Daily Archives: June 22, 2005

Last Trip with Grade 12’s Friends – At Ayuddhaya!

If anybody was walking past my school on Friday 17th, June, you would have noticed big buses lining up in a long long que. Well, it was buses waiting for us , my friends and me!! All grade 12’s students at my school were about to go on an educational trip to Ayuddhaya.

It was the last trip for all of us to go al-together in our school uniform so noone refused to go. I felt sad it’s the last trip but I hoped inside that it was definitely the last coz if I would have one more with all friends like that, that means I’ll have to repeat grade 12 once again.

At 7.30 on the dot, all the wheels started to be in motion. No waiting for anyone who hadn’t arrived yet.. I had seen a few friends waiting somewhere the buses were moving past. They were late but teachers have never been too cruel, we stopped and picked them up 🙂 On the highway to Ayuddhaya, songs started to be sung.. it should be ‘started to be played’ ~ but the radio was out of order so we sang crazily instead. We played games called “FM-AM” by dividing all of us into two teams. One team had to be FM and had to sing modern songs. On the other hand, the AM team had to sing “Country” songs. It was so fun. After a while, throats were already dried so we continued eating and drinking (water) instead. Drinking too much gave me needs to go to the toilet. Luckily, there was a toilet there on the bus. I quickly got into it.. “1..2..3..!! cannot – -“” “Again, …cannot” I tried to lock the door for a long while but it seemed like it wouldn’t work but I couldn’t let it be like that coz friends sitting in front of the toilet were all guys! ~ ~” At last, I could 🙂 After I finished, I tried hard to find some water. There was none, AT ALL!!! OMG!! Nothing, I could do so I told my guy friends there to stop others to go in and use it then. – -”

Finally, we arrived at the first place, Jao Sampraya Museum. It was a museum full of both historic and historical stuff like golden flat buddhist’s engraving and etc. Also, Jao Sampraya was one of the 33 kings in Ayuddhaya Dynasty.

Next was historical center. There were Ayuddhaya maps and other ancient things like the first place. It was such a good place to study about historicity.

Then we went to Ancient Palace. We took lots of pictures there because there were lots of ruined pagodas and brick walls. It was like present-day Palaces in Bkk because Palaces in Bkk copied those palaces in Ayuddhaya especially Wat Pra Kaew where the emerald buddha stays is quite similar to Wat Pra Sri Sun Petch there in Ayuddhaya. Both have big big glades to make King’s significant traditional ceremonies. After the all contentment, time to shop!! There were lots of old ladies running after us just to sell some desserts. “Help me, please. I haven’t had breakfast yet because lacking money” or “Assist oldsters, you will acheive some good things in life” and etc. were those ladies’ persuasions. We were touched by their words so we bought a lot.

After we left that place, we had lunch at Krung Sri River Hotel. Good food, good place, good service and good toilets there so I suggest if anyone is visiting Ayuddhaya, don’t forget to stop by :p

And the last was Bang Pa-In Palace, the most famous place to visit in Ayuddhaya 🙂 I enjoyed taking pictures with my friends there because it was so huge and attractive. Our queen Sirikit still goes visiting and staying at that place from time to time.

I admit that I didn’t get most of knowledgeable details from this trip for so many reasons. There were too many people surrounding a few guides plus it was the last trip with my friends so we enjoyed spending time taking pictures with one another a lot more. But one important thing I’ve learned is that all those ancient ruins are completely ruined and old. Some look terrible but why do we go seeing them? Why are they that interesting for Thai people and foreigners to see them for real?? One perfect reply is that those ruins are historic. They’re our background. The older they get, the more important they are because they were once our prosperous capital city. This implies the truth of our lives; When we die, there might be some parts of us left like bones and ashes or may be left none. That makes us easily forgettable but if during our lifetime, we’ve done such good things for our planet earth’s friends and our societies, our names will still be stated everywhere although we are dead for years already. Just like all those ruins, if they were just some soil or ants on the floor, they wouldn’t be this famous or worth to see in real, but because they were something “memorable” in the past, that’s how we still go visiting it.

More Thai Sayings

Ringing the bells at Wat Phra Phuttabat in Saraburi Province for good luck

A few days back, I shared with you some Thai Sayings and asked you to match the Thai with the English. Due to popular demand, here is another list for you to try:

(1) Taking over-ripe coconuts to sell to the coconut-grove owner
(2) Snake-headed old man
(3) Big boat in narrow canal
(4) Feeding the elephant but eating its dung
(5) Pulling out intestines for the crow to eat
(6) A crow among swans
(7) A crow with red chili
(8) As sticky as caramel
(9) Mouth of fermented fish
(10) Diamond cuts diamond
(11) The monkey falling out of the tree
(12) Cut off the crab’s legs
(13) A mountain behind a hair
(14) Top of the coconut milk
(15) Saying the words with a Buddha image in your mouth

a) Dark complexion with bright dresses
b) Corruption; swindling; fraudlent
c) Carrying coals to Newcastle
d) The best piece
e) An eye for an eye
f) Telling other people family secrets
g) The bad among the good
h) Easy solution to a problem
i) Very stingy
j) To err is human
k) Showing off one’s virtue and merit
l) Ill-spoken
m) Undermining someone
n) A has-been who cannot accept he is no longer rich or important
o) An old man who likes to seduce young girls

Post your answers as comments.

Meeting Once “For Real”

“Never play hide & seek in the evenings or at nights”, said oldsters. I’m sure every Thai people know that saying especially kids who try to sneak out to play with kids around neighborhood after the sun already sets, “Do not go to play hide&seek, OK?” or “Come back here!” when being caught.

I so loved going out to play with other kids my age when I was still in Primary school. The thing we loved to play the most was cooking (flowers and rocks collected from the ground) and jumping across rubber bands’ rope. We did other creative things as well like collecting our japanese comic books al-together, let others rented and gained some money 😀

One day, my friends asked me to play hide and seek with them. I said “yes” without thinking. I mean, I liked playing it and it was still at noon, I didn’t break any promises to my mum or didn’t break any old beliefs.

There were unfinished houses being built behind my house so we went to play it there. It was lunchtime so all workers went out to eat. First turn, I was one of those to hide. I accompanied with one friend, Kwang, to find some place to hide together. We ran houses to houses and at last, we found a perfect place. We were hiding behind the door near the stairs there..after a while, noone came so we got out and saw one worker sitting in front of us in that room.

That person was sitting doing something and turned the back to us. It must be a she because she had a long long hair down. She had an old farmer’s hat.. I, as always, liked to greet neigbors there~ I did!

“Hey, sorry if we’re interrupting your work or anything, lady”

Before I could open my mouth to say other words like how her work was going today and stuff…

That person turned her head to us.. with an odd smile like normal human beings wouldn’t have.. it was a wide..wide enough to reach her ears ~ her face was all green.

“MuMMMMMM!!!!!!!~!” We ran out of that place as fast as we could. The distance seemed to be so far away. I accerelated my speed but I felt like it was getting slower, slower and slower. Finally, we could get out and it was like the new world I had been away from it for a long long time.

“Kwang! You saw what I did?”
“Bow, … I hope I’ll wake up and find myself in my bed soon”

It’s been almost 10 years since that scence visited my life. I don’t know if it was for real or I just imagined it but my friends got the same picture as I did. Would the picture come out exactly the same?It’s still right here everytime I try to close my eyes at night.. If happened to you, could you deny it?