bussy bussy bussy
It's no excuse, we know, but it's true. It's amazing how, when you're not working, you've got too much time and once you're bussy, there's no time at all...
Anyway.
July already! Time's flying. I have now officially been going to University for a month and I'm still enjoying it. Yes, there are lectures which don't seem to make any sense and we've got professors who don't know how to transfer their knowledge, but I guess that's nothing new.
We had an international day a couple of weeks ago and guess what... I was nominated for Miss International Day... Everyone was (supposed to be) dressed in his/her national or traditional outfit and as I haven't got one from Belgium, I decided to go Asian.
I had a Karen shirt (Karen is a local tribe in Myanmar) and a Laotian skirt. Obviously it did attract some attention.
Last month, we had some great celebrations in Thailand. King Rama IX (or King Bumibol) as reigned for 60 years and is the longest reigning king in the world. Reason enough to celebrate the Thai people decided. And celebrating they did!
There was lots of firework, nicely lit streets (it looked like Christmas!), activities happening around the Grand Palace, but the one thing everyone was waiting for, were the Royal Barges on the Chao Phraya river.
Because it would have been impossible to get close enough to the river, we went to watch the barges on a big screen.
Which gave us a much nicer and more detailed view than if we would have been at the river we found out later...
Because the king was born on a yellow day, yellow is an auspiscious colour (and the King's colour). So everyone was wearing yellow T-shirts.
So far, Thorsten and I have been able to resist the pressure to get a yellow T-shirt. It does have a bit of a negative taste aswell because now, every civil servant is expected (doesn't have to but...) to wear their yellow T-shirts to work on Mondays and Fridays to show they love the King. If they don't do it, they often get looked at 'you don't love our king?'.
But the best thing about the celebrations of the King were the empty streets!!!
It was so nice to be able to get around easily and fast.
The junction you see here is one of the bussiest junctions in Bangkok (with the skytrain running over it) and because of all the royalties from other countries they had closed major roads in Bangkok. You have to imagine this road is usually packed, absolutely packed with cars, busses, motorbikes and tuk tuk's.
It was quite a sight!
And other than this, nothing much as happened really. Except for the World Cup obviously and this is also being celebrated immensly in Thailand. Unfortunately not always for the best reasons... Betting is very big in Thailand and the World Cup is the opportunity to win (or loose) a lot of money.
Griet and Thorsten
