Can someone help me understand local Buddhist ceremonies when family members leave and return?

Stargazer

Stargazer

Surin Legend
My Thai wife's son just finished 2 years mandatory in the Navy. Upon coming home, my wife insisted we must have a ceremony at home with a local old man presiding (for a price), where he chants and connects our son to his wife with white string, and then everyone invited eats a big meal my wife has prepared, and takes home food. Then a few weeks later, our son has his head shaved and goes to spend 10 days at our local temple in a saffron robe. Big parade around the village with loud music from a music truck (3000 THB for two hours!), then 3x around the temple. When he completes the 10 days, another ceremony with big meal for maybe 50 local people is required. I'm trying to get my wife to explain it, but her English is limited. I would like to understand this better.
 
Last edited:
Just for clarity. Did you pay for the ceremony and did you receive donations from the guests? I have heard of instances where the donations from the guests actually exceed the cost of the food and drink; but it's very rare.
 
I wasn't aware that they had ceremonies for return from national service........but the Thais will use any excuse for a party. especially when they are not paying.

Just this morning have been to a Lucky Home party. A new house built by a new farang to my village and his Thai wife 250 guests..sit down meal, beer, whisky, live music, singers and 4 sexy girl dancers.................AT 9 O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING. !!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just want coffee at that time of day. very hot..these events should be held after dark, Pink envelopes containing the invitation were sent, and their return with cash inside was expected.

Tomorrow, my daughter's boyfriend and his next door neighbour are off to be monks for 1 week!. Head shaving today, then a send off tomorrow, where most of the village will attend, to eat, take home food in bags, and no doubt avail themselves of the beer and whisky provided. My wife will go, but I won't be attending. I will have nothing do do with this sort of nonsense. Dress up as a monk for 1 week! WTF!!!

If you get away with 50 people you will be very lucky.
 
Yorky said:
Just for clarity. Did you pay for the ceremony and did you receive donations from the guests? I have heard of instances where the donations from the guests actually exceed the cost of the food and drink; but it's very rare.
Click to expand...
Oh, it all costs. Between all the parties, and donations to the monks, maybe 60,000 THB. People do give our son small money, 20-100 each
 
Prakhonchai Nick said:
I wasn't aware that they had ceremonies for return from national service........but the Thais will use any excuse for a party. especially when they are not paying.

Just this morning have been to a Lucky Home party. A new house built by a new farang to my village and his Thai wife 250 guests..sit down meal, beer, whisky, live music, singers and 4 sexy girl dancers.................AT 9 O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING. !!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just want coffee at that time of day. very hot..these events should be held after dark, Pink envelopes containing the invitation were sent, and their return with cash inside was expected.

Tomorrow, my daughter's boyfriend and his next door neighbour are off to be monks for 1 week!. Head shaving today, then a send off tomorrow, where most of the village will attend, to eat, take home food in bags, and no doubt avail themselves of the beer and whisky provided. My wife will go, but I won't be attending. I will have nothing do do with this sort of nonsense. Dress up as a monk for 1 week! WTF!!!

If you get away with 50 people you will be very lucky.
Click to expand...
A load of wank.
 
Is it still mandatory when you actually volunteer? Because that's what he did. If you go pull the marble out of the bag you get 3 years or nothing. But the marble game is stacked in the percentages they want that year. Some years it could be up to 90% black marbles in the bag. This is not answering your question. Many things in Thailand are not Buddhist rituals at all, but ancient animist beliefs that have been melded into Buddhism. What it is, is a thanks giving. That he got through his trial of enlistment safely. Now he pays the piper, so to speak, with penance. But before the penance, the party. There you have it. Only the well to do put this stuff on. And those with wealthy benefactors. :)
 
Prakhonchai Nick said:
I wasn't aware that they had ceremonies for return from national service........but the Thais will use any excuse for a party. especially when they are not paying.

Just this morning have been to a Lucky Home party. A new house built by a new farang to my village and his Thai wife 250 guests..sit down meal, beer, whisky, live music, singers and 4 sexy girl dancers.................AT 9 O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING. !!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just want coffee at that time of day. very hot..these events should be held after dark, Pink envelopes containing the invitation were sent, and their return with cash inside was expected.

Tomorrow, my daughter's boyfriend and his next door neighbour are off to be monks for 1 week!. Head shaving today, then a send off tomorrow, where most of the village will attend, to eat, take home food in bags, and no doubt avail themselves of the beer and whisky provided. My wife will go, but I won't be attending. I will have nothing do do with this sort of nonsense. Dress up as a monk for 1 week! WTF!!!

If you get away with 50 people you will be very lucky.
Click to expand...
I had 600 when I first came to Surin & house was finished! WTF!!!
 
