Buddha's Hair Loss

We are traveling in Thailand from north to south, visiting some of the places that were once the royal capitals. The Thai royal dynasties had a certain weakness for finding a new residence when they came to power. Nothing remains of the palaces and other houses (except in Bangkok, where the king still lives today), as they were built of wood. But ruins of temples and pagodas remain - usually very poorly preserved, I have to say.

I have already written a lot about the northernmost city, Chiang Mai. From there, the Kingdom of Lan Na was ruled since the mid-13th century, which remained independent until well into the second half of the 19th century, not belonging to Siam (later Thailand), whose roots also lie in the 13th century and in the city of Sukhothai - our second stop in Thailand. Inside the (former) city walls, there is very thin settlement (mainly with tourist infrastructure), most of which consists of a well-maintained archaeological park, where the temple complexes are located between many artificially created basins. Outside the walls, some locals live, many of them farmers. So everything is very quiet and idyllic, cycling is about as dangerous as in Laxenburg Palace Park. It is difficult to get non-touristy food, which we managed to do after a few attempts. And the Thai massage was also okay, not as good as in Chiang Mai, but okay.

Our trip from Sukhothai to Si Satchalanai was very nice, not a royal city, but a very similar archaeological park with many temple complexes. The downside is that I acquired an annoying bacterial skin inflammation on the right side of my face there, including a swollen, dark red eye, protruding cheek, and small purulent pimples - don't worry, I didn't take any photos, but I look completely forbidden, and this stuff burns.

Ayutthaya, six more hours south, is already close to Bangkok: somehow a mixture of Chiang Mai (insane traffic within the former city walls) and rather sparse settlement. However, there is no archaeological park here, but many separate, sometimes quite large temple complexes. The city center is overall larger than in 'our' other two royal cities and, unlike them, dirty (wild garbage dumps everywhere), but there are still traditional wooden houses in which people also live. We are staying outside the walls, but also in a lovely dollhouse-like wooden house on stilts (Roby can only move crouched in the bathroom). And there is a hospital here, where I was treated nicely (for about 1.30 Euros treatment fee) and which provided me with iodine and antibiotics in all forms for 3.50 Euros: tablets, ointment, and eye drops.

So far, our impression of the Thai sights has not fundamentally changed: The temples and pagodas are not only poorly preserved but have always been artistically - let's say - modest. There are always individual places that are fun, but most of them are disappointing (especially after Bagan). In Sukhothai, there are very good Buddha statues - many better than at any other place we have seen (including Bagan). They are lovingly restored, and if Buddha has hair loss, his pretty curls are 'transplanted' back. There are also a few beautiful temple complexes, and the archaeological park is idyllic. In Si Satchanalai, the temples are better preserved, often the walls are still standing, and so we could imagine better than in Sukhothai what the buildings looked like; there are also two really good temple complexes there: one that shows pagodas in all known styles of the time, and one with a beautiful pagoda 'carried' by many elephants.

Ayutthaya is the weakest, here they liked to build 'neo', comparable to our Ringstrasse in Vienna with its neo-Gothic and neo-antique buildings, the temples of Angkor (in the Khmer style) were copied centuries after their construction. Most of the time, it is not very amusing to look at. But there is also an authentically Ayutthayan complex, which is also very successful. It consists of three completely identical, adjacent pagodas and is surrounded by a ring of small pagodas. The highlight, however, is a very old Buddha (sometime between the 7th and 11th centuries), which somehow and sometime ended up in a much newer temple complex. And it is humid and hot here, you sweat just looking at it. Roby is coughing unhappily and is constantly looking for drink stands ;-)