Jafas in Bangkok...

For those of you who don't know what Jaffa means, it means "Just Another Fucking Aucklander" and it is some sort of a concept of young mid-class left thinking posh intellectual...or at least this is the closest translation of the french concept of "bobo"

Anyway...we found that in Bangkok, you don't have to run around the crowded temples to be "cultural", thanks to 2 monthly booklets about life in Bangkok...BK and Bangkok101.

Those are mainly expat oriented...but where we went, we only saw Thai...which I think is a good sign...albeit it might mean that there is some sort of a uniformisation of culture of the mid-class in every country...but this is no news.

We actually experienced that already in KL when using the metro...and I think if you go and take the underground (because in the poorest cities it is the more expensive way of transport and in richest citiest it is the cheapest...) anywhere in the world, you will see the same behaviour, clothes, haircuts...even if the faces are different...

So what did we do in Bangkok?

First we did a couple of touristy things;

Jim Thomson's house... because we love some much beautiful object and well built houses (plus we are looking for ideas for our home...sometime and somewhere...maybe in Norway?) (this is a private joke for Margit, and it will work for Fabrice and Lise too...;-))

[I seem to be in the mood for brakets today...]

Anyway, this was a beautifully revisited traditional Thai house, with a great garden, and the collection of this american architect, who created the trend for Thai Silk...

Suar Pakkard Palace, the former residence of a Thai Princess, who also renovated some traditional Thai houses and collected some beautiful objects.

We especially enjoyed the collection of musical instruments...I will tell you more about it, some day!


Fascinated by Wat Arun (Temple of Dawn) which overlook the canal and which we saw everyday during our "routine week", we payed a visit to this beautiful buddhist site.

On that day, there were some chinese people honouring their ancestors (their ash urns are below the seated buddhas), so the atmosphere was of encens and candle, praying and chanting...Nonetheless, the Thai people seemed quite relaxed about it all and there were restaurants set up inside the temple, kids playing around and loud techno music...


The temple itself is quite impressive; it's all covered in small pieces of ceramics. Some of it has been made on purpose, in the shappe of leafs or flowers, but most of it is actually plates or saucers that have been cut, or sometimes are used whole.


There is two explanations for these ceramics.

The first is that the people would offer their cutlery to earn "merit", thus accelerating their accession to Nirvana...

The other theory is that the Chinese junks used to come with all these cutlery as ballasts, then when loading with silk and materials from Thailand, they would get rid of the cutlery.

[I favour more the first theory, as spoiling something doesn't sound very chinese to me...]

The Khon Theatre

We then went, upon advice of our Bangkok 101, to a Khon THeatre show.

The Khon Theatre is a danced-masked theatre, which tells stories of the Ramayana.

The Ramayana is originally and Indian Epic, which has founded the mythology of most Indhu and Theravada Budhists culture.

For those who are interested (and Have Time), you can learn more about Ramayana on ;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramayana

The mask and moves of the actors are highly codified. The Thai public knew straight away who was who and what he was doing...It was a bit more difficult for us, althought we already know quite a lot, from danse, theatre, paintings, puppets we saw in Indonesia and Malaisia...

But the show is 3 hours!

There is another european couple in the room, and I can see the guy is sleeping...Romain is doing well, but I relieve him after 2hours...I just wanted to see the "Monkey Battle" before going!


Small decorative masks of the Ramakien (Thai Ramayana)

Photo Exhibition...

Style with our "Bangkok Jafa Guide", we end ups in a photo exhibition.

The exhibition is in a very posh galery, in a renovated colonial house...almost TOO Jafa for us!!!

The exhibition name is Interior, and it shows the inside of pubs, cafes and hotels a bit everywhere in Asia.

Some pictures are really good, and shows really well the atmosphere (like "Tyre shop Bangkok" and "Wheel Shop Bangkok").

For those who want to check it out ;
http://www.lalanta.com/upcoming/theinterior.htm

My favourite one is: Cave Temple Cha-am... but I think they should put more "private Homes"interior...these pictures are a bit too unpersonal for me...

Book Fair...

As a bookshop owner daugher, I had to check out the Bangkok Book Fair...

We were really impressed by the number of Editing companies in the exhibition, and even more by the number of people visiting.

It seems like a good sign of reading and education in Thailand...althought most of the books were didactorial (computers and english), mangas and cheep paperbacks, there were quite a few editing companies with good quality books (althought I couldn't really check the content!) and even some english editing about asian culture and arts...

Harry Potter in Thai...doesn't it look like a real sorcery book?

This is it for your Cultural Chronics of Bangkok...

Very soon, you will have Phnom Pen and Ventiane... 

06:17 - 7/04/2007 - Ajouter un commentaire