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Thailand 2020-2022
Recently, I stayed in the Chinatown area, around the back streets, and found it to be a very interesting place. There are many tourist shops and restaurants open that cater to people they may never see again but you really want to go to the local shops and restaurants where you get local Bangkok and surrounding area residence to frequent. The back streets are also filled with automobile repair and motorcycle repair shops. One shop I found particularly interesting was the Vespa repair shop.
A little over 30 years ago I was commuting to Bangkok on business and I can’t remember seeing one Vespa, the famous Italian motorcycle/scooter, but I have to admit I wasn’t really looking. And now that some friends on Koh Chang are interested in Vespas I have been keeping my eyes open. This is what I found in just a 500 m area around this area of Chinatown in Bangkok this week.
You know, I traveled 4,700 km (almost 3,000 miles) on this 6 week journey around northern Thailand. I came back badly in need of rest from bumping around on the not so smooth roads here and there. But it was a great adventure and I would recommend it to everyone. Here are a few random photos from that trip.
I am not going to say, “if you have seen one historical park you have seen them all”. But Ayuthaya and other cities have similar ruins influenced by Khmer and Hindu architecture and themes. These photos will give you a good idea of what the old temples used to look like when the current inhabitants of Thailand say, “others occupied this land”. Hard to tell if that is true since people usually mix and don’t tend to run away in mass hundreds of years later when attacked (some exceptions, of course).
A little known temple on the top of the hill in Fang was the temple the snake coffee fellow directed me to. So, why not? It turned out to have some nice artwork.
Joking! This road leads to the Myanmar border, which you really don’t want to cross right now. Some of these images are fairly large and load time may be “something”, not “nothing”. But the sights were so nice I wanted to keep some decent resolution (to be resolute).
Upon leaving Fang, a very beautiful farm and mountainous area in very Northern Thailand, I spotted this amazingly beautiful temple entrance and had to photo and video the visit. This is Wat Udom Mukhom.
Nan is a district and town in Thailand that is kind of interesting and I encourage you to visit to see the sights. Getting here provides many beautiful sights along the way if by vehicle.
The Explanation: “
Arts in Mueang Nan
In the remote past, Nan has long been considered as a small chiefdom, located in an embrace of a jungle and a mountainous range. Artistic style of Mueang Nan, from middle of the 4th to early of the 20th century, obviously presented an external source of influence, related to Buddhism. Over six hundred years, the arts of Nan artisans also reflected on the
Buddhism faith, history, and way of life of Nan people. According to different sources of artistic influence, the arts of Mueang Nan can be ategorised into four phases as the following details; The 1st Phase: During middle to later of the 14th Century, the artisans of Nan explicitly illustrated a similarity or stylistic art from Sukhothai, potentially because of a good and strong relationship between Nan and Sukhothai. The 2nd Phase: During 1450 – 1559, since Nan was conquered by Lanna, the artisans of Nan, consequently, reflected
a mixture between the Lanna and Sukhothai stylistic arts which commonly existed still in Nan. The 3rd Phase: During 1560 – 1785 Nan was under a conquer of Burma for over two hundred years which also resulted in a chaotic circumstance. Different battleships also came across during that period. Hence, it can be considered that Nan artisans was in a descent situation during this era. However, a local artistic style was appeared as a typical Nan style. In addition, Burmese art less influenced on Nan artworks, meanwhile, an influence from external art also appeared as a short-term existence. The 4th Phase: Nan had been ruled by Rattanakosin Kingdom since the reign of King Rama I. Nan stepped back on the right foot, and the art of Nan rehabilitated to its original. Also, it brought the other styles of art namely Rattanakosin, Lan Xang, and Burmese that imported by the commands of Great Britain to modify the traditional works of the native artisans. As a result, the significant integration in the art which branched out enormously. A visible sample was the wooden Buddha images which were very popular to make since then.
Wat Huay Pla Kang, in Chiang Rai, is an often crowded (not in Covid times) temple area highlighting a giant Buddha which is actually Kwan Yin (the Goddess of Mercy). Here are photos of this temple area.
