Nationwide Birthday Bash in Thailand

You would think that by the age of 82 that your birthday parties would be a pretty tame affair. Not so for the King of Thailand, who had the whole country turned upside down with enormous stages, firework shows and live performances going on in every town and city. We were lucky enough to be in the quant old town of Ayutthaya on the day when the old boy got older, so we headed out that night, listening for the music, and found ourselves in amongst about 20,000 other party goers. After the speeches given by important looking guys in white uniforms, a recital of the national anthem by candlelight, and a bunch of very spectacular fireworks, the party finally got started proper. On the 1km stretch of the main road where the festivities were held, at least 6 huge stages were set up with all sorts of cultural shows, rock bands and other pop music performing all night. When we had had enough of that, there were countless little street food vendors available to make sure no one went hungry. We aren’t sure what time we got back to the room that night, but it sure would have been past our bedtime. Just the concept of a whole country having a party at once is a pretty different concept to me. The closest thing I think ive come across would be the Melbourne Cup, and lets face it, there are those of us who don’t give a damn about that little race, so it doesn’t quite match the enormity of this gig over here in my opinion. That’s the second 80-or-greater birthday party ive been to this year, and it looks like the oldies know how to throw a better bash than us young-un’s so far.

Oh, of course, the main reason we actually went to Ayutthaya was the temples (no not the food), and they were very nice. Yes, very nice indeed. Well preserved or restored, very big and easily accessible to tourists staying in and around the town. I gotta admit, that while I love a good Wat, im think both Katie and I are itching to get to a beach. That said, we had a great time one night just walking around a few temple grounds, taking photos of the big old things as they were lit up by really powerful lights set up around the sites. I think they look a lot more majestic at night time, and when we held the camera steady, we got some darn fine photos.

As I mentioned, we are looking forward to the beaches, and to nurturing our pathetic tans. With that in mind, we are headed back to… Koh Samui! Oh baby. Yeah I know we have been there before… a bunch of times… but this time it is because our mates Lee and Rachel are getting hitched over there, and we couldn’t resist such a good excuse to head back to our favourite little island. We are Bangkok now… again… waiting to catch a train in six hours headed for the place where we can get a boat across to samui. We should get to samui sometime around midday tomorrow we hope.

Till then!

//Brendan