Friday, October 29th, 2021
5:17 a.m. Room 307, FIG Boutique Hotel
Kamphaeng Phet, Thailand
I had a very good day yesterday despite failing on both of my goals. My first goal was for that to be my last day in Kamphaeng Phet. I am supposed to be busy packing up and moving on to Sukhothai today. But I won’t be. The way I feel right now, I actually could. I have the energy after a good night’s sleep. But after my exertions of yesterday, I was tired, and I couldn’t contemplate the idea of being on the road the next morning. I thought I needed at least another day and a night in Kamphaeng Phet to recover and get organized. So, as I rode around town, I dropped by the Paradise Resort Hotel, and I was so pleased by what I saw and by the price that I decided to move there and therefore stay in town longer. I’ll probably stay there at least two nights. Three more likely. I loved the way the place was laid out. When you arrive, you ride your scooter into a large open area, and there are rows of rooms (like motel rooms) on the right, and then a big area of similar rooms and perhaps separate bungalows towards the back. It felt casual and free and welcoming. As I was getting off my scooter, taking off my helmet, and trying to wrestle my lengthening hair under control, a woman inside the office called out a greeting to me through an open window. I loved that. I felt at home.
The rooms seemed to have a standard price of 350 baht per night. That’s $10.50 US right now. And that is as cheap as rooms get in Thailand. They had a sign out by the street saying that their rooms cost 350 baht, and I was pleased when that turned out to be the truth. No bait and switch at the Paradise Resort. And I’m sure that the room will turn out to have issues. I remember reading that the mattresses are rock hard. And this is an older place, so furniture and bedsheets and pillows and appliances will likely be a bit rough around the edges, if they work at all. But I’m used to that. But the room they showed me was actually quite large. It was every bit as expansive as this room at the FIG and my room at the SOHO. I think they even serve a type of simple breakfast in the morning.
My other failed goal for yesterday was to shoot a whole bunch of short videos about a variety of places in Kamphaeng Phet. I fell far, far short of that goal. I went first to the Khet Nai section of the Historical Park. I intended to shoot a video there and then shoot a video at the nearby Thai House Museum and then do a tour of the city walls and then visit the temple across the river and even go to the banana market. In the end, I kind of accomplished two of those. I had a very good experience at the Historical Park. The only issue was that the sun was out in full force for much of my visit, and it exhausted me. I also had a funny experience where I lost a very important piece of my GoPro 3-Way Grip. At least, I thought I lost it. I walked all the way out of the park (a pretty long, hot walk), and just as I arrived at my scooter and started to put away my camera gear, I noticed that the main screw holding the whole grip together was missing. At some point on my visit, it had come loose and, I assumed, fallen to the ground. I thought about what to do. Without that screw, the grip is pretty much useless. And it’s an expensive and very useful device. Yet, the chances of ever finding that screw inside that vast park was slim. And I was so hot and tired by that point that the thought of retracing my entire walk through the park was not an enticing one.
But I decided it was worth the effort. This screw is actually quite large, and I thought there was a chance I’d be able to spot it if it happened to fall onto a convenient spot on the trail. I indicated to the woman at the ticket window why I needed to go back into the park, and I think she understood, and she waved me through without asking me to buy another ticket. And then I started walking. I walked all the way to the far end of the park, retracing my steps, and I didn’t see it anywhere. I was about to give it up for lost. But then I had a brainstorm, a brainstorm I probably should have had when I was still at my scooter. I wondered if this screw had worked its way loose while the grip was still inside my knapsack. Perhaps it had not fallen onto the ground at all. And this was possible, because while I was in the park, I had never actually extended the arms of the grip. I’d only used it in its smallest form, as a simple hand grip. That’s why I didn’t notice the screw was missing. If I’d extended the arms, I would have noticed right away because the whole thing would have fallen into pieces. But since I’d never opened the grip up, it was possible the screw was sitting at the bottom of one of the many compartments of my knapsack. I sat down on the trail inside the park and methodically went through all the compartments where I remembered putting that grip this morning. And to my disappointment, the screw wasn’t there. I was just about to pack up and continue looking on the ground when it occurred to me that there was no reason the screw had to fall out that day. Maybe it had come loose on a previous day, and on those days, the grip might have been in a different compartment of my bag. So I checked all the remaining sections as well, and I found the screw at the bottom of the very last one – the small compartment at the very front of my knapsack. I was so happy to have found it. So, it turned out there was no need for me to have gone for that long second walk through the park. I could have found the screw inside my knapsack while at my scooter if I’d thought to look. But I was glad to find it regardless. I have so much technology trouble that it was nice to avoid this particular problem.
After my visit to Khet Nai, I rode my scooter around the old city for a while just to create a breeze and dry off the sweat on my body and cool down a bit. I would have popped into an air conditioned cafe if there had been any in the area, but there were none. Then I went to the Thai House Museum. Unfortunately, it was closed. There was no actual sign saying that it was closed. But nor was there one saying it was open. But all the many buildings were locked up tight with all the windows and doors closed. And I saw a bunch of displays on the lower floor, but they were all covered in sheets. And I saw no one there at all. I wondered at the time if the place was ever open.
After that, I found a burst of energy, and I decided to follow through on my plans to circumnavigate the old city by following the path of the city walls and shoot some video. I started in the north-east corner at what they call a fortress. And from there, I rode the entire way around, stopping at various points that struck me as interesting. I had done this entire ride the other day when I did my time lapse, but this time I went much slower, and I explored more, and I got a lot more out of it. I’m hoping the video of this experience will be of some interest to some people.
