Thailand Post #4-Wrapping it Up

Drinking cashew juice

On our last day in Thailand we had a very relaxed, easy day.  Although we had seen a lot of the area around Phuket, we hadn't actually been to Phuket yet and decided to take a tour. We were driven around downtown Phuket and saw the historic Chinese section of town. We actually saw the herb store the Amazing Race had visited when they went to Phuket (only fans of the show would care, but we were excited!)

They took us to a cashew nut factory which was pretty interesting-who knew that you could drink cashew juice and that's it's pretty sweet and tasty! They had cashews with every flavor imaginable that we were able to try-chocolate, honey, wasabi, and even durian. Now if you've never heard of or tried durian it is a fruit that is extremely pungent and common in Asia. In fact, there are even signs in taxi cabs and at the airport that you can't bring durian because the smell is so offensive.  Unfortunately the taste of the durian among the cashews was too much for me, and I thankful was able to get something else in my mouth quickly!

Chalong Temple

We visited the huge complex of Chalong Temple next. There were five buildings we could see, all of which were ornate and had huge Buddha statues inside. As the temperature outside was in the 90s I was in shorts and a tee shirt, and I was asked to put on a shawl not only to cover my legs but also my arms.  One of the temples was three stories tall, and at the top many people were worshipping because Buddhists believe part of Buddha's bones are behind the glass case inside the temple.  Throughout the complex you would hear fireworks going off in a large outdoor oven every few minutes after worshippers bought them to give thanks to Buddha. In each room we saw lots of people bowing and kneeling to Buddha statues, and to be honest it became a little overwhelming to me at some points.  Buddha never said he was a God, yet people are treating him as such. I just felt very overcome with emotion visiting here.

Big Buddha-hard to tell from here how big it was!

Next we went to "Big Buddha," the largest sitting Buddha in the world. It was just recently finished and is on a huge hill overlooking Phuket, so you can see if from almost any point. You don't realize how big it is until you actually are underneath it and staring up at it. There were many, many tourists, but there were also lots of people there worshipping.  Again I was asked to cover up out of respect, and once again it was very sad for me to see all these people worshipping a man instead of God.

That night/early morning we left Phuket and headed to Seoul to visit Eastern, our adoption agency in Korea. Jon wrote an AMAZING post on the entire experience which I can't even begin to replicate, but suffice to say it was wonderful to be there but also very hard.