December 25th marked the beginning of what is supposed to be a festival in Khon Kaen. Actually, not only in Khon Kaen, but throughout various cities in Thailand.
The promotion is called Khon Kaen Countdown to 2011 which initially was a New Year’s Eve celebration with fireworks, music, and alcohol. Now it has been extended to a week long sales promotion.
The Tourist Authority of Thailand (TAT) in Bangkok and also in Khon Kaen have been promoting this and the Khon Kaen office even put out a video telling all the wonderful things that would happen during the Festival of Light:
Reality was quite different.
I was at the City Gate at about 1000 and stopped by the park to see the set-up. Overhead lights were in place on Sri Chan Road by Central Plaza.
Khon Kaen Overhead Lights
And, as I wheeled my bicycle around the park, I could see that they were definitely not ready and would not have everything in place and operational for the start time 0f 1600. Lights were still being hooked up, sculptures were still being built, and people were scurrying about trying to get things done in time.
As I rode around, the only thing I saw that was ready to go were the girly motorcycles all over the place from sponsors Fiore and Yamaha. These were definitely being marketed to to the girls of Khon Kaen.
Khon Kaen Girly Motorcycle
Khon Kaen Girly Motorcycle Cute Sign
Khon Kaen Girly Motorcycle Chic Sign
Despite the obvious motorcycle promotion, me and Tom from Isaan-Live decided to check out the festivities.
We met up at 1700 and workers were still running around trying to set things up. The lights around the park footpaths were inoperable and the overhead starlight effect between the park and Central Plaza also was not working.
They could not have chosen a worse location in Khon Kaen to hold this event. There was only parking for motorcycles though cars and trucks attempted to get in only to be told to back out into busy traffic. Parking was only available at the shopping mall, Central Plaza, across the street. This was most likely planned by the mall to attract customers. Regardless, it was a parking nightmare.
The city gate was not lit up at all. This was one of the few things that I actually wanted to see and take photos of.
Khon Kaen TAT, in their promotional video, also said that there was going to be a Food Festival. It was nowhere in sight. The only food available was from about 10 Thai street vendors serving up normal Thai street food. Same old, same old.
There is a restaurant just off the side of the side of the park, so Tom and I went there for a beer and a talk. After one Beer Chang and one Beer Singha, we were informed that there were no more bottles of beer. Only Beer Chang on draft served in tall, plastic towers. We moved on.
The musical entertainment was quite painful to my ears. While I was there, I saw one lady attempting to sing and doing a poor job at it. At other times of the evening, the stage was taken over by the promoters trying to sell their wares.
Here – you can see for yourself the blatant motorcycle promotion, some lights on trees, and people milling about. Maybe it will be better on New Year’s Eve, but I won’t be there. I try to avoid places where lots of Thais and alcohol get together.
Thais refer to this as “mai sanuk” – not fun. Farangs call it crap.
So, the Khon Kaen Countdown to 2011 is a total waste of time unless you want to buy a girly motorcycle.
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[...] I wandered about to see if this Sparkling Fantasy World was going to be as ridiculous as last year when the big sponsor was a motorcycle company. You can see how crappy this was at a post from last year – Khon Kaen Countdown to 2011. [...]