Trip Home

[Scott:] We finally said goodbye to our beautiful view of Bangkok. We expected to go back to Chachoensao for a night and a day, but, when we confirmed our flight, we realized that we had misread the date, and we had only 12 hours left in Thailand

Nicholas and cousin Pan took full advantage of the 12 hours they had together and played energetically and mischievously the entire time. Ying's brother Moo played chauffeur again, giving us a ride to the airport in his pickup.



On the way home, we saw this sculpture of a Hindu story about angels and demons churning an ocean of milk using a serpent. The dancer in the middle is Vishnu. Nicholas had seen this sculpture on a previous trip and wanted to show it to me, so I'm happy he got a chance.

Our flight wasn't until after 1 AM, so Nicholas was very tired. Even his favorite Thai desert didn't wake him up very much.

We had an 8-hour layover at Incheon airport in Seoul, which turns out to be a great place to have an 8-hour layover. There is a free waiting lounge in the transit area with large, comfortable, reclining chairs for rest, reading, and a nap. The same area has a beautiful media room with a flat-panel television and a DVD player. There is free internet access from their computers.

We took a transit tour during our layover. Unfortunately for Ying, the 3-hour shopping tour was already full, as was the tour to the set of her favorite Korean soap opera. So we selected a 1-hour tour to a Buddhist temple near the airport, which turned out to be very interesting and pleasant.





The tree at the very left of this picture is 1600 years old. Temple members call it the grandfather tree, and they offer respect from an altar in front. There was a stone pagoda made out of rocks from the area.

Couples who are trying to have a baby drink from this special water to help them get pregnant. (We didn't drink any.)

Korean Buddhas are a little different from Thai Buddhas. The tour guide didn't explain the wide hat, but it seems practical for outdoor meditation in a country with four seasons.



Temple members offer these beautiful lanterns at the prayer hall and write their wishes on the ribbons.