I had to wear a wig for the day for my various dance performances, which is not the most comfortable endeavour. After make-up and hair were on and we were suited up in our wedding attire (D in his gold shirt, suit pants and sash, and me in my blue silk dress that had been made for me when I was 15 years old), we were out the door by 8:30 am. Blissfully, we didn’t have to cab anywhere, as the venue was just next door. We made our way over and set about discussing the details of the day. The space was quite pretty with orchids dotting the hallway, gold and white linens and dark hardwood floors. The main wedding room had a multitude of flowers arranged to emulate a garden setting, with a silk-draped backdrop at its center. D and I were somewhat bemused to see our names in hand-carved Styrofoam, but mother assures me that this fairly typical. We went upstairs to deposit my costume in an area that looked to be a museum (the venue also serves as a Cultural Centre). There, Ajaan Wantanee (my former dance teacher) and Ajaan Pakhon met with us briefly to wish us well, as they had to perform that day and couldn’t stay for the ceremony. Ajaan Wantanee arrived just in time to affix some rather large and unwieldy orchids to my hair. We then proceeded to mill about, waiting for the guests to arrive while listening to the live traditional Thai band playing in the foyer. The guests began trickling in, brightly adorned in colourful silk outfits and bearing small envelopes of monetary well wishes. D and I did our best at schmoozing; thankfully, many of mother’s friends speak relatively good English. Seupong, the son of one of mother’s closest friends, gave us perhaps our most practical gift of the day: a set of pre-charged cellphones with 500 Baht of time on each and my parents’ cell numbers already pre-loaded. We could also make calls to Canada at an astounding 1 Baht per minute. He works in telecommunications, and I’m fairly certain we were on his plan.
At around 10:30 am, the monks arrived (9 in all), who had been specially invited for the day’s festivities. They filed in, took their appropriate seats and began the ceremony. We had been prepped to a certain extent on what we needed to do during the ceremony; although, the exact timing was largely unclear. D and I sat on our little mats, hands in wai position, and listened to their chanting. We were soon handed a lit candle, and together lit the candles and incense surrounding the Buddha statue. I was somewhat covertly informed by my mother that hand position for such rites is key, as the person with their hand on top will largely be in charge of things. I ensured that the appropriate hand arrangements were in order. After a lengthy stint of praying, during which point both my and D’s legs both became numb, it was then indicated to us that we needed to light another candle together. We lit the candle atop a large gold water-filled goblet, after which point, the monks proceeded to bless this water, chanting as they dripped the wax from this candle into the water, along with some gold leaf. D and I were then provided food to jointly give to a monk, which we picked up and placed on his little cloth. We then, somewhat cumbersomely, shuffled down the line and scooped rice for each monk. The awkwardness arose from the fact that one cannot really stand, as it is disrespectful to be standing next to someone seated, and our wedding garb made it awkward to move with any grace in a kneeling position. Our task was soon complete however, and we then waited for the monks to finish eating their meal (monks cannot eat after 12 pm, so they always eat before everyone else). D and I took a reprieve and sat next to the band. For some unbeknownst reason, D was soaking in a nervous sweat, likely induced by the rice-giving endeavour and his fear of spilling rice everywhere. Once the monks were finished eating, we were ushered back in and gave a package of incense, candles and flowers to the monk we were assigned, placing it on his cloth. We were then given a small goblet full of water that we had to pour into a small golden cup. Not long after an extended bout of chanting, each monk dipped a bundle of sticks into the blessed water and shook it, raining gold-flecked water droplets on our heads. This concluded the monks’ ceremony, and they soon took their leave, filing past us as we knelt on the floor.
We were now free to eat lunch, which was served buffet-style and neatly labelled in English and Thai. Servers did provide plates of food from the buffet on our table, which was handy, as it removed the need to get up for seconds. The food was good, although D and I hardly tasted it, as we were somewhat pre-occupied with the day’s events. The dessert was memorable, as mother had specifically asked for my favourite Thai dessert to be served (khanom bua loi; balls of taro in a coconut milk sauce). I had put together a selection of pictures of D and I (growing up and once we got together), which were playing on repeat on the flat screen TV stationed in each room. The pictures had been put to a delightfully cheesy love song (not of our choosing). I was soon whisked upstairs to change into my first dance costume, a blessing dance to be performed in honour of my grandmother’s 94th birthday. After a prolonged, rather heated wait (the upstairs air conditioner was sadly not working), I was brought back down and performed Uay Pawn On Waan for Khun Yai. D and I then paid our respects to my grandmother by pouring water over her hands. As I changed back into my wedding attire, the rest of the guests gave their best wishes to her by the same water-pouring procedure. The room was quickly re-arranged and setup for our wedding ceremony, with a pair of adjacent stools, padded stands (for us to lean on) and ornate flowers (apparently arranged by the palace). We were then seated, D on my right (his position in relation to me was a source of much debate the previous evening). Mother’s friends helped Khun Yai stand and place flowered lays around our necks. She then blessed us by drawing three dots, in a triangle shape, on our foreheads with a white paste. With some help, she placed string circlets, adjoined with another string, around our heads, signifying our bond. The guests were then invited to give us their blessings by dipping an ornately painted shell into flowered water and pouring it over our hands. Most guests murmured their best wishes to us with big smiles; interestingly, they often spoke in English to D (if they could) and in Thai to me. Dad lightened the mood by making a quip (or what I sincerely hoped to be a quip), wishing us a plentiful brood of 10 babies. Once all the guests had visited us, the string circlets needed to be removed. Originally, my parents had planned on Dr. Phaiboon, who had originally performed my parents’ wedding ceremony, to remove them, but Bangkok traffic was being its usual snarly self and had unfortunately prevented him from making it in time. Dr. Prida, who was my father’s superior when he worked in Thailand some 30 years ago, was kind enough to perform that part of the ceremony.
