Famous for the Day
Myself and two friends of mine went to the King Hung Festival today. It is the celebration of the Kings Birthday, and takes place around a lake, in a far away province, where none of the locals have ever seen a white person before.
You take a walk up to the Temple, and there are various arts and crafts and tacky toys for sale, which you can give as an “offering” to the Temple. It’s a celebration for children, and many of them get bought lots of toys.
I now understand what it must be like to be famous. Everywhere we looked, everywhere we turned, people were staring. It was comic book staring too, slap stick comedy staring, where their face locks with yours and their head turns to follow you as they walk past, and by the end of it, they are walking one way, their head still turned in the opposite direction, to face you, mesmerised.
If you smile at them, or give them a wave, their eyes light up and they are delighted, they enthusiastically shout “Hello!” at you, and the more confident ones shout “How are you?” or “What’s your name?” but they are usually too excited that they are speaking to a foreigner to actually listen to the answer. Major fits of the giggles commence.
Then there’s the photos. Hundreds and hundreds f people as asking for your photo. At first it’s funny, then it’s sweet, then it becomes damn annoying. Just as you are finished with one person or group, the next lot arrives, and you are passed from person to person. The students and kids were all very polite and would say “Excuse me, can I have a picture please” which of course I didn’t mind. Then there were some adults (who you’d expect to know better) who would just grab you by the arm and make you pose for a photo, seemingly unaware that you are scowling in the photo as they manhandle you, as they beam with pride, excited to show their friends.
After an hour of this, we resorted to looking at the floor, making eye contact with no-one and walking quickly. We escaped to a lake and stopped to have a rest on a bench, exhausted. Again, when people walked past we averted our eyes or pretended to be deep in conversation.
As we stood up to leave, a large group of kids (who must have been waiting for us on the other side) saw that we were turning back the other way and all twenty of them began to run around the lake. (And it wasn’t a small lake!). We saw them and didn’t have the heart to leave, so watched, laughing, as they hurriedly scampered towards to us. They were delighted to have photos with us, it made their day.
On that day, all over Facebook, there will have been hundreds of photos of us, with everyone announcing us as their new best friends, all there for the world to see, and yet, we never saw any of these photos, posted all over the Facebook pages of strangers.
