Ngan Wat

From February 6-14, WatNongChok (the Temple right next to my school) is having a Ngan Wat (temple fair). Yesterday evening I went to this fair thing with P'Patch and La (and I went again today after school with some other girls from my class). I don't know how to explain the whole thing... It was pretty much a market set up inside the temple ground, with some fair type games thrown in (throwing darts at balloons etc.), and a big screen set up where they show a different movie everynight. It's honestly not the kind of thing I would expect to see at a place that is supposed to be holy, I guess just because I can't really imagine the same thing happening at a Christian church. But then again, Buddhism isn't at all like Christianity... Nevertheless, I had fun there with my Muslim friends.... I played a game where I had to "go fishing" in a little pond and pick a random floating coin thingy with a number on it to win a prize.. I won a roll of toilet paper :S which is pretty much the most random prize I've ever won at a fair. However, it did come in handy when La, Patch and I pigged out on chicken wings and somtam. Today after school we stopped there on our way home pretty much to buy some snacks, and a couple of girls convinced me to go look at this thing they had set up with all these pictures of people who had been in car accidents and such. The pictures weren't too gruesome at first, and then I saw one where a person's head was smashed open and their brains were everywhere.... One of my friends joked that she wanted to save money, so when she was hungry she looked at these pictures and then didn't want to buy food to eat anymore... Honestly, I don't understand why they would have these kind of photos set up outside a temple for people to look at for entertainment. I understand how maybe they could be used for some type of education for people wanting to be paramedics or something... I dunno. But I will be happy if I never have to see things like that again. As Patch would say, "welcome to Thailand." (she says this to me whenever there are weird going ons, such as when the traffic lights just don't work in the middle of an intersection....)

And on a side note, I have noticed several times lately adults riding around on motorcycles down the highway with a child of two clinging on behind them. Strange thing is, I always see the parent wearing a helmet, and never the kid. Honestly, I just want to make these people stop, take off their helmet, smack them across their head, and take the kid home myself. I feel kind of the same when people don't wear seatbelts in their cars.. Instead they all have special protective prayers written on the roof of their car, and often have a mini Buddha imagine sitting on their dashboard so as to not get in a car accident.... After seeing all these gruesome pictures at the temple fairs you'd think they'd begin to realize the importance of a seatbelt (?)