Vien Hua and Vien Tien: Visakha Puja Day at Siam World Water Park
Posted by Stuart at 12:23 AM on June 03, 2004It is Visakha Puja Day in Thailand, one of the three main Buddhist holidays. We had the day off from school and I was determined not to do any work. So Piyawat and I decided to head to Siam Park, a 20 year old water park on the outskirts of Bangkok.
And how was it? Well, it looked 20 years old, for starters. But we had a good time in the talay ("ocean", or in this case, the wave pool) and the super spiral and straight-away water slides. The super spiral was especially fun. It seemed super fast and super twisty. In fact, every time I went down it, I had to sit down to rest to clear my spinning head.
After a few hours we were both feeling quite dizzy -- or, for the Thai word of the day: vien hua (literally, "circling head"). So we headed home to rest.
As I said before, today is the Buddhist holiday, so tonight (after a nap, dinner, and a few laps at the gym pool) I went to the temple to watch the local folk do the vien tien ("circling candles") around the temple. In this ceremony, which I have seen a few other times, worshipers walk around the temple three times carrying candles, flowers, and incense.
It's a beatiful sight. I'm just glad that my vien hua didn't keep me from the vien tien...
