Tim in Thailand : Jui Tui Shrine - Piercing and Parade

Jui Tui Shrine has always been special for me - I think that it was the first time that Jamie introduced me to so much that I did not know. Arriving early (5:30) I was surprised by the amount of people that were at the Shrine.

I moved swiftly and carefully (remembering to remove my shoes) and was very pleased to see one of the regular possessed - see pictures above and below - his body is a work of art.

It really is - he is covered in tattoo and on top of this his body is pierced in a different way each year.

A very real pleasure was finding this man - beautiful art, wonderful.

I chose to be blessed by another possessed (as above) and it is becoming more important to me to have this done at the beginning

- similar to wanting to have a number of bracelets given to me. After the quick trip into the shrine I circulated the grounds outside the shrine to see all of the people being pierced.

Then the possessed began to leave - wow, did this possessed guy really crawl all the way and then the sedans followed with the entourage of fireworks following them.

Then came the sedans carrying the effigy of the Chinese Spirits.

But this photograph gives me the creeps every time - what movie does this remind me of?

It was now that the pandemonium began - magnificent chaos - it gets me every time. I did mange to catch Jamie run across the film.

I had my foam ear plugs in and I tried to capture some photographs but was not quite able to - I think I like to be a little too close for the telephoto to be really effective... Then began the long walk...