Third Weekend in Udon Thani

People warned me this would happen...

I'm slowly falling behind on my blogging. 

This could be for several reasons:

1. internet here is questionable, so the last thing I want to do is write an entire post only to lose the internet as I hit submit...

2. There is a lot going on over here, a million and ten things I want to share with all of you, and the desire to type is lowering every day.

3. Ari tells me I can't because she is so far behind on her blog...haha

Either way, here's how the weekend went:

Friday.

We taught our three classes for the day, the head of the eighth grade English department (her nickname is Ying) took us out to lunch. Ari and I ordered chicken and rice- one of the things we both actually enjoy eating. After class, we took the public car (where you just ride in the back of a pickup..) to the Central Plaza mall. From there, we walked to UD Town and the dress market... of course we didn't know that most of the shops don't start opening until four.... we were there at 2:15, so that was great. Thankfully, we found a few things that were open to entertain ourselves. Around 5 pm, we took the public car back home (this was an achievement in itself). After getting ourselves presentable, Ari's host family took us to walking street. This is basically where they shut down a street so that people can sell stuff- a shopaholic's dream, if you will. Ari and I found headbands for SUPER cheap, which was fun. The couple that were selling the headbands were so excited that we were buying them that they gave us each a free one. It made our night! After walking street, Sirilak's husband (pronounced like Sake) and brother in law (His name is pronounced like Fork without the r) took us to Western Pub; whatta ridiculous place. First of all, why does Thailand have a Western pub? Do they have cowboys? Not sure... haha. Second, the band actually played american music! But really not country... Funny for a western pub.. We did, however, request some Johnny Cash, which they obliged. It made us happy :) It was a little taste of home 24 hours away! Ari and I tried a "sweet Cowboy" and "rum punch". The sweet cowboy was delicious- Fok (spelling?) even ordered it for his first cocktail ever.. He claimed to be a "beer kinda guy". The day ended up being wonderful and full of laughter.

Saturday.
We were up early to observe the dancing in the street. This wasn't any old dancing- in fact, it was a very very large Thai dance. In fact, they broke a world record and had a huge dealio to go along with it. There were over 20,600 dancers in all. they blocked off five roads to fit them all, and Ari and I had a great spot to watch them. We were able to get to the roundabout center, and therefore, had all of the dancers facing towards us. They made wonderful pictures! After that, we met up with the rest of Ari's host family and went to a restaurant for lunch. When we got back, Ari and I took a nap and then headed outside to sweat in the hot sun. Sirilak and her family thought it was SO ODD that we were voluntarily sitting in the sun- it's not a thing to do here apparently. However, we didn't let that stop us. Of course, Ari became sunburned again... I continue to get little to no color at all- it's a bit depressing. Saturday night was the time for fireworks. All of the commotion for this weekend was because it was Udon Thani's anniversary- it turned 121 years old this weekend- how thrilling. The fireworks were literally the best thing I have ever seen, and I wish photos did it justice. They don't, but that didn't stop us from at least attempting. They tell stories with their fireworks, as well as display photos. They also play music- it was like watching a movie with fireworks in it. Pretty cool! 

Sunday.

Today, we were able to "sleep in" for the first time since we've gotten here... we woke up at eight thirty... it was a bit pitiful. At eleven, we left to go to a mountain in Udon Thani. We hiked up the mountain, took tons of pictures, and then went to a flower garden. It was wonderful. On the way back, we stopped by Granny's garden where the family grabbed fresh bananas, papaya, and other fruits. We then went to a Thai buffet. I had rice and a salad- sound about right? After lunch, we had about an hour and a half to kill sitting on facebook attempting to catch up with the rest of the world before we left again to go to a Thai dancing performance. This wasn't any performance- it was actually a musical (kind of). It was beautiful and a ton of fun, but would have been wonderful had it been in English, or if we could speak Thai... It was almost four hours of sitting listening to Thai. Sirilak whispered what was going on as often as she could, but she couldn't obviously state everything that was happening. 

This is what I got for the basic plot line: There was a king who's queen was kidnapped by giants. In order to get her back, the king worked with the monkeys and some of the giants brothers who left giant city because their brother was corrupt. The evil giant convinced his wife to act like the queen and convince the king that she was dead. They tried to burn her body and learned that she was in fact, a giant and not his precious queen. In order to get to the giant city, they had to get across the ocean. They decided to throw rocks in to make a path? The black and white monkeys got in a fight, and the black one was banished. The white one was told he had seven days to finish the path. The white monkey went into the ocean to see what he could do and fell in love with a fish. He then came out of the water, helped defeat the giants, and got the queen back with the rest of the army. The end.

It was strange, but Sirilak said it was similar to our Shakespeare. I then thought of all of the things that happen in Shakespeare, and realized that this probably wasn't the weirdest plot line in the world... Good luck future English teacher self on getting kids hooked!

At the end of the night, we were able to take pictures with some of the cast, which was quite neat. Their costumes were absolutely amazing! We also took a picture with the mayor of Udon Thani, which was pretty impressive. 

Well, that was my weekend. Please feel free to message me with updates on your lives- I love hearing from everyone. I continue to pray for all of you every day, as well as your family and friends. 

Xoxo Kenzkeg

p.s. putting pictures up takes too long for my patience at the moment, so I shall just tell you to go on Facebook and look at them! If you don't have Facebook and want to see them, email me!