Nay a turkey, many a monkey: Thanksgiving & Lopburi

Well, we tried.

A traditional Thanksgiving in Thailand is not only hard to come by, it's also expensive. Because my CIEE friends and I did not want to fork out $30+ for a Thanksgiving buffet at one of the pish-poshy Western hotels in Central Bangkok, nor did we trust the food in the American expat bars/pubs (um, where did they get that turkey?), we ended up eating Middle Eastern food on "Soi Arab" at the Nana BTS stop. That's how you do a non-Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving dinner in Thailand.

I got Iraqi kabobs and plenty of naan & hummus.
Nothing wrong with that meal, for it was delicious, but there were two MAJOR bummers on my Thai Thanksgiving:

1) No pumpkin pie. It's arguably one of my most favorite T-giving dishes; Joanna and I vowed to find a slice - any slice - but at 10pm, in Bangkok, our valiant search and desperate wanderings around Sukhumvit proved fruitless. We settled for McDonald's. I got a vanilla cone.

[even though the sheraton bangkok displayed our Amerrrican flag in an ice sculpture, lol, it will never be as american as it tried to be. why? no pumpkin pie.]

2) I really missed my family. I've never spent the holidays away from home but somewhat masochistically used this fact as a way to challenge myself by signing up to go on this program. I knew what I was getting myself into, and I guess I might have wanted to prove my own independence and personal strength by being away from my loved ones when I knew I'd miss them most.

Now, I know I am learning and growing from this experience, but seeing my whole family - my cousins from SF and LA, along with my aunts, uncles, brothers, and parents - crowded around the screen as I Skyped with them, made me so entirely homesick and teary. Sniff! Though it's only been a few months since I've been gone, the physical absence of my family and friends in my life has already made me appreciate them ten-fold. I love them and fully realize that they are integral to my happiness. Unfortunately distance is sometimes the only way to truly make one realize these precious treasures in life.

(To help you understand how close I am to my family, my aunt later told me that when asking her 2 year-old daughter what the highlight of Thanksgiving was, she said, despite seeing her cousins and the delicious food, mind you, that "the best part was seeing Kwistina on the compooter!" So presh.)

//

Now for the less sappy stuff: Lopburi.

Lopburi is a city that's north of BKK by about 3 hours by bus. It's overrun by monkeys because some settler brought them over one day, the monkeys did their monkey thang and bred, took over the wats/shrines, became too comfortable with the human inhabitants, and now, run wild along the sidewalks & streets; hang above pedestrians as they dangle on telephone wires; jump on unwilling passerbys; and steal peoples' food.

I witnessed all of this.


We went during the last weekend of November, during which L-buri hosts its annual monkey festival. Indeed, they bring out plates and plates of food for the monkeys to gorge themselves. The locals do not believe in harming the animals and thus use this festival as a way to celebrate and thank them for their good luck, or charm, or...good looks, I have no idea.

[s/he's like james dean. monkey style. classy.]

Well, after a three hour bus ride, Linnea and I arrived and spent about an hour photographing the bizarre city. I gave a monkey my coconut smoothie (but quickly ran away, don't worry, Mom!). A monkey jumped on Linnea's back, poor thing (she hates animals), at the monkeys' main wat-haunt. We sheepishly dodged monkey poo that littered the streets. We witnessed many a monkey mating on the sidewalk (I'll admit, I giggled like an immature 7th grade boy). We tried to cover all items resembling food as we tip-toed cautiously through the streets and saw the lanky fellows watching us from above the stores, perched on hotel balconies, trapezing along telephone wires.

[goodbye, delicious and freshly made, 50 cent coconut smoothie.]

They literally run around the city like stray dogs. So weird. Lopburi will forever rank as one of my most surreal and bizarre experiences in life - and that beats bike riding alongside elephants, holding a tiger, and snorkeling the Great Barrier Reef with a fish that was the size of my upper torso.

Other than the monkeys, we spent time with a TON of other CIEE folks, who incidentally wanted to experience monkey mania and headed down to Lopburi as well. That was nice. We did not get to see the sunflower fields for which Lopburi is also famous, but we'll go back in December.

Oh, the adventures. MORE TO COME, for the King's birthday is this Saturday. Off to go blast Madonna's "Holiday"! Toodles.