These kind of thing happen in the villages and the richer the patron the bigger the parties. Lucky for me, they all knew I had no money, or so my wife told them. We enjoyed no such parties, not even a wedding party, although we did get a small blessing wih a pig's head. 20 years on, with a nice house in town, 2 cars in the carport, and 2 daughters in the best school in Surin, I think some of the villagers believe they were conned. Whatever! As @Prakhonchai Nick said, "I will have nothing do do with this sort of nonsense." I echo Nick's sentiments, me neither.
 
You married a Thai, and all that family stuff (take care me and Mama etc), Buddhist stuff, good luck crap, making merit baloney, house warming (you are actually supposed to sleep in the new house for a night to give them good luck and blessings), where to place the spirit house for your home and pay the attendant monks for finding the most auspicious place to place it (but if you bribe the monk you can have auspicious placement anywhere you like), and ALL the silly things they believe in or ways to get some free booze and food and a party to break the monotony of the week. And on and on. Want to stop it? Move away from the family, or even the country. Though even then she will likely be prey to family 'obligations' to be sent back home for all the shit they want, guilted, as you have shown you have the money (rich farang) to pay for it all (ALL of it). You need to set limits, learn to say no, tell her what you can/will do and what you will not/can not do. You are now the rich husband, father, uncle, married into their family. And they WILL take advantage of that as much as YOU let them. The wives are under pressure from all sides to provide now she is a rich 'Mia Farang'. Comes with the territory with many families, the poorer usually are the worst (though not always). The larger the family, the more brothers and uncles especially - entitled cunts, and everyone has a hand out for you to solve their issues of money and face (basically begging the wife to intercede on their behalf). All loans will more than likely never be paid back so best to avoid. Learn to shut the hell up and make no promises, cry poor mouth, cite financial problems and limits to your resources. Some of the gals and their families are great (I am lucky, mine are great). Many are not Mr. ATM. :) The more lazy c**t menfolk in the family the worse it can be - because they are the privileged swinging dicks and the women are supposed to spoil them and treat them as the masters of the household, even if they provide Jack Shit.
 
Last edited:
Hell, I've seen them rent a f**king elephant for the kid going into a week or two of monkhood, with him strewing favors from the elephant back seat as he strolls by to the Wat. This for a kid that never raised a hand to help the family and always in trouble. Stupid stuff. Like shaving his head and going to be a two week monk was going to redeem the fact he's a little dickhead. LOL
 
Cent said:
You married a Thai, and all that family stuff (take care me and Mama etc), Buddhist stuff, good luck crap, making merit baloney, house warming (you are actually supposed to sleep in the new house for a night to give them good luck and blessings), where to place the spirit house for your home and pay the attendant monks for finding the most auspicious place to place it (but if you bribe the monk you can have auspicious placement anywhere you like), and ALL the silly things they believe in or ways to get some free booze and food and a party to break the monotony of the week. And on and on. Want to stop it? Move away from the family, or even the country. Though even then she will likely be prey to family 'obligations' to be sent back home for all the shit they want, guilted, as you have shown you have the money (rich farang) to pay for it all (ALL of it). You need to set limits, learn to say no, tell her what you can/will do and what you will not/can not do. You are now the rich husband, father, uncle, married into their family. And they WILL take advantage of that as much as YOU let them. The wives are under pressure from all sides to provide now she is a rich 'Mia Farang'. Comes with the territory with many families, the poorer usually are the worst (though not always). The larger the family, the more brothers and uncles especially - entitled cunts, and everyone has a hand out for you to solve their issues of money and face (basically begging the wife to intercede on their behalf). All loans will more than likely never be paid back so best to avoid. Learn to shut the hell up and make no promises, cry poor mouth, cite financial problems and limits to your resources. Some of the gals and their families are great (I am lucky, mine are great). Many are not Mr. ATM. :) The more lazy c**t menfolk in the family the worse it can be - because they are the privileged swinging dicks and the women are supposed to spoil them and treat them as the masters of the household, even if they provide Jack Shit.
Click to expand...

Cent, please don't hold back. Your insight is so dead on that it should become mandatory reading at TAT offices and Thai visa outlets. :)

Most of us (white western farangs) have put ourselves into relationships well within the "bumfook" (excuse me, Ferret) - the poorest parts of Thailand.

We basically pay for that privilege. Our significant others do not support us.
Our SOs are not from the Hiso end of Thai society.

But seriously why are we here ?
If we really know why and we are happy with the answer...and our choice...then so be it.

We originally came to the devil's playground for what...to study Buddhism ? To take art classes with gold leaf ? To learn to communicate in another language ? To train to become a mahoot ?
(Fook no.)

We all know why we're here so let's not beat the dog.
As an American (for instance) we could always pull roots and go to Mejíco, Costa Rica, Columbia, Dominican Republic, Uruquay, Portugal, parts of eastern Europe or...
But in the end we'd probably be a helluva lot worse off or possibly still unhappy...or wind tits up in a ditch.

