Thailand. Lenten Candle Festival. Big Crowds and Hot Weather.

Now as you all know the Lenten Candle Festival is Ubon Ratchathani’s biggest draw card for tourists each year. I have attended previous years and swear each time that I am not going to go there in the daytime. The reasons being are, one because of the heat and two because of the huge crowds.

But because I am a glutton for punishment and I am dedicated for my readers to see the festival as it should be seen I hopped on my motorbike and went on down to the park where it was being held.

Of course being a stupid farang I went with my bag and a camera and nothing else. I thought I had my hat in my bag but after arriving there I found out that this wasn’t the case. Also I left the sunscreen as this is for pansies as I used to surf for 4 hours plus back home in only a pair of board shorts and never needed sunscreen.

Now to get close to the action it meant going down many roads that were blocked off by barricades but when you are on a motorbike you can go anywhere you like as long as there is the tiniest bit of room. The police manning many of the roadblocks just simply wave you through and you give them a smile and a salute and sometimes they salute you back, which is funny at times.

I arrived and was only a 30 metre walk to all the action and getting to this spot wasn’t a hassle at all. If in a car you had no chance and would be looking at a very long walk of 1-2 kilometres depending on how much you were interested in paying for parking.

I had just got off my motorbike and walked across to the action when my English mate rang, Keith, to ask where I was. He was back up the road a bit and I told him where I was and in a few minutes I had his company, his wife and youngest daughter.

We started to wander along looking at the candles on show and the only thing I could think of was how bloody hot it was and how burnt I was going to get. I bought a small umbrella for Keith’s daughter and was thinking of getting one for myself but it would have been a hassle to have this and take all the pictures as well.

We came across a hat stand and there were plenty of brimmed hats (floppy) for sale and I grabbed one and Keith paid for it and his wife also picked one as well. Happily we were on our way.

Now there was plenty of dancing and kids and adults were having fun and entertaining the crowds with Isaan Style “Mor Lum” that the local people love. It is repetitive music that goes on and on and the people dance in funny way sort of like freestyle and you just let your body move however it wants too.



Now the bad thing is the crowds. The walkways are too small and allows a small amount of traffic and there are always a lot of people trying to go here and there and it is slow and very hot going.


The floats were going by with all kinds of designs and they carried the bands that played the music for the girls to dance to who were competing in a competition.

The girls dancing were in the direct sunlight dressed in traditional Thai outfits that look beautiful. It would have been low 30’s (degrees) and with the stinging hot sunshine and no breeze made it so much worse. The girls dance for a good 7-10 minutes for each performance. This type of dancing is very traditional and slow and precise movements using the hands, fingers, legs and so forth.


Standing and watching some of the floats and girls dancing was hot work and we didn’t last long until we moved out of the crowds and looked for some more space away from the bedlam.



We made our way into the main park and there was plenty of room to move and stretch and also shade out of the direct sunlight. Many people had set up in the park under trees and even though you didn’t have a bird’s eye view you could still enjoy the atmosphere of the festival. We made our way through the park and seen many happy families sitting with I would say 3 generations enjoying a meal and time together.


While making our way we come across some happy fish on the surface of the moat like river that encircles the park. I am sure they are well feed by some of the locals.

Also there was a project that is like a huge aerator that helps oxygenize stagnant water HM King Bhumibol Adulyadej projects .

As always there are people selling everything and anything and lottery sellers were out in force. They were sitting in the shade just waiting for people to wander past and then look for the lucky numbers that might change their lives forever. Thais love the lottery and is a big money spinner for people specially the illegal lottery operators.

The main fountain near the Ubon Museum looked like a very nice place to go and cool off and if there were young kids in the fountain playing I would have joined them within a blink of an eye but sadly no-one was cooling off so I just sadly took pictures of the cool looking water.


So after going here and there 3 hours had passed and it was time to get out of the heat and home. I have many pictures of the candles, the big professionally made candles and also the smaller candle made in local villagers. I hope to have these all up and posted in the coming days.

As for me and my dedication for you I ended up with a very red nose and extremely burnt arms. As Thais say “Sum Num Naa” or serves yourself right. So I am now being very tough and using moisturizer on my sore red arms and nose. Long gone are the days of hours in the sun without getting burnt.


Brunty.

Australia. Child Killer. Really a Loving Father. Makes Me Sick.

Now this is a story from Australia and I know it happens all over the world and there are many deaths like it. But Australia is meant to be a first world country and this sort of blatant incomprehensible crime is so hard to understand.

A pathetic excuse of a human being Stuart John McMaster, 30, beat his five year old son for who knows how many years with a specially made reinforced leather belt also used his fists and feet when he misbehaved. He made this belt himself for the sole purpose of hitting his child.

These are the cold hard facts.

Cody Hutchings, 5, was covered in more than 160 bruises and had suffered two fractures to his skull, tears to his liver and abdominal injuries when he died at his Hoppers Crossing home in March last year.

