Today, I’ve probably seen more gold than any other day of my life; we visited the royal Palace and the reclining Buddha of Bangkok. Read more…
First of all a nice breakfast at our hostel. Toast, Corn Flakes, fresh fruits… sounds good, doesn’t it? The place we stay is called K.S. House, the rooms are nice and very cheap, a little loud sometimes. Everything else is rather expensive to balance out the cheap rooms ;-) but people are friendly.
We then set off by foot to the royal palace, about 20 minutes from our guest house. It’s really a must-see. Pagodas of pure gold glisten in the sun lights, there are buildings clad in colourful glass tiles, mural paintings with hundreds of human, apes, gods, castles; there is the famous emerald Buddha, a 700 year old statue carved out of a jade block and kept inside the monumental royal chapel. Short, there are so many colours and attractions that one is simply gaping in awe.
Another monument is the reclining Buddha, in a temple just south of the palace. 45m long and 15m high is the golden statue. The hall is filled with a strange, but nice dripping sound of people who constantly throw coins into metal offering baskets… really nice.
All this left a slightly strange impression, though. It was like seeing and still not recognising, reading descriptions and still not understanding. So many gods and goddesses, Buddhas, mythical creatures, giants… what do they mean? What could I learn from them?
Internet time’s over for today, sorry. See you again…