wanderlust

It's a few days before the lunar 7th month begins. That's when the Gates of Hell open for the Hungry Ghost Festival.

Just like last year, I really want to go Phuket in the 9th Lunar month for the Phuket Vegetarian Festival which is a nine day celebration of the Taoist Ninth Heavenly Emperor.

Check out the special site for the event. Went alone last year and will do so again if can't find suitable people. It's crazy to some to travel so far for photography. It's only 3 hours or so lor. Then there is the delicious street food, cheap massages and fantastic views. Muay Thai is exciting, tour of surrounding islands is exhilarating and entertainment is extensive. I should not talk about cheap alcohol, cigarettes and other forms of debaucheries. *twitch*

Where'd the time go?

I've not been able to put up the pictures of the muay thai matches I caught in Phuket. Been too busy with maybe. Or just lazy after the initial flurry of posts on Phuket.

Just to put up a few shots.

Phuket Series #05: Vegetarian Festival

Images like the one above don't get out of your mind easily.



What more when it's not pins that are sticking through but pick-axes?

That's one can see at the Phuket Vegetarian Festival. This is an annual affair that starts on the first day of the ninth lunar month and continues until the ninth. The different temples will have street procession through Phuket town and the biggest procession is the one staged by the biggest Chinese Temple here called Jui Teng.

So on a hot Saturday afternoon, I was there along with thousand others to witness the procession that lasted from early morning about 8plus until early afternoon. The morning will see the devotees getting ready at the temple. I wasn't in time for the ceremonial bits but it's got to do with the devotees getting into a trance state before being pierced, possessed or something like that.



The town was out in full force. Many were preparing to let off firecrackers as the devotees or chariots carrying the deities and gods went pass.



Some would kneel down as certain chariots went pass. Probably a high ranking god or something.

The locals set up altars with offerings of wine, fruits, sweets because they also sought blessings from the procession. Some of the devotees will stop by altars set up by the locals and bless them.

Males were not the only ones involved. Females were in the procession too. But the more extreme stuff were by men.

The girl in the red cheongsam was damn chio....she's probably going to be wedded to some deity of god or something. Symbolic I think. Not legal binding. Hahaha.... Young girls formed part of the procession too.



The guy with the green umbrella pierced through his cheek...well, judging from the angle, he wasn't doing it to shade himself.



Many had swords (Japanese Samurai type) pierced through their cheeks.



Some had knives.



Poles....



Even small plants...

Barbed wires could be used for piercing as well as wrapping.

Everyday objects like what appears to be oven skewers can be used too! I wondered if the things they used for piercing reflected their occupation.....

Like clockwise from top left: dumbbells = gym instructor, lampshade = lightings salesman, warship = navy man, flowers = florist, electrical cables = electrician, badminton racquets = badminton player, skewer with apple at the end = fruits vendor, engine parts = car mechanic.

These two above sell tyre rims?

I wondered what was going through their minds when they inflicted such damage to their bodies. I'm sure it's all spiritual and stuff....but I caught one of them (I'm giving him a fictitious name, Rachat) who seemed to have second thoughs....see below:



*I do apologise about the resolution of the pictures. It speeds things up for me though.

*****************
#01: Introduction
#02: General
#03: Food
#04: Island Tour
#05: Vegetarian Festival
#06: Muay Thai
#07: Firecracker Special
#08: Afterthoughts

Phuket Series #??: Sorry For The Delay

I've been very busy lately....so haven't been able to upload my pictures for the Phuket Series. The remaining enteries in the Series are the heavyweights. By that I mean lots of pictures. Lots of pictures that will probably consume my weekend. And it's Sirens weekend at Zouk. damn....

I'll post some pictures.....consider them like "trailers"....

Muay Thai (the pictures in this series will really show how lousy I am with the camera still - not able to shoot sporting events yet).....

& Vegetarian Festival (afternoon sun and lots of shadows again - poor metering) .....

Decisions, d.c.tions, de see shens.

damn....I haven't blog about Pass Out Party 2006.... and need to ask Jados for permission to use her pics again...

*****************
#01: Introduction
#02: General
#03: Food
#04: Island Tour
#05: Vegetarian Festival
#06: Muay Thai
#07: Firecracker Special
#08: Afterthoughts

Phuket Series #02: General

This is mainly about the odd bits which I don't really know where to blog them under. So ended up bundling the departure bits, hotel bits, bohliao bits, sights that I thought might be interesting bits, so on so forth. This is not going to be coherent. I try my best to be chronological but may not be so...

Those who've been so privilege and not departed from or arrived at or seen the Budget Terminal of Singapore, well, here it is.

Only two airlines operate from the terminal: Tiger Airways and Cebu Pacific.

I stayed in Salathai Resort in Phuket. There's the Royal Phawadee Village on the opposite road which I think I will try the next time I am in Phuket. The location wasn't exactly sea front but it's about 2 minutes from the beach. It's a 10 minute walk from Bangla Road which is really great cause that means the rowdy crowd is more than earshot away. Makes for peaceful sleep at night.

The rooms are pretty good-sized. I had a twin share room which overlooks the pool. It's only 3-storeys high so only stairs. No lifts.

Not too messy my room...I think. Was living out of the luggage most of the time although I could easily hang my clothes but was too lazy. And it's Phuket! I only brought t-shirts and polo Ts, no need to be neat lah...