Let's face it - weren't the majority of us 'happily married at sometime' to someone our own age back home ?

So hell, why not try to find the right partner at the right time and try to make a go of it. It couldn't get any worse than the last time, could it ?
(Well it could but ...lol) :p
 
Mel Malinowski said:
My Thai wife's son just finished 2 years mandatory in the Navy. Upon coming home, my wife insisted we must have a ceremony at home with a local old man presiding (for a price), where he chants and connects our son to his wife with white string, and then everyone invited eats a big meal my wife has prepared, and takes home food. Then a few weeks later, our son has his head shaved and goes to spend 10 days at our local temple in a saffron robe. Big parade around the village with loud music from a music truck (3000 THB for two hours!), then 3x around the temple. When he completes the 10 days, another ceremony with big meal for maybe 50 local people is required. I'm trying to get my wife to explain it, but her English is limited. I would like to understand this better.
Click to expand...

The meat of the matter requires further information. Your wife's English is limited.
The white string is an indicator.

Mel, was your wife's son legally married with/to "his wife" before his two years in the RTN ?
Does he have any children with her ? Has he made his mother (your wife) a grandmother ?
Have you paid for any wedding parties previously ?
 
I think we have there, most likely the best two posts of the year, and its only March. Both stating the cold hard facts and truth of the matter.
In a nut shell we put up with statement 1 because of statement 2. Lets just all get back in that bed we all made our selves.
Does it hurt to have a dummy spit occasionally, even if we already know the score?
 
Coffee said:
The meat of the matter requires further information. Your wife's English is limited.
The white string is an indicator.

Mel, was your wife's son legally married with/to "his wife" before his two years in the RTN ?
Does he have any children with her ? Has he made his mother (your wife) a grandmother ?
Have you paid for any wedding parties previously ?
Click to expand...
There was both white and orange 'lucky' string tied to wrists. Yes, he was married. Didn't know she was pregnant until after he had to go in to draw straws. Locals say it is 10% chance, and the obligation is 2 years, which is what he had to serve. (what a racket! They just used him as unpaid labor to mow lawns and drive officers around, never taught him anything) It may be she was pregnant before he got married ;) As she had just finished nursing school, we figure she wanted to get pregnant to give her sick mother a grandson. I'm sure she wasn't thinking about how he had a mom married to a rich farang:tearsofjoy: He was married before (Buddhist ceremony only) at a young age, no kids, amiable 'divorce'. That was before my time. I can afford all this. We just don't do it this way in USA. I'm trying to get my wife to agree to not spend 300,000 THB on music etc. when I die, but she refuses, says it is required. When my wife of 41 years died, her cremation (her preference) cost $850 USD. She didn't want a memorial service. So it seems extravagant to me to spend $10,000 on me. A whole lot of people seem to make money on it that poor people really can't afford. It's my understanding that many borrow on their land to be able to do it. I'd rather save it in the grandson's college fund.
 
From my experience over the years. sending off a farang costs more than the average Thai. There seems to be a necessity inbuilt into wives/widows that the farang deserves the best send off possible, and of course that costs.

No amount of stating you want the absolute minimum will change anything. Several widows I have assisted over the years have borrowed heavily for the funeral in expectation of receiving much money from the husbands estate and pensions, only to find out there is very little, and in 2 recent cases, have received absolutely bugger all!
 
Prakhonchai Nick said:
From my experience over the years. sending off a farang costs more than the average Thai. There seems to be a necessity inbuilt into wives/widows that the farang deserves the best send off possible, and of course that costs.

No amount of stating you want the absolute minimum will change anything. Several widows I have assisted over the years have borrowed heavily for the funeral in expectation of receiving much money from the husbands estate and pensions, only to find out there is very little, and in 2 recent cases, have received absolutely bugger all!
Click to expand...


Face.

Same when you go. Your status in the village is such that there will be an expectation that the send off reflects that status.

All your demands for simplicity will receive lip service while you are upright but, once departed, your threats to come back and haunt your loved ones will count for nowt! :smirk:
 
Last edited:
CO-CO said:
Face.

Same when you go. Your status in the village is such that there will be an expectation that the send off reflects that status.

All your demands for simplicity will receive lip service while you are upright but, once departed, your threats to come back and haunt your loved ones will count for nowt! :smirk:
Click to expand...
Knowing the score and making preparartions prior is all well and good but, once the sh*t hits the fan--forget it.
I know that I have exercised due dilligence to the best of my ability now so, you can only deal with the cards delt to you.
I am sure Pat's family will support her in the worst case scenario, it's the bull sh*t mumbo jumbo that pose a problem.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top