Tham Boon

Tham Boon... "make merit". It's what every Thai person does when they go kneel in front of Buddha and rattle joss sticks and burn incense.

Pui and I took Pot out to the McDonald's at Royal Garden Plaza today so that he could play on the jungle gym they have there, but I guess the older group of kids intimidated him, and when we asked him why he didn't want to play, he said it was because he didn't have his friends with him.

After that, we rode up to the park on Pattaya Hill (I think it is called Queen Sirikit Park) to visit Buddha and Guam Im. First we all fed the catfish at Guam Im's temple, and then Pui bought some birds and we went up to Big Buddha to tham boon. (I have to laugh about making merit by freeing birds who are raised in captivity under the pretense of doing good. But whatever works, I guess.)

(Notice the above photo, Pot is trying to do some kind of gangster pose? I have no idea where he got that from, but it was pretty funny.)

After Pui (and Pot) made merit, they walked to Buddha Wan Jan (Monday's Buddha) which is the day Pui was born on, and she released her birds. Suprisingly, and embarassingly, she couldn't remember Pot's birth day (as opposed to birthday). Therefore, we went over to Thursday's Buddha and Pot released his birds for me.

Big Buddha is pretty close to my house, and you can see the roof of my house from directly behind Big Buddha.

It's getting much warmer here in Pattaya. The sweaty days are definitely returning.