Bangkok

The beginning of this adventure has come and gone. Only now, nearly a month into my travels have I had the time and quietness of mind to sit down and write. The old struggle between committing time to stop, breath, slow down and reflect on my experiences and continuing to go out and accumulate new stories is once again playing tug –o-war with my conscious. It is times like these that I usually cut and run, leave the weeks old adventure in the dust and move on to relate the more visceral, the more tangible adventure of yesterday and today. But I will try to rewind, simply because there is too much to tell and maybe, with luck I can cover enough to get me back to the present.

Arrival into Thailand was like finding myself in a reoccurring dream, a place familiar but fleeting, a place that I knew well but was unable to decipherer the legend in my own mind from the true experiences of years gone by. The feeling of deep déjà vu ran through me like a train, everything so similar but just different enough to question whether it was Thailand myself that had changed over the past 10 years. Ultimately it has been little of both.

The Shanti Lodge is a place of refuge. Quietly tucked away in the Tewet district of Bangkok it constantly bustles while remaining homely. The open aired hallways hang thick with vegetation, the kitchen is constantly emitting delectable smells of gingery, garlic, Thai-succulance and Thai massage is gloriously relaxing the inhabitants. It was there that I rediscovered into the depth of my connection to Asia for the again, there that I ran into old friends for the first time and there I realized that not only did I remembered Asia, but Asia remembered me.

The staff at the Shanti Lodge became good friends of mine during my first tour of Thailand in 2000 and now, more than ten years down the road many of the same smiling faces greeted me. One of the most striking things about Thailand is the apparent health of the people both mentally and physically. Immediately upon arrival our students reported feeling healthier than ever, that a weight have been lifted from their shoulders and that even in smoggy Bangkok an aura of good living was contagious. Indeed many of my acquaintances here look exactly the same if not younger. The resilience of the Thai’s is amazing; aging with grace is a inspiring thing to behold first hand.

Bangkok is a fascinating city. We started with a temple tour, heading from the Shanti Lodge through the bustle of the riverside market which crawls with live fish, meter long eels, snails, toads, chickens, spices, drying meet, stray dogs and peddlers of every variety. We made our way slowly, swimming through the smells until we finally arrived at the Chao Phraya river. Bangkok has been called the Venice of Asia and its intricate system of waterways provided the original public transportation for the city. River Taxi’s have operated efficiently and reliably for centuries as the city has grown around them into a tangled mass of traffic jams and high rises. There is no way quicker, more interesting nor more direct than utilizing the carp infested canal systems to get where you are going. And it is not secret: the river itself is jammed with all manner of boats and random rigs. Barges pushed massive piles of trash to unknown destination, “rooster tail” boats with their converted four cylinder car engine outboards zip around in chaos and near collisions and the ferries diligently bump and grind their way from stop to stop. The biggest danger is getting your arm caught between the boat and the tire lined piers as the taxi snaps into place off the lassoed spring lines.

First stop the grand and majestic Wat Po, home to the largest reclining Buddha in Thailand. As always the magnitude of the Buddha is breathtaking and I was immediately reminded of the significance of religion to art throughout the ages. Regardless of creed it is impossible to dismiss the resources put into art by faith worldwide. Throughout the time it has been through the lens of religion (or narcissism disguised as piety) that has prompted humanities most precious works of art and architecture. Whether at the Vatican, the Taj Mahal, Angor Wat, Manchu Pichu, Chichen Itzá, the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Acropolis or a native village on the west side of Vancouver Island, religion is the original benefactor of artistic expression. Nowhere is this more apparent than Bangkok which houses at least one elaborate temple in every neighborhood and contains a total of 450 Buddhist temples city wide.

After a tour of Wat Po and the intricacies of the temple complex we crossed the river again to visit the historically significant temple of Wat Arun. Built in Khmer style and constructed when the center of power was moved from Ayuthia to Bangkok by Rama I, Wat Arun was originally created to house the Emerald Buddha, on of the most sacred relics of early Thai/Khmer history. It is said that whoever controls the Emerald Buddha controls power over the Thai Kingdome. The effigy now rests safely at the Royal Palace in Bangkok after a long and adventuresome tour of the world via pirates, marauders and traders.

Although no longer housing the Buddha, Wat Arun still stands tall, a testament to the initial push towards Thai nationalism and the consolidation of governmental power in Bangkok.

After a day in the sweltering heat it was all about street food and Bananan Lassi’s whipped to a cool refreshing froth. The first day is the craziest day, simply in the fact that time becomes so relative. In new and stimulating surroundings your brain can process more information in one day than it does in a week in your comfortable abode back home. The brain is literally creating twice the connections as normal and “growing” at twice the normal rate. It is for this reason that when my head finally hit the pillow that first night it felt that I had been going for a week.