Holidays Greetings & Felicitations to you & yours!
We're enjoying our second Christmas in Chiang Mai - here's what's been going on:
This is the little Christmas tree in the lobby of our hotel, cute, huh?
This pretty tree made of blue lights is in one of our favorite markets.
More signs of the season: garb for Mrs Clause ...& perhaps some elves?
and, poinsettias all over the place!
On Christmas eve, we had a big party at our hotel! We have wide balconies overlooking the pool/restaurant area & our group of 14 took over the 4th floor for the evening.
Here is Aase, Betty, Chairit, Beverly & Eva posing with the 'Orchid Tree' and gifts underneath.
Our table was beautifully set, everyone contributed delicious food & drink, and the weather was perfect!
One of our contributions was this fruit salad made of scrumptious tropical fruits: papaya, mango, tangerines, pineapple, dragonfruit (white w/ black speckles) and banana, drizzled with lime juice - YUM!
And we had presents! Everyone got at least one -
lots of fun & funny gems.
Here's the group (minus Chairit, who had a quick errand to do). From the top row: Kathleen from Colorado, Lena who is Thai, Adrien from London, and Sada. Middle: Kay from Chiang Mai, Eugene from South Africa, and Jim & Mido from BC Canada. Front: (standing) Eva from Germany - she now lives in Chiang Mai, Betty from everywhere in the US, Beverly from Michigan, Aase from Denmark and me!
The party broke up around 11:30, and after we cleaned up & got home (across the courtyard for us), the sky filled with fireworks - a wonderful way to end the night!
Christmas day, we relaxed (?!) ate great leftovers, sunned & swam, and then went out to a night 'walking street' market.
Here's a bit of the scene:
We loved these beautiful instruments and lantern decorations,
we watched this shopping frenzy over flowery quilted bags,
and had some excellent gelato!
On the way home we passed thru the Tha Pae Gate where the first of seven nights of 'countdown' to New Years had begun with loud music, dancing, games for kids and this high school choir singing Christmas carols in english! Interesting!
The gate area is all decorated for an International Celebration. There are many large steel sculptures covered in moving light strips representing the Sydney Opera House (below), the Coliseum (you can just see the edge, to the far right), the Leaning-ish Tower of Pisa, and the Eiffel Tower (2 of these).
Behind the Opera House you can see some of the food stalls.
But of all the Holiday decorations we've seen around town, I think this is our favorite.
Can you even begin to imagine what's going on here?
As the tree (enclosed in a plastic bubble) twirls, little foam 'snow' beads fall from the cup under the star and bounce merrily down the tree branches to the container at the bottom
... yup, it's 'snowing' in Thailand!
Merry Christmas to All, and to All a Good Night!
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