Happy New Year from Thailand!

We arrived in Chiang Mai–which is in the northwest corner of Thailand, fairly close to the Myanmar border, just before lunch on New Year’s Eve to visit Doug’s son Eli who is teaching English there. After a lovely walk around, followed by a two-and-a-half hour massage for $30 we joined the masses to begin ushering out the old year and welcoming the new.

All along the moat that encircles the old city of Chiang Mai were locals and visitors lighting and floating off paper lanterns. We missed Loi Krathong which takes place on the evening of the full moon of the 12th month in the traditional Thai lunar calendar–which happened in November. Apparently thousands of these lanterns were sent off then. We just got to see hundreds of them.

The lanterns size in around 3x2x2 feet. A wire or bamboo ring holds the paper with a fuel disk that gets lit in it’s center. The result is a mini-hot air balloon. I had to float one off of my own!

All three of us did it–we wrote our prayers/wishes for the new year on the outside of the paper lantern, and then helped each other hold and and adjust the paper as they filled with hot air.

Eli helping me hold my lantern as it fills with hot air.

One of the moments I will remember the most from this two-week trip to South East Asia is Eli saying to me as I was holding onto my lantern, “Remember Melanie, when it’s ready, just let it go.” And I did what I often do in life, I held on tightly to the lantern, and kept holding and holding a little fearful that if I let go it just might not do what it’s supposed to do. As those thoughts rifled through my head, a tugging and pulsing began in my hands, the lantern wanted to move into the sky with all the other prayers and I just had to let go. I just had to let go and trust that it would go along into the sky along with all the others. And it did.