The Chao Phraya River

The central organizing principle for my first proper day in Bangkok was the Chao Phraya River. The river bisects the city and feeds the many canals that cut through neighborhoods like so many veins and arteries. Before yesterday, I had no idea that Bangkok shared canals in common with Amsterdam and Venice. I learned about the canals after getting on a long tail boat with my sister, my mom, my uncle and his wife. We sped down the river taking in views of the city. It's a truly splendorous way to travel.

Our first stop was Wat Arun. An ornate Buddhist temple with considerable Hindu influence (lots of statues of cows and Gods from their pantheon), Wat Arun dares you to take a tumble on its pyramidal step formations. Near the end of our explorations of the vertiginous structure, I glimpsed a Buddhist monk working as a clerk behind the counter of the Wat Arun gift shop. This image inhabited me with a bemused sense of sweaty irony. I find it fatuously unsettling how easily Buddhism has taken to the highly commercial culture of modernity.

The long tail boat than took us into a labyrinthine latticework of canals enervating Thai neighborhoods that alternate seemingly at random between wooden shantytowns and opulent villas. Both types of domicile had Spirit Houses outside - small shrines that house the spirits that haunt our lives - because no one wants bad spirits to sleep in bed with them. We stopped at a large Orchid Farm populated by gorgeous airborne flowers. I looked up at the opal sky, overcome by delicate blossoms with the mouths of insects. This far off land of astonishment holds too many gifts to unwrap on a single two-week trip.