But after this experience, I was too tired to continue. If I knew for sure that I was leaving Kamphaeng Phet the next morning, I might have forced myself to also visit the big temple across the river and the banana market, but I had already made up my mind to stay in Kamphaeng Phet even longer. And with the thought of at least one more day to explore, I decided that my visit to the Historical Park and the city walls plus a brief stop at the Siva Shrine was enough experience for one day. Once I made that decision, I rode to the Paradise Hotel to look at a room. And that was largely the end of my day. I was exhausted.
But to go back for just a second, I should note that I very much enjoyed my visit to the Inner District of the Historical Park. The woman at the ticket counter was very friendly, and she engaged me in some simple chatter about where I was from. I tried to learn from her how to pronounce Khet Nai, but no matter how many times I tried to say it, along with Khet Aranyik, she didn’t understand what I was asking her. I got the impression that Khet Nai meant nothing at all to her. Perhaps this name for this part of the Historical Park only exists online in one or two places and the distinction between Khet Aranyik and Khet Nai is not used locally. Not to harp on the subject, but this division of the Historical Park still strikes me as a potential source of much confusion for visitors. Or maybe I’m just a dummy. But the big sign at the entrance and near the main road reads simply “Kamphaeng Phet Historical Park”. A casual visitor could easily conclude that this was the entire Historical Park and never even realize that the main park was, in fact, somewhere else entirely. I think the signage could benefit from at least a small subtitle making a distinction between the two sections of the Historical Park. The English words in use are quite clear: Inner District and Forest District. Perhaps that could be added to the signs.
Though I get the impression that there could be a better and more descriptive name for the Inner District. It is clearly distinct from the Forest District. There are two main sites in the Inner District: Wat Phra Kaeo and Wat Phra That. And as I’ve read many times, these temples were “without monastic precinct”, which means that there were no living quarters for monks. Large groups of monks lived and meditated and did monk things at the temples in the Forest District. But no monks actually lived at these two very large temple complexes inside the city wall itself. The temples were for ceremonies and offerings, but no monks lived there. This gives me the impression that these were a kind of royal temple or special ceremonial temple, more connected to the rulers and powers of the time. A clear difference is that the temples in the Forest District were outside the defensive walls of the city while Wat Phra Kaeo and Wat Phra That were inside the walls and therefore protected. Perhaps that is the key distinction between them, and this Inner District would be better named as the City Wall District or, better yet, the Royal District.
I had three main takeaways from this Inner District: First, I was struck by the size of these two temple complexes. They were both quite large in scale, perhaps much larger than any equivalent temples in the Forest District. Second, I kept worrying about the very top of the various chedi. They looked just moments away from falling over or collapsing. I wondered aloud several times whether the authorities and experts were confident that these structures don’t need to be reinforced. And I wondered if there was discussion around the issue in terms of preserving the past. There is clearly a desire and a need to maintain these ancient temples in good condition. You don’t want them falling apart. But you also want to keep them looking in their original condition. You don’t want to renovate them and change how they look. You want to keep them historically accurate. But how do you keep them historically accurate while at the same time reinforcing the structure so that they don’t suddenly collapse? Or have they done that already?
My third impression was of the beauty of the collection of the three Buddha images at Wat Phra Kaeo. I had seen pictures of them, and I was looking forward to seeing them in real life. There is a serene reclining Buddha in front. And there are two companion Buddhas in a seated posture just behind, one on each side. I think it was just nice to see these three Buddha statues together almost as friends and companions. It felt like the two Buddha statues in the back were keeping the reclining Buddha company. And that is rare, I think. Normally, Buddha statues are separate and individual. There might be a hundred Buddha statues in a row, but each one is clearly separate and not connected to the others. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that regular Buddha statues give off an air of loneliness. They don’t. But they are always alone in tone if not in geography. It was nice to see a grouping of three Buddha statues that were clearly meant to be together as a set, kind of like good friends having a pleasant meditation session together.
After Breakfast:
I’m surprised at how busy this hotel is. They appear to have been close to full occupancy every night that I’ve been here. And the somewhat simple breakfast buffet is a beehive of activity most mornings. A lot of people are there. This morning was particularly active because it rained heavily, and there was a lot of frantic moving of tables and such things in order to find shelter. Something I’ve noticed about rain in Southeast Asia is that if you look up at the sky and have the sense that it might rain, it WILL rain. It rains every time you think it might. In a place like Canada, you can look up at the sky and see dark clouds and you might remark that it looks like it is going to rain. But it may not. It usually doesn’t. Only sometimes when you think it might rain does it actually rain. In Thailand, every time you sense rain might be coming, it does arrive, and with power. It’s practically a certainty.
And that’s what happened this morning. When I emerged in the breakfast area and started scanning for a suitable table choice, a woman that works there quickly set me straight and indicated that I should choose a table that can be pulled against the wall and underneath the roof. She pointed at the sky toward the rain clouds. On my own, I would have waited until the rain actually started to bother relocating. But this woman dragged the table under the shelter for me. And she was right. It rained, and it rained hard. It rained so hard that I had to keep inching my table and chair farther and farther underneath my shelter to avoid any kind of blowback. I ended up practically hugging the wall to try to keep my phones and maps and brochures dry.
The rain annoyed me, but I also just laughed at it. After all, I had already cancelled my plans to be scootering today. In fact, I don’t know that I will spend much time outside at all except for the time it will take me to pack up and ride from here to my new home-away-from-home, the Paradise Hotel. I’m confused about the name, though. It might be P. Resort. It might be P. Paradise Resort Hotel. I’m not sure if the P stands for Paradise or a different word altogether. Either way, I know that they have a rock hard mattress with my name on it (and potentially stinky water coming out of the taps). A small hotel adventure awaits me today.