The Spectrum of life
Today was another wonderfully packed day. This morning Jenny, Pat, Katie, and I all clambered into the car to see Pat’s work. Pat is a manager for an English speaking school here in Bangkok. Any of you wonderlust people out there if you want to visit Bangkok and Thailand for a year come teach English. Kind of a cool set up, the students are there to learn conversational English and get a better feel for the language. It is very tempting, I just can’t handle Bangkok anymore, I am excited to see the country (yes, I am admitting I am mountain girl).
Jenny and I started off for Wat Traimit and the 9 foot tall solid gold Buddha. AMAZING! The temple is in China town and so it had a a large Chinese exhibit in the temple. As we wondered about we got to learn about the Chinese immigration and learn a little more about the Chinese influence in Thailand. I could tell I was like a child on Christmas, I like history but I wanted the meat, the juicy part, the Gold! It was beautiful! I couldn’t imagine being on the team trying to move this huge Buddha, dropping it, and having the plaster crumble enough to know something was hidden. Then to uncover it and here is solid gold?!?!
We decided to make it to Ratchanatdaram because it sounded cool, or maybe it just looked like it would sound cool, I can’t pronounce it! When we got there it was being remodeled so it felt like we were intruding which made it even more intriguing. This Wat had 360 degrees of Buddha relics, there seemed to be almost every pose and the staircase just wound it self up and up and up.
Just across the street is Wat Saket and Golden Mount so we went over and climbed up and up and up to the top of Golden Mount which was beautiful, have I mentioned that this is the cool season and it is about 85degrees with some wild amount of humidity? It is hot here! Oh, and if you want to go into the temples you have to have your arms and legs covered plus the fear of mosquitos has me doubly covered. It is hot here! Anyway we went up and up and up and got some more spectacular views and ran into a group of school girls wrapping the top of Golden Mount with a red scarf, it was perfect.
After climbing back down from the top of Golden Mount and resting in front of the Buddha. We went to Wat Suhtat and sat in front of the Buddha, what is amazing about the Thai Buddhists is that you can buy incense, candles, and lotus blossoms, and offer them to the Buddha then say your prayers/blessings at every temple, I enjoyed joining in and I also just enjoyed shutting my eyes and letting my mind quiet down. I can tell I am thirsting for that right now. Especially after we went hunting for Ban Baat which has its own post, if you are interested read So I had a dream.
Jenny has a friend Lin who got me tickets to and from Chiang Mai and who is working on getting a tickets to and from the south. She couldn’t get me on the Friday train so I leave tomorrow for Chiang Mai. I had to go into her office to get my tickets and we started talking, she was able to get me into a very swanky hotel right next to the subway for the train tomorrow. So here I am after a day of seeing poverty, a day of wealth, and partaking in both (my transfer of funds didn’t go through until just now so Yay for $), I am exhausted on more than one level. And yet I went back to Jenny’s salon to say goodnight and we went out again to get foot massages (wonderful!), see Soi Cowboy, a strip club row, the Bangkok Night Bazaar, and I ate tongue and heart soup at midnight. This mountain girl is beat!
So I had a dream…
A few weeks before I left on this amazing trip I had a dream. It was a pretty wild dream too, I was being courted by Bruce Willis and he took me to his mother’s house. We visited and as we were leaving he decided he needed to take me to a place to get Mango Chutney it was something like Ban Kat. I wasn’t really listening because out of the corner of my eye I saw a figure in white and it was the Ghost killer…blah blah blah. The dream went on what stuck with me though was the name. I needed to go to this place and as I woke up it stuck with me. A few nights later I had another dream about a date and that I don’t know if I even want to go into. So back to Ban Kaat, or whatever. I decided upon waking up that I needed to remember that name, I googled it, I looked it up in my Lonely Planet, I listened for it because for some reason it was important I go there. Well once I got here and I realized I am TERRIBLE at the language what if I mispronounced it and what if on the map I read it wrong. I went to the index of my Lonely Planet and looked for all the Bans I could find. Whalah! There is was, Ban Baht. Ban Baht is the Monk’s Bowl Village in Bangkok. The village was set up by Rama I way back when to make these metal alms receiving bowls made for the Buddhist monks. Now days the monks use mass produced bowls from China but there are a few families who still make the bowls and live in the village. I got all of this from the sign outside the “village” after I visited it and from Lonely Planet. Getting there was an amazing adventure. I asked Pat and Jenny and neither of them knew what I was talking about and the maps in this Lonely Planet haven’t been doing it for me. Jenny volunteered to be my guide again (I think she is okay with me going to Chiang Mai tomorrow) and wanted to know what I wanted to see. I gave her my list and off we went checking off my requested sites, I will get to those. So Jenny is Thai and she is asking taxi drivers, tuk-tuk drivers, temple personnel, where is Ban Baht? Everyone is telling her that it is a street and not much there. I was ready to give up but it was on my list and Jenny wanted to check off everything. Finally we figured out that if we went to the street we could figure it out from there.
Jenny and I get directions and start walking, we come to an intersection and to the right there is BAN BAHT! Or at least a sign that says it. We head over and there are 3 people working on metal bowls and since we have engaged the guy in conversation I have to decide if I am getting a bowl. I am still wanting to make sure that we are really in Ban Baht and so Jenny asked if there were more bowls. There are, just down the street, Jenny and I jump through traffic and walk down the street to another sign, Ban Baht. What I am realizing is that I am not in Kansas anymore AND I am grateful I had Jenny with me, I think she was wishing we had Pat with us too, because it was a little seedy. We started walking down the way and I got to see real Thailand, the poverty part of Thailand, the homes were one room shacks, and at one point in time we thought we were going to a store front to find out it was someone’s living area. My heart knew I was somewhere very special, this was what I was really seeking. Jenny has been so good to me, too good I think. I have been the dutiful tourist going to the temples, eating amazing food, seeing the beauty that Thailand has to offer but removed from the people and as you all know I am a people person. This gave me that sense of people, I went right away to the first guy we talked to and haggled just for show and got a couple of bowls. I don’t know if my purchase will help him but it helped me. The head guy showed pictures of the awards he has received from his craftmanship and showed us how his family makes the bowls. Jenny and he had a long conversation and at the end she decided she wanted one too. I didn’t have the courage to look for and have Mango Chutney there so who knows if I fulfilled my dream, I do know my heart sits a little more at ease tonight.
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