Rice Grains

Since Twila arrived here three days ago, we have been doing a bit of sightseeing around Bangkok. But the first day we had some business to attend to. Twila's glasses suffered a fall and were sadly bent out of shape, so we took a trip to Samitivej Hospital (your one-stop medical shopping mall) to get them fixed. Have you ever heard of a hospital with a pianist playing a (baby?) grand piano for people sitting in a very comfortable, spacious waiting area?

I'll skip on to activities of yesterday, since they were more touristy.:) On the way to see a couple famous wats, we visited a little streetside coffee shop where I often had stopped on my way to school. The girl there is very friendly, and it has been fun practicing Thai with her.

From there we took the sky train to the river express boats in order to visit Wat Arun, up and across the river from where we were.

We first visited a little rock garden of sorts.

The detail on the wat itself was amazing. It incorporated broken pieces of china fastened into rock or whatever building material they used.

The steps were extremely steep; the picture doesn't do the steepness justice. We were VERY thankful for the side railings to hold on to.

On our way up, we met 3 young monks, so I asked if I could take their pictures.

As we walked around the edge up on the wat, we had a nice view of the river and of Bangkok.

On our way down, I couldn't resist taking a picture of this cute little guy.:)

From Wat Arun, we took the ferry straight across the Chaopraya River and walked a short distance to Wat Pho, home of the "Reclining Buddha". Wow, this temple basically housed a huge bronze statue of Buddha; there was little room for much else. I believe the dimensions of this statue are 15 meters high by 46 meters long. Following are a few pictures.

This last picture (above) is actually the feet of the Buddha. The soles of his feet are engraved with mother of pearl pictures and designs.

Our final activity for the day was getting foot massages close to the wat. Wat Pho is believed to be the birthplace of traditional Thai massage and houses a Thai massage school on its compound. After a long day of walking in hot, muggy weather, it felt great to relax in air conditioning and getting pampered.:)

Many thanks to the generous folks, whoever you are, who made these excursions possible. We are enjoying our time immensely.

Posted by Sharon Rice at 09:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Today was my last day at Union Language School. I'm not even sure why I went in to take the test apart from feeling a tiny bit sentimental. After all, this has been my life for the past 9 months! One aspect I will really miss is meeting so many people from all over the world and from all walks of life. But I do have phone numbers and email addresses for a few of them.

Now I am excitedly anticipating the arrival of my good friend Twila, who should be flying today from Ohio and is to arrive here at Suvarnibumi Airport about 11:30 PM tomorrow night (10:30 AM daylight savings time). She is coming a couple weeks early to spend time with me and with the Masts, after which a prayer team from her church will be coming.

Below: Twila and I pre-Thailand :)

Sunday night Twila and I will take a sleeper train the 12-hour ride north to Chiang Mai to do a few days of vacationing. We hope to spend one day with a tour group visiting an elephant camp, riding elephants, and bamboo rafting down a river. I also expect we will visit the night bazaar as our hotel is walking distance from there. Who knows what else we will end up doing??:) But with Twila we're sure to have a fun-filled time!

Posted by Sharon Rice at 06:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Today on the way in to Bangkok to meet Michelle for supper, I spotted a truck full of eggs. Of COURSE, that reminded me of growing up on the farm gathering eggs and the way I loved going to Philly with Dad and his truck full of eggs. So I had a short trip down memory lane. I didn't realize that I also got a picture of the bus driver in the mirror.:) And some BTS sky train construction in the background. I'm really impressed with this picture--I took it while the bus was moving (and so was the truck:).

Posted by Sharon Rice at 11:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

On my way to school early this morning I discovered that today is Wai Khruu Day, a day for students to show honor and respect to their teachers by presenting the head teacher with floral arrangements, music, Thai traditional dance, and speeches.

The way I discovered this fact was by passing through the food court at Tesco Lotus on my way to the BTS sky train. I noticed 3 young gals sitting at a table with 2 huge bouquets in front of them, so I asked if I could take their picture, and they kindly acquiesced. (I found, to my dismay, that both sets of batteries I carried with me were dead, so I had to run back into the store to buy a fresh set, but the girls were still at the table when I returned.) The girls also decided that I needed to be in one of the pictures.:)

Then, today at school, my good Korean friend, Yoo Gye Hwa, asked if she and her husband could take me to lunch since I will not be returning after next week. As it turns out, a few other Korean students joined us as well. They are a really fun group, all missionaries here in Thailand. Some of them are Presbyterian and one couple is Methodist. Great people. I will certainly miss them.

Posted by Sharon Rice at 07:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Sorry I have not made any entries lately. I have not taken so many pictures lately, and I like to include pictures on most blogs. But not so very long ago I was in Bangkok one Sunday and decided to take pictures of various flowers and plant life in the city.

While Bangkok often feels like a huge maze of gray concrete, it certainly is not without touches of nature here and there. Many of the pictures were taken at a small garden near one of the churches I attend. The rest of the pictures were taken as I explored a couple streets.

Posted by Sharon Rice at 09:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Today on the way home from Bangkok I rode a bus with a maniac driver. I thought he was going to get us all killed. There is a certain stretch of Theparak Road on which many bus drivers like to fly, but I feel safe with most of them.

This guy, going at what felt like breakneck speed, was weaving back and forth between 3 lanes. One time in particular I thought he was going to roll the bus, because we were beginning to rock side to side. And then he had to slam on the brakes to keep from crashing into stopped traffic ahead of us.

I remember another time when a bus driver actually hit a motorcycle as we were going around a corner at a three way intersection. Fortunately, the girl driving the motorcycle wasn't hurt even though she and the motorcycle were under the bus, which explains why the driver didn't want to move forward or backward. That time, after the girl crawled out from under the bus, the busdriver pulled over to the side, went to talk to (pay??) the police officer, and returned in about 5 minutes to continue on his way.

Anyway, I am home now, and arrived here in one piece.:)

Posted by Sharon Rice at 06:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Yesterday evening Trish, Michelle, and I spent the evening together. Our normal meeting place is at Tesco Lotus at On Nut. As we walked through the food court, we saw a whole group of beautiful little Thai dancers taking turns getting their pictures taken. Trish and I asked to get a picture of one of those girls. Isn't she a doll?

From there we walked on down toward Trish's apartment, stopping for supper at an amazing restaurant called The English Pub. It is in a quiet area and is run by a retired Thai couple who couldn't quite retire just yet. The seating area is really quite small but is decorated with antique china on the walls and on shelves behind the bar. We 3 were the only customers the whole time we sat there. Trish and I shared a spinach lasagne and an order of garlic bread. That garlic bread has to be some of the best in the whole world! And the lasagne was awesome too. OH, and the fresh-made lime juice just can't be beat either. SOOO refreshing!!!

My final picture is another "khanom thai". Gop, the 10-year-old son of the manager, was sent up to give me the treat. And it really was a treat. I love coconut treats. This one needed to be eaten with a spoon. It was more of a pudding consistency in a little banana leaf bowl. Below the thickened, sweetened coconut milk was little pearl tapioca mixed with the Thai favorites: corn and even a kidney bean. But wow, was it tasty! It didn't take too long for that to disappear.

Posted by Sharon Rice at 04:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)