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Saturday, May 5, 2012

Chang Museum

The real name of this museum is the Erawan Museum but when trying to get there on public transport I just got stared at when I said this but as soon as I said Chang (Elephant in Thai) people were really helpful. Chang is also the name of the beer I mostly drink while in Thailand so luckily I know that word.



The 3 Elephant heads is an impressive sight and I had seen if a few years ago on my way to Samut Prakan but did not stop to see it that time. The inside of the museum is also really striking. It has a large stained glass roof that has a map of the world and zodiac symbols.



There are 4 pillars going from the base of the 1st floor to the ceiling. Each of these is dedicated to a different religion, Christianity, Hinduism and 2 different forms of Buddhism (Mahayana and Theravada). You can see 2 of these in the above photo.



There are 2 winding stair cases on each side of a shrine in the middle. I found the use of soup spoons and I think soup bowl really interesting in the building. You can see the Elephant ears are made of soup spoons at the base of the stairs.



There is one level above the main room that has a number of Buddha images on display. I am not sure I was suppose to take a picture here but since I did I might as well share it.



I was not sure that the museum was worth the 300 baht (about 10 US dollars) but I took more pictures here than I did of anything else I visited in Thailand this time and am glad I went. The lowest floor was also closed when I was there so could not visit that part of the building. The basement is suppose to represent the underworld so you can say I didn't get to "go to hell" even thought I have been given this suggestion a number of times.

9 comments:

  1. Keith, where is the Erawan Museum? You must be pronouncing 'chang' correctly! If I had 100 Baht for every mispronunciation...well, I could certainly buy a few bottles of the stuff! But, beware the Chang beer, it IS notorious for giving you a headache, not even the next morning, while you're drinking it.

    Jok dee kha :)

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    1. Snap,

      It is officially in Samut Prakan but really just on the outskirts of Bangkok. It is on Sukumvit road about 2 kilometers south of the Bearing BTS station. I am clueless on pronouncing things correctly in Thai. I can not hear the tone differences in words at all let alone say them correctly. I think I may have just got lucky with saying Chang but I have said it a lot but usually with the word beer after it. I think I like the surprise with Chang beer. It seems like sometimes I can drink 3 or 4 and am fine and then another time after 1 I feel drunk.

      No don’t even have a personal twitter account. Is there a reason you would recommend setting up one for the blog?

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    2. Twitter is for those who want to drive traffic to their blog/website. So, it really does depend on whether you write for therapy/personal enjoyment and/or to build a business of some sort.

      I rarely tweet my own tweets, but have opted for Blogspot to automatically tweet whenever I write a new post.

      I also tweet other people's blog posts :)

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    3. I started the blog in the past just to share my trip with family and friends. I do it now just for my personal enjoyment.

      It would be nice to get some income or just freebies from the blog but have never seriously looked into it other than putting up adsense for a few months. I got a big total of 2 clicks in the few months it was up and decided I am not going to make money that way.

      What are the reasons you do your blog? A lot of the blogs I follow now I got from the links on your site.

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    4. We started Cooee for the same reason, to keep friends and family up to date while we were in Thailand for one year. Although, we started writing a few months before that, about a visit to Vietnam. It's also very theraputical and opened up a whole new world of blogging friends, some I've actually met :)

      I also have this *thing* about putting our experiences down in black (purple) and white...you never know, in 20 years time I might go back and relive our adventures!

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  2. PS. do you have a twitter account for your blog?

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  3. Wow Keith! Your photos are over the top! I love the brilliant colors when they are enlarged. Cool......

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    1. Thanks Lynn but honestly the compliment should go to my camera. I just point and click.

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