First things first, the Americans celebrate Thanksgiving this Thursday, and I only take note of it because I find myself surrounded by Americans and it means so much to them. Gareth Cliff says its the day we give thanks for not having been born a turkey, and I'm inclined to agree with him!
But I'm also thankful for lots of other things, and I like the idea of taking a day to be aware of them.
1) I'm thankful that my body is whole, my mind is whole and I have the capacity to do and be anything I want. There are people for whom life is so much harder than it is for me, and I'm grateful for the perspective to see that my problems are pretty small in comparison.
2) I'm thankful for my parents for giving me all the opportunities they could, and for always helping me, even when the help was in not helping. They have moulded me.
3) I'm thankful for South African school children, for making me a teacher. And to Thai school children for showing me that I don't know it all yet.
4) I'm thankful for Tyron, for being Tyron, and for being MY Tyron, and everything that means.
There's lots of other things that I'm thankful for, but I didn't intend it to be that kind of post, so I won't go on.
Now, about my weekend:
Sunday marked the celebration of Loy Krathong festival in Thailand, as previously mentioned. So my school was dead set on having this really massive event with each grade doing a dance, and a big catered supper and so one. Teachers also all had to do a duty, which is fine.
However, we were required to be at school from 8am on Sunday to do these duties and supervise the last rehearsals. So Ben, Jennie and I planned to go to the cinema on Saturday night, to stop ourselves going too big and being useless at school on Sunday morning. Naturally I'd been looking for an excuse to see the new Harry Potter movie anyway. Very dark, and too much suspense for my weak heart, but I'm keen to see the next one.
Anyway, we were late for school on Sunday, and arrived just after 9am. I thought we'd have to sneak in, but there were hardly any teachers around, and even fewer kids. Most of the parents seemed to have had the good sense to ignore the school's request to send their children to school for no particular reason.
There was no rehearsal that we were aware of all day, so we stayed in Jennie's room amusing ourselves with Spongebob Squarepants. I even straightened my hair for the first time since coming to Thailand (and I'll admit that I thought my hair was going to refuse!). I cannot emphasize more how much nothing was going on. I didn't even see my Grade 12's until 5 minutes before the performance.
We started primping at about 2pm; there's only so much Spongebob a grown woman can/will watch. That part was quite fun, I haven't spent that much time and energy on getting dressed in a couple years lol. I even managed to have a quick Skype with Ty before we started.
The show went off ok, pretty boring. The fun part really started afterward, when I joined some teacher friends for a beer on one of the klong boats on the canal opposite the school. I know, I don't drink beer, but I'm not really high on options over here. Besides, if you drown it in ice it doesn't taste quite so bad :)
On the way to the boat I bought a krathong and convinced Ben to come with me to do the traditional floating. You're supposed to put a piece of your hair and a coin into the krathong, light the candle and the incense and then say a little prayer. You think about all the hurts and bad things that have happened in the past year, and all the water wasting and stuff, and you put it away from yourself. Then you put the krathong in the water and give it a little push. Its such a beautiful ritual.
The other traditional thing you do is send up lanterns. I don't know if you're supposed to say a little prayer while doing that, but they're very pretty :) I'll put up some pictures later today.
No one wanted to go out after having a beer, so we decided to all split taxis and go home. But I got waylaid by some of the Thai staff sitting outside the school having a drink. So Ben, Jennie, Katie and I were just going to sit for a very little while, and had the time of our lives. I love being surprised by having a really good time! It was so much fun that I only got home at 5am, luckily we had been given Monday off school.
I was so proud of myself for not flaking out and going home, which I've been known to do. I want to trust my instincts more and take more chances and not always be so tired. And I think I'm doing it.
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