The balcony overlooks the pool...

I had a lot of time in Phuket which was fantastic. Until boredom sets in. Which is still alright by me. Beats working by far. I spent alot of time with Discovery, VH1, Star Movie and other cable channels. I also caught the Miss International Queen on the local Thai channel. Miss Mexico won by the way. I was rooting for Miss Thailand though. I spent alot of time taking pictures and just walking up and down the beach. Not spending much time on the beach itself though. Those who are familiar will know that the beach chairs are available for a small fee. Well, I never did use it once. Not at all. In fact, I think I touched sea water like twice. And never went in beyond knee deep. Wasted I guess. I took some pictures of Patong Beach and odd stuff I had seen like birds roosting on cables.

I didn't immediately recognise them at first. I thought how come this set of cables had ridges on them. I was staring at them for sometime and finally make out the shapes. There was a hawker who saw me looking at the birds. He was smiling at me and saying they were birds. I nodded in agreement. Then he asked me if I wanted chicken wings.

Close up of the birds. Swallows I think. More here.
I didn't bring along my tripod and I definitely don't have a pair of steady hands. Flash wasn't powerfuly enough...so in the end, the pictures turned out pretty crummy.

I walked along the road parallel to the beach and took photos of the scene. There was this group of men who were trudging some mudflats. Probably looking for mollusks.

Views of Patong.



Look carefully at the picture below and spot the guys looking for mollusks.

I spent about 3 of the days in Phuket town. When the Vegetarian Festival was in full swing. Caught the procession and also other sights. It was difficult to get really great pictures because it was high noon. Actually, it just mean that I'm still lousy at photo-taking. Nevermind, just need more practise.

The King (or his picture to be precise) made an appearance too. Paraded throughout Phuket. marking his 60th anniversary on the throne I think.



And this guy was riding his "homemade" chopper. Not exactly O.C.C (Orange County Choppers) but it did invite envious looks from the policeman standing by the road.



The parade with the marching band...



Lots of firecrackers! I've never seen so much of them in my life.

There was street art in Phuket but not very wooster worthy. This 20 metre piece was one of the best I've seen. Not just because of the size lah, because it was more than random sprays or tags.

There were some pictures I took cause I thought they might be funny. But didn't turn out so. One of them was this of the Kumon signboard that was looking over the Phuket procession.

It rained on 5 of the 7 days I was there. It's always around the same time. 4-5pm local time. And on the final two nights, it rained between 4-5pm, stopped briefly and continued from 6 plus until 9pm. That meant no chance of taking beautiful sunsets. All I got was this series of clouds I took from my balcony.

But despite the weather, there were many opportunities to take pictures. I got to know my new camera better. Hopefully I can find another chance to go on a photo trip again. Find more Kodak moments. Like this one:




*****************
#01: Introduction
#02: General
#03: Food
#04: Island Tour
#05: Vegetarian Festival
#06: Muay Thai
#07: Firecracker Special
#08: Afterthoughts

Phuket Series #04: Island Tour

I went on the Sim's Island Tour on my second day. Those who have been to Phuket will _definitely_ know of Sim's Island Tour. I'm not sure if the guide I had was actually Sim himself, but checking with a colleague who was there recently and went on the same tour, we seemed to have had the same guide. Skinny, dark, crew cut and Thai accented English. Wait....that seems to describe a lot of Thais. He has this weird way of pronouncing "ladies and gents". He'll shorten it to "lay-gents". Which totally baffled me for the first 5 minutes.

You'll be lavishly praised for choosing to tour with Sim's. He'll assure you that you're really savvy, you're in safe hands, he has got a first-aid kit onboard his bus which no other rival agents have. He has got a canvas bag full of plastic bags to store your expensive (cost more than half his year's pay - so he says) cameras, video-cameras and valuables during the boat ride or when it rains. And he proudly states that his is the ONLY tour that provides raincoats for all. Well....some truth in their...as I later found out...

Anyhow, the tour started with a visit to a Monkey Cave Temple on Phuket itself.

The temple was so named because of the numerous monkeys (actually they were macaques). They temple itself was within a limestone cave and features a number of stalactites and stalagmites. Try searching for the 10 monkeys found in the photo below:

Next we took a long boat ride through the Phang-Nga conservation area.

This included a visit to the famous "James Bond Island" which is actually Ko Phing Kan.

The main highlight was the limestone feature (Ko Tapu or "nail" island) that was used as a location shoot for James Bond - The Man With The Golden Gun. It was the hideout of Scaramanga.

After the tour of James Bond Island, the long boat headed off to a sea gypsy village. This will appeal mainly the non-south east asians because the village was nothing more than a huge kelong. Like Kukup.

Accordingly to Sim, the gypsies were using the scarce land that they have for burials. So they just extended the real estate by living on stilts.

It was during the sea gypsy tour when it started pouring! And lucky for us with Sim, he provided us with raincoats. Well, Sim was certainly not the only tour agent to have raincoats for sure, but we were all glad he did.

All in, the tour which cost 650 baht wasn't too bad. Had plenty of chances to take photos and it was unhurried in most cases.

*****************
#01: Introduction
#02: General
#03: Food
#04: Island Tour
#05: Vegetarian Festival
#06: Muay Thai
#07: Firecracker Special
#08: Afterthoughts