McBlog

Songkran was over (road toll over the 4 day period was just over 400 people dead), the squirting was done and now any time we returned to my parent’s apartment soaking wet it was thanks to the heat & humidity. For a bit of a distraction, Kitt, Nykolai, my father & I went to the Queen Saovabha Memorial Institute in Bangkok, the home of a Snake Farm run by the Thai Red Cross.

Nykolai had been with my father about 5 years ago when I had been working on a project in Korea. On a lark they’d gone down and 5 year old Nykolai had been draped in a python (the snake, not the programming language) and had everyone going crazy when he kissed its head. Sadly, dad had not taken the camera so we missed out on having the moment recorded visually.

This time we went loaded with camera and spent some time touring the new museum they’ve set up. It’s an amazing set of exhibits with live snakes, samples, replicas and multi-media shows describing everything about snakes. Well worth the visit.

After checking the displays we watched the live show where handlers bring out a king cobra, siamese cobra, pit viper, rat snake (not venomous) and a couple of other snakes. You’re right up there with the snakes so it’s a great show. The final part of the show is the python. Before they brought it out, they asked who wanted to hold it? Nykolai’s hand shot up and, Thai’s loving kids, he was chosen to go down and wait as a handler brought this huge snake out. The lady running the show had Nykolai looking the wrong way so the snake appeared rather surprisingly from behind, much to everyone’s amusement (even Nykolai’s).

So, we now have a few photos of Nykolai holding a Phython and photos of the other snakes. I’ll get around to loading them eventually.