A pathologist told the court Cody died as a result of blunt force trauma to the abdomen, likely caused by a series of forceful punches or knees to the boy's stomach.
Mr Meredith, McMaster’s solicitor told the hearing McMaster had not punched or kicked the boy, but had pressed his foot into Cody's stomach, which may have led to the fatal abdominal injuries.

But thankfully Justice David Harper said the extent of Cody's injuries was indicative of forceful and sustained abuse.

Justice Harper said McMaster's decision not to seek medical assistance in Cody's final hours was damning.

"To deny the boy medical treatment would indicate self protection -- an entirely self-centred approach to a situation that confronted both child and parent."

This is the defense for McMaster’s.

His lawyer, Gavan Meredith, told the Supreme Court his client had showered the five-year-old with affection and Christmas presents, and had tried to resuscitate the boy on the day he died.

"There was a loving and affectionate aspect to their relationship," Mr Meredith said.
"There was evidence concerning Mr McMaster's efforts to resuscitate Cody and evidence of the family's Christmas that year, of Mr McMaster giving presents, taking the children for bike rides, playing basketball . . ."

Mr Meredith said his client's admission of guilt demonstrated remorse.

"Had he been a more callous individual he may have wished to stand trial again," he told the court.

The court heard evidence that McMaster, fuelled by drug-induced paranoia, routinely smacked, slapped and strapped the boy with a reinforced leather belt when he misbehaved.
McMaster told police he had struck Cody -- a slow developer who suffered from a condition known as Williams syndrome -- up to 25 times on the day of his death with an open hand and a leather strap.

Now the outcome.

Stuart John McMaster, 30, last month pleaded guilty to Cody's manslaughter after a jury failed to agree on a verdict on a charge of murder.

The maximum penalty for manslaughter in Victoria is 20 years.

McMaster, who was found guilty by a jury of intentionally causing serious injury to Cody's mother, Belinda McMaster, will be sentenced on both charges on August 14.

Now my rant.

I have read many stories and also transcripts on this case and the sad reality is this guy is guilty as hell and he is such a pathetic coward, he is one of the biggest cowards I could ever imagine as now he is petrified about being sent to prison to be amongst big grown men who are a lot worse and a lot meaner than him. These guys don’t beat up five year olds and when they do find out he will be as good a dead.

For some reason even hardened criminals hate child killers and pedophiles. The justice system knows this as well and sadly locks them away in isolation for their own safety so they don’t get what they deserve by the good prison society.

I have read his defence and it is all about him being a loving caring father and shit like this. His lawyer tried to paint him as a great guy who had drug problems and I know everyone is entitled to a defence as our great justice system is based on “innocent until proven guilty.”

I read one statement made to the police where McMaster’s said he had taken a cocktail of drugs on the day he had beat his son to death. He said he was celebrating after receiving his welfare check.

How could anyone especially jurors come back with a decision other than “murder” is beyond me. Okay maybe he hadn’t committed premeditated murder but he had been abusing this poor boy for such a long period of time he had to have known that sooner or later he could or would kill the boy inflicting these types of injuries.

So even if he gets the maximum of 20 years for manslaughter, I personally don’t believe this is anywhere near enough for the pain and suffering he caused to a helpless child. He should be locked away forever without a chance of parole until the very happy day of his death.

These types of cases I would like to see capital punishment for. I am not a big fan of capital punishment but in some cases it is well founded I believe.

I would gladly volunteer for the job be it pushing a button to inject a lethal dose of drugs into his system, or flip a switch to send an electric current through his body (this I don’t agree with, very horrible), or I would happily pull a trigger on a gun.
These are my views and I would gladly know what you think if you agree or not.

Brunty
Killers story

Thailand. Isaan Temple Ceremony. Khao Phansa.

We are now in the holiday period known as "Khao Phansa", the Buddhist Lent and it starts in July and goes until some time into October. In former times, this is done to prevent monks from trampling upon rice paddies when they venture out to receive offerings from the villagers.

Buddhism, Buddhist traditions and beliefs are central forces that shape the local way of life and give rise to various festivals of religious origin which have been observed for generations. For example, the majority of the Buddhist ordinations take place during the Buddhist Lent when young novices enter the monkhood. Villagers also actively engage in merit-making during this period. Offerings consisting of an assortment of savoury dishes and sweets as well as items for daily use are offered to monks. Items that provide light such as candles, lanterns and lamp oil are deemed to be particularly important offerings as it is believed that they provide monks with illumination physically and spiritually.

I was fortunate enough to go to Noot’s mother’s village to participate in and also take pictures of the ceremony. The fortunate part was that Noot’s mum had gone to another village a few days ago so this was happy news for me.On the way to the village you always come across flower sellers at major intersections and they have these little flower offerings for you to purchase and you can put in your car, house and so forth, in Thai I think Pheung Mah Lai

On the way to the village you always come across flower sellers at major intersections and they have these little flower offerings for you to purchase and you can put in your car, house and so forth, in Thai I think Pheung Mah Lai.

