My Isaan adventure

[frequent]

Who doesn't like a man in uniform?

ManInUniform.jpg

These were two of the soldiers on duty in the central public park in Yasothon on the last morning of our adventure. No, I don't know why the Army has soldiers stationed there. In the background is a giant frog, and I don't know what its significance is either. It was, as you can see, already hot around 11am

Hot.jpg

We were there for the Rocket Festival, an all day event, held the previous day across the road near the Sports Stadium and its nearby park. It's held with home made variants of this splendid item, in the park next to the frog (which, by the way, was shown with fingernails, so not a species of frog that's common)

Rocket.jpg

From there we headed off for the airport in Ubon Ratchathani, about an hour and a half's drive away

The rocket festival itself does not adhere to Western "health & safety" concepts, so bad luck all you politically correct members. Here's a recent video report of the sort of accident that's quite common

The adventure will be reported from the end to the beginning, so more to come

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[Manforallseasons]

Nice pics!

[frequent]

The Sunday night after the rocket festival I spent in a nearby village - maybe 20 or so kilometres outside of Yasothon. No running water, outside loo, outside (cold) shower but, thankfully, one air-conditioned bedroom. Before you start getting excited about Eskimo hospitality, it was a single bed and I was very tired. I'll comment about the "dating" Apps later on

In the morning, before we set out for Yasothon town and then the airport, my host walked me around part of the village. I was again impressed, as I have been on previous visits to Isaan, at the large wealth transfer that seems to be going on. There were close to a dozen new and nearly new houses, all costing in the two-to-four-million baht range, funded by remittances from Bangkok and, in a couple of cases, Australia. The sons and daughters are off in the big city, working their arses off (sometimes literally), and sending the money home. In return grandmothers and aunts are raising their children for them while they work in the factories and shopping malls - rarely the offices, not a high enough level of literacy - and houses of the rich as well as - perhaps less often than you might imagine - in gogo bars. Few young people remain at home - just enough to do the farming. I did see one very handsome young lad who would certainly have made his fortune servicing the latintopxxxs of this world in Bangkok but his story was "married at 15, father at 16" - not uncommon, and he was a farm labourer

It had rained heavily while I slept, and was very wet underfoot but there was livestock in abundance - chickens everywhere, pigs and cows all being fattened up for slaughter. Despite the chickens being everywhere, apparently their owners are able to identify them simply by sight (so I was told)

[christianpfc]

Well written, amusing and informative at the same time, and I didn't find a factual, grammatical, spelling or punctuation error. That's close to the highest praise you will ever get out of my feather (figuratively, in fact keyboard).

I will leave it to others to run a google image search to see if these pictures are taken from elsewhere.

[frequent]

I will leave it to others to run a google image search to see if these pictures are taken from elsewhere.

Knock your socks off

[Patanawet]

and I didn't find a factual, grammatical, spelling or punctuation error.

Are you for real?

[francois]

Quote Originally Posted by christianpfc
and I didn't find a factual, grammatical, spelling or punctuation error.

Are you for real?

Perhaps Christian was being facetious considering cdnmatt's vision problems. Quite a feat being able to compose a post with no errors when someone is blind.

[sglad]

...and I didn't find a factual,...error.

You sure? Try again. It's quite easy.

[latintopxxx]

geex...christian...soooo suspicious...

[Surfcrest]

It sounds like he's not traveling with his usual travelling partner, from the almost factual sojourn series.

Surfcrest