The Girls Go Shopping

The Girls Go Shopping (hm)

After a couple weeks of sensitive cultural explorations, the girls decided it was time to go shopping. Since we are in our twilight hours in Thailand, the time to boil down all of the statues and shapes and pottery into a few purchases has come.

The winds of travel blew strongly this morning as we decided to pack up and head north to Bangkok. In the space of two hours we packed, checked out, found hotel reservations and thanks to our intrepid cultural interpreter, Arika, found a driver.

By this point in the trip we’ve collected some things which add up to a few large, heavy suitcases. (Yes, some f them are gifts for you all!) The way to travel short distances is to hire a driver and a mini-van. If there are more than two people and a purse you must hire a mini-van because the cars are mini-sized.

Our driver thought this would be a quick round-trip to drop off the farangs (foreigners) and just smiled with amusement as we asked if we could stop to purchase a spirit house for the upcoming exhibit. He replied that he didn’t think we had room, but we could try.

So we piled into the van with all of our baggage and it was true, there was almost no space left.

A few miles into the trip Karen spotted a roadside stand and we pulled a u-turn to get to the shop. We found a fantastic spirit house, a broom Karen wanted and several object for the exhibit.

(photo 2795 spirit house store)

2795

(photo 2791 spirit house we chose)

2791

We spent all of our collective cash to acquire these items and had a tough time fitting them into the van. But we managed it. (Photos 2796, 2797)

2796

2797

Now we are stuck in a maze of Bangkok traffic looking for the DHL office so we can ship all this stuff back. Arika and I haven’t been able to move for hours due to our collection of artifacts (photo 2815).

2815

Statuary for the exhibit (photos 2808, 2794)

2808

2794

We have been lost for some time now and have just had a moment of excitement because we spotted a DHL truck. Wait, look there is another DHL truck. It looks like we might be hot on the trail of our destination. We just found it, so we will post more later!

PS- We found DHL and were horribly disappointed by their unwillingness to do business with us. Let’s hope we can find someone who will do business with us tomorrow. -HM