Wrote: Saturday, February 16, 2002 1:31 PM
I'm in Sukhothai, Thailand now. Sukhothai was the capital of Thailand for approximately 120 years. Sukhothai literally means "Dawn of Happiness". It is about 427 kms north of Bangkok and near to ChiengMai.
With coming to Sukhothai, I had visited the total three capitals of Thailand, which are Sukhothai, Ayuttaya and Bangkok. I was impressed by the Grand Palace in Bangkok, whose arhitectures are rich with Thai's arts. From the buildings, i can see Thai people's patience because the arts of the arhitecture need a lot of patience on designing and creation. The Thai government does a plenty good work on keeping its historical sites. Even though it is difficult to communicate with Thai because they can't speak or understand English at all, there are many tourism police standing by to offer help to tourists. Besides that, Thailand has managable train transport system. Therefore, it is not difficult to move from one place to another place in Thailand. No doubt that tourism is the major resource for Thailand. Beside train, Thailand has many kinds of transportation. There are local buses, travel buses, tut-tut, bisycle, motorbisycle-taxi, motorbyle-taxi and taxi. However, except train, the transportation fare for tourists is different from the locals. Perhaps they thought all tourists are rich and their currency is lower than other countries.
Buying things are not cheap for Malaysians in Thailand, as after convention, the price in fact is higher than in Malaysia. I prefer going to isolated areas than the popular tourism points such as Bangkok and ChiangMai. We can just see the original living style and food of Thai in the isolated areas. However, the place of staying is not so clean in the isolated places. Yesterday afternoon, while ireached Sukhothai and found a guesthouse to stay. I felt really disgusting while I found a lot of Monquisto's babies in the water of the bathroom that i should take shower. I was thinking that: My Godness, How am i going to travel to other countries that are more backward than here.
After visiting the two ancient capital of Thailand - Ayuttaya and Sukhothai and the current capital - Bangkok, i strong feel the need of studying Thailand's history after going back to KL. While visiting the historical sites in Ayuttaya and Sukhothai, i am really impress by the ancient grand buildings and big compound with a very nice views. I was trying very hard to imagize the ancient times.
I took many pictures. There are about 8 films of 36 photos i had taken. I'm going to Phitsanulok this afternoon from Sukhothai. I'm going to take train at Phitsanulok at 9 p.m. to Bangkok. I will reach Bangkok tomorrow morning at around 6a.m. I will make a visit to the Weekend Market in Mat-Chi, near Bangkok with carrying my back-pack. I can't imagize how tiring i will be with carrying my back-pack to visit the Weekend Market which equivalent to 7 football fields. After visiting the Weekend Market, I will stay in Khao-san Road again for a night. The next day, i'm going to take train in Bangkok train station on Feb 18(Monday) afternoon at 2.30 p.m. to Butterworth in Penang, Malaysia. I should reach Butterworth on Feb 19 at around 2.30 p.m. From Butterworth, if i could get a sit of the bus, I will take bus going back to Kuala Lumpur and resume work on Feb 20. If not, i will stay one night in Penang and try to get a bus ticket to go back to KL.
I hope the pictures i had been taken are in good condition afterdeveloping. It's a nice trip.
Last night, when i went to Sukhotai Historical Park, the ancient King's Palace of Sukhothai Dynasty, i met four monks from Sri Lanka, Nepal, Loas and Myanmar. I had the pleasure to meet with them because it was going dark at that moment. As i was alone visiting the wats, i followed at their back. We started our conversation after they noticed that i was following them. We exchanged our view in Buddhism Philosophy. They come to Thailand under a International Studying Master Programme. They are doing their two-year master degree in Thailand on Buddhism Philosophy. They speak English to each other. In fact, the languages that they can speak are more than me, one of them can speak 7 languages. We exchanged our contact for future opinion exchange. For me, it's really a pleasure and lucky to meet them in Thailand.
Best Regards,Hui Mei
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