Peter and Ava . com

There are always quite a few sad things that happen in our life.

It’s hard to admit and walk through it but we’re lucky we have each other.

There are always quite a few troubles that affect and change our lives.

They really irritate and bother us but lucky we can always plan it again together.

Love Ava

On the weekend (2004-03-02) I went back to Ava’s home town to go and see something that her parents thought I should really go and see.

Ava goes to University on the weekends, but she thought it might be nice if I take her parents up on the offer and go down anyway to see this quite famous thing go.

So on Saturday morning I managed to book a seat on a very crowded train and take the 4 hour journey down South, followed by a bus ride that took another hour or so.

One funny thing is that often the food that Ava’s mom cooks for us I really can’t stomach. They eat every part of the chicken imaginable. I don’t fancy chicken neck, but they seem to think it’s great. But last time her mother found out that I don’t mind pizza too much. So within 10 minutes of arriving at their home, she had ordered a pizza from Dominoes.

Well that was enough to keep me stuffed well into the evening. So after I had finished we set off. Her dad and I.

What I was greeted by was something beyond what I could ever have imagined…Here’s a little background.

Every three years all the temples in an area, in this case a whole town, come together to hold a kind of traditional event, which no one so far has been able to tell me why. They all come together and for three day they carry their little gods in their carrying boxes and go and visit all of the temples in that town.

All in all their are 39 temples in their home towns vicinity, I never imagined their were so many.

Every group from every temple has some people at the front banging on their “gongs.” They are also followed by all the people who usually take care of matters at that temple and some people to push or carry around the little cart that the god from their temple rides in.

As they approach a temple the real stuff starts. It’s started off by a string of firecrackers. No, not those little ones you had as a kid, but ones that are about 10 times that size, which apparently scare off evil spirits and the like.

Along with these groups they often have groups of people who do special performances, which are traditional dances of sorts. There were some guys on stilts who did some fighting with swords at the entrance to the temple. There were some women who did another kind of dance. There were another group of men who did a Kung Fu display. On another note the group of men doing KungFu always do it in groups of 36, 72, or 108, but no one has told me the significance of this.

Back to the temple approach. When those guys come to the front of the temple they kind of run at the temple as though the god is trying to get into their temple. This is preceded by a loud banging on a very large drum, which gives a cool effect with the atmosphere.

As that god tries to enter the temple, it is confronted by someone from that temple who looks like they are in a kind of trance and being controlled by the god of that temple. When they approach, the temple protector comes in closer and shouts, at which the approaching god moves back. Once the approaching god moves back, the temple protector takes a piece of wood, covered in nails and whacks himself on his back, as though it was a terrible back scratcher. He takes three whacks and then the approaching god comes at him again. He shouts again and they move back. He then hits himself three times on the back in rapid succession. They do this ritual three times in total after which the approaching god backs down.

They then do a little prayer to the temple and move on with the procession.

NOTE: The whacking on the back maybe doesn’t sound too bad from what I have said here. But he really hits hard. I saw the blood dripping down his back, which they mopped up with “paper” money, which is paper with a print on it, which is burned to the gods.

That was probably the most freakish part of the whole event.

The next day on the Sunday we went to see the procession of children.

The kids are put up on pedastel, 108 of them, all in a really long train and are pulled along. The kid who sits at the front is the kid whose parents paid the most money and so on and so forth. They head around the town throwing candy at people who put their hands out for it.

I think the amount of preparation that goes into the event must be huge, many roads are blocked off as the procession is long and slow. It’s quite something to see, and when I remember to take my camera next time, 3 years from now, I will share them with you.

As of the end of January I started a new job.

Many people may know this already but I will restate it anyway for my friends who are not completely up to date on my goings on.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it but it is at “Joy” franchise school. The ones I had been working at before were all owned by the same boss, who owns the whole company. This school is owned by a couple who have had it open for a few years. At this school I get paid as a full time teacher, which means I also get paid for holidays (not many of those though).

The new job has been nice in a few ways.

Firstly, I needed the mental break as I working for the branch schools I have become a bit disenchanted at how they ran things and how things were organized. I don’t think they were really run too badly, I just really thought that they should all fix the school and that everything should be better.

I have taken a far more proactive approach here at this school, which is easier to do as I can just talk to the boss who has the final say and is in fact very reasonable and nice. In the end I have almost complete control over what we do during our classtime. There are certain things that we still need to cover, but beyond that they trust you to get the work done.

Secondly, I have been using my time very well. I used to just waste away my lunchtimes looking at things on the internet and checking my email. This was a real waste. Now I use my lunch to plan ahead and to prepare for upcoming events. So I am better prepared, which pays off, as I then feel better about my class and so feel more inclined to want to plan. And in doing even more planning I feel even better about things, and so all my work gets done on time and I feel good about it.

So, it’s been very positive overall so far. It is amazing what a little proactivity, something I lack, helps things along.

It’s been a while since I last wrote.

Two weeks ago, my uncle died. It was Wednesday, the 17th if I remember right.

That week was the first phonecall I’ve had from my mother for a while, as it’s too expensive to keep phoning, and we just email.

As she started to speak and told me she had bad news, the first thing on my mind was, “Mor-mor has passed away.” (She is my now 94 year old grandmother). I was a little shocked when she told me it was not my gran, but my uncle.

The sad part is that he is quite young, 50 or so, and that he committed suicide. He had been sufferring from bi-polar depression for at least the last 10 years or so. It has been quite a hard time for him, as well as his close family and friends.

Bi-polar depression is a different kind of depression where you go from very high highs, to very low lows. Instead of being in the pit of depression your body swings from good times down to the bad times and back up again. It is often a discease that needs ongoing medication.

He had a very hard time coping with it as the times when he was on the “high” nothing could go wrong and anything was possible. While when he hit a low, the wheels fell off and those times can be especially bad. And as he got older those highs and lows increased in intensity, so much as to make life quite difficult.

In the end, the sickness just became too much. May he rest in peace (thank God he was a born again believer)

It is a terrible thing for parents to have to bury their children, and I pray for my Gran and Grandpa, as this is really tough for them in their old age (both in their 80s). He was really loved by all of us. He will be sorely missed.