Happy New Year
We celebrated the Thai new year with most of the Saipetch family on Sunday. It is kind of like getting together for the Van Gorp 4th of July picnic. The food and tables were outside where it was 100 degrees in the shade, but they did have the AC on inside and they tried to keep the kids inside so they didn't get overheated. I volunteered for Mallory duty ;) They had quite a variety of Thai food and they also had ice cream. Mallory loved the ice cream and was begging everyone for their ice cream.
I think the best part was when everyone honors the oldest members of the family. Part of this was Buddist ritual, but I think the theme of honoring the elders was nice and something we don't do enough in America. All the elders, which were mainly 4 ladies who are 90+ years old and one of them is Eddie's Grandma, sat in a row and everyone passed in front of them and greeted them and gave them money. Afterwards, the Grandmas were able to say a few words to everyone. One of Eddie's aunts entertained them with some Thai dancing, which they liked. Then the Grandmas gave money to all the little kids. Mallory got 100 baht ($3) from her Grandma. We have pics of all of this and Ed will be posting them soon.
After the New Years celebration, we headed for the beach house. Mallory didn't like the feel of the sand on her feet a first and she was afraid of the water. She did get into the ocean finally and liked it...except for the salt water in her eyes. The water was 80 degrees so it felt like bath water. We will post pics of the beach too.
Right now we are trying to pack since we are leaving this evening. We seem to have much more than we came with. We are going to Ed's uncles house for dinner to see Great Grandma one more time before we leave, then heading for the airport.
See everyone back in Indy.