Hello Friends!
I have now been in Southeast Asia for five days. In that short time I landed in the Philippines, flew to Thailand for a whirlwind tour of a gigantic city that could easily take weeks to visit, and now back to the Philippines.
I am having a difficult time downloading pictures from my camera to the Gooden's computer so these are not my favorite pictures but they'll have to do.
The first morning we were in Bangkok we toured the most famous part of the city, the Grand Palace. The Grand Palace consists of several temples, meeting halls and the old residence of the Thailand king, Rama IX. Within the Grand Palace is the most famous Buddha Thailand has, the Emerald Buddha, made completely of one piece of jade. While is was very beautiful it was no bigger than a medium sized dog. This was very surprising to me since the anticipation of seeing the Buddha was built to a very exciting high. It has different outfits that it wears according to the season. Right now is the 'rainy season' so it wears its rainy season shawl.
It was fascinating for me to watch hundreds of people worship this figure with their whole hearts, mind and soul. Outside of the Emerald Buddha's temple was another area to worship and offer sacrifices. This was also fascinating since the people were literally praying to a golden calf!! Just like the exiles Moses was leading out of Egypt! Their sacrifices were of fruit, incense and we even saw a chickens, pigs and ducks (already dead) offered!
The picture of me with the people in costume and on the elephant were taken that night, after we spent the day touring around the temples. We went to the world's tallest stage, they're in the Guiness Book of World Records, for a Filipino show. It was awesome! The costumes, the choreography the music were all amazing. I really enjoyed it even though it was extremely difficult to stay awake!! Riding the elephant was way cool! Curt and I went and took little Jones for his first elephant ride.
