Past and Present, moving forward

So, this weekend was REALLY fun, since... we took a look at ANCIENT THAILAND!!

WOO WOO~!

After consulting with one of our trusted research colleagues, our group of 8 U.S. Chemistry students rented a van to drive about 1 hour north of Bangkok to Ayutthaya! (The places to see in Ayutthaya are a bit spread out, so I'd definitely recommend renting a van for the whole day, like we did - or, perhaps taking a bus there, then renting bicycles, or tuk-tuk-ing it!)

Just for a little background information, Ayutthaya was the old capital of Thailand, during the Ayutthaya period which lasted from 1351-1767, and was known to many foreigners as 'Siam.'

The city is actually a sort of island, since it is located at the junction of three rivers, and has the rivers surrounding it, like a natural moat - thus, apparently it is sometimes called the 'Venice of the East.'

Anyhow! I was super excited about seeing this particular site in Thailand, since it's known to have so many ancient ruins, and I definitely wanted to see some cool, crumbling Thai buildings! Okay, fine, that doesn't sound that cool, but, believe me... although there were tons of temples (that may have gotten a bit repetetive), we made some other non-temple stops, making the trip definitely above my expectations, especially...

because I definitely felt like I was living the life of Indiana Jones, and... that's pretty SWEET, I would say? :)

Let's get on with the photo's - and... I'll just show a few, here, and those of you who will see me in the states can just ask me for some more, in-detail shots that I took!

1. Wat Yai Chai Mongkol - This was a pretty cool temple, probably the one where I saw the most monks walking around! Complete with an outdoor reclining buddha, as well as this cool tall building (crumbling brick, of course!), that had a circular room with 5 or so golden buddhas at the top of it! And tons of buddha figurines, one after another...

2. Wat Tummickarat - More awesome than the previous one... This was more ruin-y, but you could definitely see the new-meeting-the-old. For example, this next photo, here. Firstly, I had some difficulty taking a really 'cool' picture of it, since there's actually just a normal 3-story apartment/office building right on the other side of the fence of it. Secondly, these stones lion/dog statues are crumbling (and indeed, some of the stone statue-heads fell off and were just sprawled on the grass!), but the people expertly (?) substituted some bricks to try to keep the statues together.

Hmm... I wonder who that weirdo is...?

3. Wihan Phra Mongkorn Bophit - Largest bronze Buddha image in Thailand.

4. Wat Phra Si Sanphet!! - Even cooler than the one before! This definitely made me feel like Mogli and King Louis from Disney's Jungle Book could just stroll in from behind a pillar and start singing their beloved jazzy jingle (my sister and I LOVE this song and at least try to sing even the jazzy scatting lyric parts...!!). It was AWESOME. we could walk all over the ruins and climb up the stairs... :D

Aww, why not? I love this song so much and feel the need to listen to it! hehe~ Here's fo you, Erika! :D

5. Wat Chai Watthanaram - the BEST site we went to!!! Not only were the grounds just huge, we seriously could climb up all over these ruins, too, and it was just... unbelievably beautiful and just, surreal that these ruins were still existing..

It was just, majestic, to say the least.

I was too scared to go up these stairs, since not only were they REALLY steep, there were apparently bats at the top of them!! haha~

We had a great time.