i've been busy Vol. 1

PANDA LANTERN: awesome

well it's been a little busy this last week and a few little events have passed so i have much to tell you all.first off, last weekend was the buddist festival, loy kartong. kartong are little floats made from banana leaves and are decorated with flowers. I saw all different kinds of them being sold by street vendors but all of them also haveincense and a candle on each one. buddists believe that by

lighting one and sending it down the river, they are releasing their sins to lord buddha. we could see hundreds of these little floats

aglow on the river as we sat on the bank lighting fireworks.

there was a crazy amount of fireworks going on everywhere and nobody really seems to care about the safety of those around them. i'm

pretty sure my hearing dropped a couple notches after going the second night. as a farong [foreigner], keeping a look out as to where fireworks are aimed is especially important, because it's not so rare for them to be aimed at you. the first night we went, the was definitely some guys who shot a few bottle rockets at us and a couple of us got hit by the shrapnel of a big firework the second night.

my favorite part of the whole festival were these paper lanterns that worked like hot air balloons that people sent off into the sky. the lanterns represent sending people's prayers and wishes up to buddah. with so many in the sky, the lanterns look like constellations, it was so beautiful.

i've started going to a bible study that meets on mondays, so that night we cut it short and sent lanterns up to our God. however, i guess the lanterns we got were the really cheap kind so out of 10 lanterns, only one actually managed to fly, while the others just sat on the ground and eventually burst into flame. luckily we love a God who doesn't expect our prayers to come in the form of lanterns...otherwise we would be screwed.

[the lanterns that never flew]

the weekend was so much fun if only because i got to spend it with amy and sarah and also with our friends shanna and ozzie. it was definitely a one of a kind experience, they would never do something like loy kartong in america, i can just imagine the outcry of ufo enthusiasts seeing hundreds a glowing dots in the sky. plus everything they do with fireworks in thailand is probably illegal in the states.