Lopburi Winter Festival

erinwlsn
Dec 14, 2016
5 min read

I have been very lucky to work with some of the sweetest women I know. And one of my amazing co-teachers offered to take me and a few friends to Lopburi for the Winter Festival. After her describing it to me, it sounded just like any other fair. Rides, food, games, more food, and some shopping stalls like at the market. So I invited my friend who is the other English teacher at the kindergarten, and my friend who loves Christmas so much she would probably marry it if given the chance.

This is my co-teacher from my K2 Yellow class who invited me, Tuoy. She is really funny and sweet. She and her friend stopped by and picked up Emily, Allison and me in the evening after school. It is a pretty easy drive there, but it is weird being in a car after riding so free on a scooter all the time. We got to Lopburi, find a place to park off a hidden driveway and head into the fair. There is food everywhere, mostly sweets, and stalls with all kinds of things from purses, shoes, clothes to dishes. We wander around a bit looking through everything.

Tuoy said she wanted to go on this big zipline that they have so we look for that. Which we find, look at it, a giant metal rickety looking tower with a two zip lines coming off of it. It looks like people are wearing parachutes instead of a simple harness. Everyone except for Emily and Tuoy decide to do it. Hell if you're going to die in Thailand at least make it a good story.

Keep in mind I have been skydiving 5 times, so getting into the harness is simple, but climbing up that tower is a whole different story. I am terrified of heights. Like climb a ladder and feel stuck scared. So this was probably a dumb idea, but life is full of them and I feel we should try to do one thing we are scared of at least once a week. So up I go, very slowly, feeling the whole thing shake from the people above and below me. When I get to the top the floor is just sheets of metal kind of placed over each other. I freeze and they say and gesture for me to sit down. I do and feel the metal bend under my butt.

I'm regretting my decision but there is no way in hell I'm climbing back down that thing. That and there are more people climbing up it. I watch as the guy before me goes, they pretty much pushed him off. They two guys smile and wave me over. Enjoying the panic that I'm sure is all over my face and that this silly farang is here and this scared.

I don't know if I've explained it yet, but farang means foreigner.

So I step over, they hook me to the part that zips down the line, I have no idea what it is called. He points where I should put my feet, one directly in front of his knee. So with doubt I do he positions me and then leans forward, pushing me out with his leg. I scream (I think out loud) for a second as I wait for the jerk of the harness catching, once it does it is smooth sailing. The guys at the end are all cracking up and I notice at least 5 people are either taking pictures or videos of me so I ham it up and give them thumbs up, etc. I get down and needless to say am a little shaken up but get my certificate and we are off. There is a video but I am still trying to figure out how to post it.

We ended up stopping and eat this weird sweet desert that has liquid nitrogen on it so it smokes. I know what this is from seeing it in my mom's office. She was a doctor and would use it to freeze off warts, or to cool off her sore feet pour a small amount into her shoes to cool them off, give them a few seconds and then put her feet back in. So Tuoy and her friend bought it and we all ate it while making a Livefeed on Facebook. It was fun blowing out the smoke from eating it. But I was cautious to eat any towards the bottom for sure.

I saw a gun shooting stall and being the cliche American I wanted to shoot. Only when we got closer did I realize it was a more realistic gun and not the simple pellets. He tried to show me how to load the gun and shoot and I did every step before him. Oh living up to stereotypes. I then shot the 5 rounds and that gun needed cleaned or something. I lined of the target and sight perfectly and it was hitting lower. Regardless I hit the target so I was happy about that!

We wandered a little further and came across this giant tent. I notice the guy dressed like Captain America instantly but resisted the urge to get a picture with him. We walked up and then were given cards and asked to pull a slingshot to get a velcro ball to stick on the wall. So I did. One by one we did and then were taken over to this photoshoot section and took several pics. I get excited by the little things in life and playing silly games, being flung down a zip line, and being able to take funny pictures = a good night. If you can't tell from just looking at the pictures, I got a little into it.

After we did our photoshoot they told us we could get a free manicure... Uh, ok! So we went over and picked out different colors and designs. I got adorable bows. While they were doing that we watched the show that was going on. It was bit like Thailand's Got Talent. No idea what anyone was saying but it was entertaining enough.

Once nails were dry we headed off to find food and see more of the fair. We finally stumbled onto the game section, I had a desire to win a giant stuffed animal, but everyone was getting hungry so we moved on. Tuoy said she had somewhere she wanted to take us and we ended up going to 3 different restaurants before we finally found one. I can't remember the name, but it had live music and was pretty fun with good food.

There were foreigners everywhere! After you are some of the only foreigners it is weird when you see other ones around that you don't know! After dinner we headed back to Singburi. I think it was quite the eventful evening. Full of slight terror and possible death, games, photoshoots and free manicures, just like any other normal night after work.