These guys and girls are pretty brave they way they walk amongst the cars as motorbikes whiz by. They are out early in the mornings and again late in the afternoons.

Noot was in a silly mood and pulling cheeky faces at me, must have been sleep depravation as we didn’t get to bed until around 1 am the night before and were up at 5:15am to go to the market to purchase food to take for the monks and so had many other people as well.

Driving out to the village it was a little eerie with a very bright hazy light coming through the windshield of the car. Maybe it was Buddha/God shining early morning light onto us. You can see in the pictures the flower offerings and Buddha image and also some scripture hanging from the rear vision mirror.

As always when we got to the village I was greeted with the usual sight. Now don’t get me wrong as the majority of the people are fantastic but they don’t seem to have much pride in how things look. You will always see filthy stagnant looking water lying around and rubbish lettered everywhere. The young kids just throw rubbish wherever they are standing and the parents don’t care. I have many times had a go or word to young kids when they just throw their rubbish on the ground and it’s always met with laughter and I am sure they think I am insane when I tell them to put it in a bin.

The other things that I don’t like are the cats in Ma’s house. Now Ma being as useless as she is at finding and keeping a job somehow finds it very easy in keeping 15 plus cats and just letting them roam about the house as if they are the owners. I have never been a cat fan anyway but when you have 20 odd cats meowing for food and trying to eat food off of your plate this is what I call insanity and disgusting. I have spent many nights when we were trying to eat dinner hitting the cats with a large cane stick and very hard to make them scatter and I am sure that again people thought the Farang was crazy.


We put our food offerings for the monks onto plates and then made our way to the temple on foot. I was going to offer 5 lovely big juicy apples and of course some sticky rice, also some meat, fish and sweet dishes were on offer.

As we got closer to the temple entrance the eerie light was again shining as we walked towards the temple.


There was plenty of chatter taking place while the people waited for the ceremony to start and on this day the numbers on Barn Tai Kow had swollen to large proportions. It seemed that many people had returned to the village for the holidays to visit family and friends. Again conspicuously missing was the younger Thai boys of the ages 16-30. I never see them at any of these ceremonies as they tend to stay at the houses smoking and drinking beer and making comments as the younger girls walk by. In the temple the ratio would have had to have been 95% women.

A lady who and I am not being rude is usually always well and truly Molly the monk (drunk) was getting the monks breakfast ready and she was dressed very nicely as well. This was a happy sight for me to see her like this.

The elders of the village sat close to the front of the temple and the younger people toward the back. If you look in the pictures you will only see a few men here and there.

The monk’s alms bowls were waiting to be filled with all the goodies being offered by the villagers.

The ceremony started and the people placed their hands in a prayer like pose and repeated the chants that Buddha himself said many years ago. It was good to see some really young girls participating in the chanting and they knew the chant, sadly the young boys 5-10 years old ran around making noise and being pains in the butt.

Noot and Joom offered the food in a prayer like pose as a chant was said but my apples and sticky rice missed out as they were on the floor and I was behind the camera.

The time came to start offering the food and placing it in the monk’s alms bowls. When you do this you make your way on your knees and shuffle along and when you get close to the bowl you hold the food up to say a prayer I suppose and then start placing the food into them. I always try and get out of doing this as I am not Buddhist and don’t believe in religion but I am told to do it and if this keeps the peace and makes Noot happy then I will go along with it.

The monks sat waiting for everyone to finish filling the alms bowls and then they could complete the ceremony and eat all their spoils.

As always there were around 4 or 5 dogs wandering around in the temple and they also seem to have the run of the place and can go here and there, Thai people and stray and homeless animals is another bewilderment to me.

We joined the very long line to start shuffling our way towards the alms bowls on our knees and his isn’t so bad if you have jeans on but when you have shorts on your knees take a bit of a beating. I know that many temples you are told to wear jeans as Thais find it rude or something like this for people to wear shorts but in the village it doesn’t seem to matter, I have seen drunken men come staggering in with no shirts and filthy dirty shorts on before.

The monks sat waiting for everyone to finish filling the alms bowls and then they could complete the ceremony and eat all their spoils.

So after finally making it to the front of the line and giving our food to the monks we then went back to sit down for the last part of the ceremony. People have small bottles/glasses of water that they tip out onto a plate as the monks say a chant and this creates a holy water or something along those lines.

We then headed outside and went to see Noot’s deceased father are tip some of the holy water onto his resting place and placed a small amount of sticky rice there as well. This is to feed the spirit of the father I suppose. The girls were laughing and chatting away to Pa if he was there listening.



The girls then moved onto their grandmother and grandfather and did the same thing and then it was time to go and head back home to Ubon Ratchathani.


The girls had one more stop before we left and they visited their cousins grave site as she died on Khao Phansa day when she was 6 years old when her family was traveling on a Soi Thaew or small bus and it crashed off the road into a ditch. She was the only causality in the crash thankfully as it was fully loaded and overcrowded I was told.

On the way out of the temple a family was together paying respect to a deceased loved one and was a good way to leave the temple with a happy thought.

Brunty.